HoPpY EaStEr

"He is Risen; he is not here." Mark 16:6

 

"I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me, though he may die, he shall live. And whoever lives and believes in Me shall never die."
John 11:25-26

 

 

All week long at school, Holden has been coloring and painting pictures of Jesus and telling us through his crafts the story of Easter.  I love that not only do we get to read and share these stories with him at home, but that he also hears of Jesus' love for us throughout the day.  We are very fortunate to have found such a wonderful and loving school for our little man.

 

Holden has had a busy week.  We started "practice" egg hunts in the yard this past weekend, he had his Easter Egg hunt and celebration at school on Thursday, work up at the crack of dawn this morning so he could see what the "e bunny" brought him, church and then Easter lunch, another basket of goodies and another egg hunt at Grammy and G-Pa's.  It's no wonder he crashed in the car on the way home today, too bad he decided that the 30 minute cat nap he took on the way home was enough, cause Mommy and Daddy sure could have used a little snooze.  But, instead, we have been hiding eggs again, we have colored in the new book the Easter bunny brought him, we're opening all his eggs and seeing what's inside (I took all the goodies out and put them up in the snack bowl, which he already ever gets), but he knows that they had goodies in them this morning and wants Mommy to put them back.  The cycle continues.

 

Andy, Holden and Harrison

Little stinker

 

Family of 3 for a few more weeks

 

Reading with mommy while the "Easter" bunny hides the eggs

On a mission.

Oh, here's one in the bushes.

Checking out his loot

It's too bright Mommy!

It's time to put the Easter eggs and baskets up til next year.........of course that's once Holden decides that he's done hunting for the year.  Until then, we'll keep hiding the same eggs over and over and over.

Hayes' Nursery

So we finally got most of the nursery completed.  There are a few pieces that we're still getting together, but its coming along nicely.  We started by painting one accent wall, hung a few shelves and decor and it will all be complete when Baby Hayes is here!

 

We're still working on where to put everything and Big Brother Holden has been a BIG helper.  He has helped Daddy hang things!  Really, he has.  He's helped Daddy find studs, used his hammer and screwdriver on almost everything in the room.  Not much Big Brother wont be able to help with it seems.

 

 



Hayes' Baby Shower

What a wonderful shower we had last weekend.  I feel so very fortunate and blessed to have so many amazing friends!  It was great celebrating and getting ready for Hayes' arrival.  And the hostesses did such an amazing job with everything!  I was over the moon excited for the shower and even more so when I arrived!  They did awesome.  One of the most exciting aspects was that I had been struggling to find just the right decor for his room and low and behold, the shower decor was every perfect piece that would make the nursery complete!  And of course, there were many other things that were awesome as well, the ladies that joined us of course, the snacks, games and THE SURPRISE!  You'll have to wait on that one......

My lovely hostesses: Cari, Kim and Bekah

And Baby Hayes got some really cute stuff, many of which were handmade with love!



 

 

And after the fun games and presents, they made me wear this..........now one could speculate that my friends had some "entertainment" planned for me, but knowing me, they thought their surprise would be much better......

 

And of course when I took the blindfold off, I was overwhelmed, as I was NOT expecting such a wonderful and thoughtful gift!  Thank you everyone so much!

This picture doesn't show the entire thing, but my boys are now the proud owner of a double jogging stroller.  And we couldn't be happier.  I cannot wait for Hayes to get here so that we can all go to the park and on walks/jogs together.  I even already tried it out, borrowed my friend Darcy's little girl Elin and took it out for a spin.  PERFECT!

Thank you everyone again for helping us get ready for the newest member of the Hunt Family, we are over the moon with joy and excitement about this new adventure we will soon embark on, a newborn and a 2-year old.  Should be fun times and many memories to come.

