Happy Easter! We are thankful for the miracle of Jesus’ resurrection and to be together to celebrate it.
On Saturday we bundled up to go out to Garfield Park where National Community Church put on a carnival type egg hunt, Eggstravaganza. It was raining and cold, but we still went out to play games, win prizes and get treats!
Bunny nose!
On the way home from church Sunday, we were talking about Easter. We’ve had more discussions about the cross, life and death than I expected. I was proud of her basic knowledge. But when we asked what Jesus did on Easter morning. She said: “He gave us eggs!”
We also did a Easter egg hunt at home and filled a watering can with gardening gloves and seeds to plant.
After Alyssa’s horse show, my parents and sisters wanting MORE crazy family time and were good enough to stick around for a whirlwind day driving around Sacramento, San Francisco and then dropped us off at Oakland Airport.
Our first stop was special for Aliyah: a museum. Aliyah had a great time (even though it was a bit disappointing for the rest of us) who explored the insect room, doctors’ offices, and even a play kitchen/diner area.
Then on to San Fransisco Pier 39 and the famous two-story carousel! Alyssa and Dad bought fares for all the ladies since we all wanted to go with Aliyah.
We had our clam chowder in bread bowls on the pier and then had to part ways so Aliyah & I could catch our plane to Washington. It was a crazy whirlwind day, but I was thankful for the awesome time spent with my parents, sisters and brother-in-law Jordan.
Last weekend Aliyah and I were able to see Aunt Alyssa and her horse Mahriza perform in a dressage show near Sacramento, CA. We loved being a part of the celebration in seeing Aunt Lissie ride again after battling health issues for two years. Mahriza & Alyssa must have been showing off for us because when we and several other family members were there, they not only had a great ride and scored well, they won first place!
**Update: After finishing the entire movie after this post, I thought I’d share that the last 30 minutes or so of Mary Poppins was not enjoyable to Aliyah. George Banks looses his job, has a life epiphany, and then gets his job back again. Nothing scary, but a bit confusing. Next time we’ll stop the movie after the hilarious “Chim Chiminey” dance sequence.**
For the past several weeks Aliyah and I have been driving in the car a lot, so to make the time pass, we listen to tons of music. One of her favorite is the a cassette tape to Mary Poppins. She has almost memorized every lyric.
After reading the Greer family blog, I decided that Aliyah’s fascination with Mary Poppins warranted a movie night. Aliyah has not watched tons of movies–as Jonathan & I are prudish and old fashioned– so this is a big deal. Jonathan ordered it from Netflix, we prepared snacks, and went to the basement. Aliyah loved seeing the characters that she knew only through music. She laughed hard seeing the silly dancing penguins in Bert’s tap dancing sequence. This may have to be one of the cherished family movies.
Antares Boyle, a friend of mine from University of Maryland, and I put on a faculty recital together at Fresno State. We picked some exciting (and HARD) music. She arrived by Greyhound on Friday afternoon. We crammed more practicing in than I thought possible with the help of my mother who watched Aliyah throughout the weekend.
I was very proud of how it went and was attended by great friends and family from all over California. Aliyah was great through the entire 2 hour recital, being passed between Nana, Lyssie, Gramma, and maybe even Papa and Grandpa. She even got to sit in the sound booth with all of the buttons!
At the end of the recital, as we were taking bows, I heard “Good job, Mommie!” Then Tara and I did a quick silly encore and she yelled again: “You guys are SILLY!”
A few weeks ago Nana & Papa took all three of us to the Monterey Bay Aquarium while Jonathan was in town. We all had so much fun! The Aquarium is absolutely amazing and so great for kids. There is an awesome aquatic petting area where we spent oodles of time watching Aliyah pick up starfish, sea lettuce and a hermit crab.
Aliyah is thrilled by the waterfall! This is a glass enclosed area that they splash sea water over every few seconds.
Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory was down the street and we also ate way too much chocolate!
Eating chocolate covered strawberries!
Aliyah also loved the toddler play area. Here is a video of her jumping around on a water mattress. One nearly two year old wanted to show how excited he was to see her…
