Easter Plague & Airplane Noises

Our ward Easter Party was all indoors cause the weather was too cold.  That made the whole egg hunt very loud and very crowded.  But we managed to make some fun memories.  They showed an Easter video that had lots of scenes from the crucifixion - a serious film and maybe not the best choice for a family event.  During the somber scenes, Scarlett (very loudly) turned to Jake and said "They don't show us this video at primary!"

We came home from the party and Siena started throwing up.  Then Jaide.  Then Scarlett.  Then me.  Then Jake.  We had the plague for about 5 days.  It was AWFUL.  The girls all threw up 8-10 times that night.  Jake and I only threw up once, thank goodness, but that was mostly due to my secret stash of Zofran from my pregnancy with the twirls.  Even after the nausea passed we were still so sick for days.  It's a bummer being sick and taking care of sick kids at the same time.  So much laundry.  So little energy.  We watched videos and lived off my "sick stash" of ginger ale and saltines in our food storage.  Luckily Jake and I hit the worst of it a day a part, so at least there was a semi-functioning adult to take care of everyone.  When I was at my worst, Scarlett brought me a flower that she made out of links - her own idea too!

Luckily by the time real Easter and General Conference rolled around we were all doing better (sans a few pounds).  Scarlett and I went shopping the day before Conference.  When we were at Target I realized that she was going to see what I bought for their baskets.  I had to decide if I was going to take her home then come back, or just let her see what we got.  I was too lazy (really still just recovering from being sick) so I decided to let her see what I bought.  I came home and discussed it with Jake and we decided that the Easter Bunny isn't something that we want to do anyways.  I mean, we will still give them baskets - just not from a random Bunny.  We do Santa.  We will do the Tooth Fairy.  But we decided that Easter will be more focused on the Savior's resurrection (and eggs).  It's funny cause if you asked me a week ago I would have thought differently.  But the chain of events led us a different direction.  So, if you ask Scarlett what she got from the Easter Bunny she might think you're a little crazy.

We steamed some eggs then dyed them using a kit I bought last year but forgot to use - oops!  (Do you like my yellow flowers in the background by the sink?  I was chatting with the cashier at Kroger and she gave me 3 little bouquets for the girls - for free!  How sweet!  I loved seeing them and being reminded of her kindness).

Then we shrink wrapped them.

I know that her face is covered a bit, but this photo of Scarlett reminded me of this other photo of me when I was in 2nd grade...

Instead of giving the girls all their treats and little games in a basket at once.  We brought them out one by one all Conference weekend.  It helped keep them preoccupied and happy with all the church talks.  Though at one point Scarlett said "I don't like watching this church show anymore."  I'm guessing the twirls agreed with her.  Though she did like that Pres. Uchtdorf looks like Grumple!  ;-)

When we were eating treats the girls all pretended to be baby birds and I was the mommy bird.  They would tweet (the sound, not the social media) and I would feed them a chocolate robin's egg.  Then I realized how morbid that game was!  haha!

We played lots of games - including lots of play doh.

We let the the girls hunt for eggs in the backyard.  We hid them over and over til they were finally bored.  I decided (out of laziness - a common theme that weekend) not to fill them with candy.  We ate most of the candy earlier anyways.  They didn't care and many of the eggs popped open on the ground, so I guess it's a good thing that they were empty!

Siena kept leaning forward to look for eggs - like those extra few inches really helped her search for them.  It was hilarious!

We spent the rest of the evening playing with the remote control airplane.

Scarlett has been really interested in learning about Heavenly Father and Jesus lately.  She'll ask me all sorts of questions or tell me random things, I can tell that she's really trying to figure out their role in our lives.  Like: "Does Santa need Jesus?  Does he pray before eating his food?"  Or: "God told me it was my job to hammer in these nails."  One time she came running into the kitchen yelling "MOM!  JESUS IS ON UMI ZOOMI!!!!"  Curious that Nickelodeon was including religion in their cartoons, we rewound the show to find exactly what she was talking about.  We started watching it and she said "Look, he's playing the drums!"  haha!  In her defense, this actor does resemble the painting of Jesus that we have.

We live close to an airport.  It's mostly little hobby planes that fly out of there, but a few times a day they have 747s take off.  And they are LOUD!  They often wake up Scarlett at night and scare her.  We've talked about how the jet engines work and why they are loud (poor girl being raised by two aerospace engineers!)  We've talked about how airplanes take people home to their families, like when we go to Utah.  But they still frighten her.  So we decided that we could ask Heavenly Father to help her not be scared.  The next morning. while praying for breakfast Scarkett said "and thank you that Mom could pray for the airplanes to not scare me last night and that I wasn't scared."  Then later that night she asked me to pray again for them to not scare her.  She's gaining her own little testimony of the power of prayer!  When she prays she asks Him to hold the airplanes so they won't fly over our house.  This week she said "and Heavenly Father, please wake your team up and get them out of bed so they can hold onto the airplanes."  I asked "Who's on the team?"  "Jesus and His friends."  "Who are His friends?" "The ones on Saturn - the astronauts."  Not sure exactly what's going through her head, but at least she knows Heavenly Father has figured out how to help her with the scary airplanes.

And finally, this video I took secretly - she didn't know I was recording.  I hid my phone and didn't do a good job of focusing it, that's why she is blurry... but I wanted to show you her new thing.  She "acts out" her prayers.  The actions vary, but usually there's a lot of pointing, flexing of muscles when she says "healthy and strong" and basically a lot of peeking to see who's watching her.  We've been talking about being reverent during our prayers, so she hasn't been doing this as much.  But I wanted to capture it because I thought it was cute.  And I'm glad she loves to pray.

I hope that my girls will always know that they can pray to our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ for whatever they need help with in their lives.  Even airplane noises.  #BecauseHeLives we are not alone in this earthly journey.  I'm so thankful for the gospel and what it teaches us of the Atonement and Resurrection.  HE LIVES!!!