 



My Valentine

Valentine's Day is one of those holidays that I have grown to not pay much attention to.  Don't get me wrong, I will always make sure the boys have lots of fun crafts, goodies for school, etc.  But I think that I have come to realize that I'd rather get flowers one a random day when I know that Chuck has a random reason for thinking of me and showering me with nice things.  However, it was a very nice surprise to get the sweetest card for Chuck.  I don't think he could have picked a better card.  Heart!

But this year was super fun cause Holden got to participate in his first "Valentine's Day" party at school.  They made little bags to hold all their goodies, had juice and cupcakes and got to take home 2 goody bags full of treats.  In addition, he made Mommy and Daddy a Valentine's day card, a homemade gift with his hand print and Bible versus they have been studying and Mommy bought a "Color Me Mine" holiday plate that Holden got help making for us to keep as a momentum of his first Valentine's day at Castle Creek.

The best gift of all this year, was knowing that I have the sweetest little boy who has the biggest heart for a 2 year old. He is just the most loving and caring little boy. Even all his new teachers and the director say that his demeanor is so sweet and calm. I'm so proud of the little man that he is becoming and cannot wait to see him interact with his baby brother.

We like to have fun too.  Can you tell Holden is in the phase of mimicking everything that someone else is doing??

Busy Bee's

The past few weeks have been pretty busy for us.  First, we received Holden's big boy furniture for his room, so that we could use the baby furniture for Hayes.  This seemed to get the ball rolling on my "nesting" kicking in.  We had ordered Hayes' bedding a few weeks back (pics to come once everything is all together in the nursery) but it really didn't dawn on me then that we had a TON of work to do before we could even start getting Hayes' room ready.

So, fortunately, I was on a work trip to Boston when Holden's new bedroom furniture was delivered.  It just so happened that Chuck happened to have a day off that week, so he and a friend planned on moving all of our guest bedroom furniture into the garage, moved all the boxes that I had previously packed, up into the attic for storage and moved our treadmill into the office.  Because I was out of town and hadn't washed the big boy bedding that I bought for Holden, Daddy decided it was probably best to leave Holden in his toddler bed until I got home versus trying to get him to go to bed, while his toddler bed was relocated to baby brother's room.  So I came home to having to wash bedding, help Daddy build Holden's bunk beds and get him re-adjusted to sleeping in his new, cool, big boy bed.

Did I mentioned that Holden would need to "adjust" to his big boy bed????

 

I don't know about you, but it doesn't look like he needed to "adjust."  With the exception of us having to rig something to keep him from climbing from the lower bunk to the stairs of the bed, which is NOT how it was intended to be done, he has done awesome.  We installed the toddler railing just to be sure he doesn't fall out until he is comfortable with the new bed too.  And he does climb the stairs, but has not tried to get on the second bunk and we still have it blocked so he can't get to it anyway.  I haven't taken any pics of the new set up yet, as it is still a work in progress. We still need to hang is new valance, mount the TV on the wall and move around his toys/toy box once we get everything situated.  But we no longer have any of the nursery furniture in the room, the glider is out and things are coming along.

This past weekend I cleaned Hayes' room, painted the accent wall behind his crib and placed the furniture where I want it.  I also had a friend come over and we played "amateur photographers" for the afternoon.  Much to our surprise the maternity photos turned out awesome and I am very happy with them.  I'll post those in a few weeks after the baby shower, gotta keep some things a surprise.

Despite all the work going on inside the house, we have found a little time to enjoy the beautiful weather that we have been having here and there.  Daddy put Holden's baseball tee together a few weeks ago, and not that I'm bragging, but I think we have an All-Star/Pro baseball player on our hands.  He's pretty good for a 2 year old.  Makes contact with the ball every time and hits it hard too.  Daddy is also very proud of the fact that Holden, although does everything right-handed, picked up the bat and has been hitting left-handed.

We've also enjoyed some other activities indoors, its not all nesting 24/7.

 And we have to go have breakfast at Old West Cafe when Daddy is off on Saturday's.  He LOVES their pancakes!