I love Easter

We had a wonderful Easter weekend filled with family, fun and, of course, candy and eggs.

It started when we dyed Easter eggs for the first time with Lydia. Since the egg dye specifically said it will stain clothes/countertops/skin, we decided Lydia was better off pretending to dye a plastic egg in a cup of water while Derek and I tackled the real thing. She didn't seem to mind the substitution and had a great time.

Derek wrote secret messages on some of the eggs for me to discover when they were dyed.

On Saturday we headed to the St. George Art Festival with my parents. The artwork was amazing and it was the perfect day to be out in the springtime sun. Then we went back to our house for a cookout with my parents and my Grandma Grady.

Hanging out with Grandma!

Lunch on the patio

The bunny cake: A Grady family tradition

And what Easter picnic would be complete without an Easter egg hunt? Lydia woke up from her nap on Saturday to find brightly colored eggs dotting the backyard. She couldn't wait to get out there and grab them.
After she'd found them all and brought them back to mom and grandma, she wanted to find more. Everytime she turned her back Derek would re-toss a couple of them onto the lawn or place them somewhere and she'd get all excited that there were more eggs to find. She hunted the same dozen eggs several times.
Ah! I love how easy it is to please her sometimes.

The games we play

I'm sure I have said this countless times before, but I love the stage Lydia is in right now. In truth, I really have loved every stage. I feel fortunate to have truly enjoyed each stage, not wishing any of them away.
This particular stage, with her increased cognitive and physical abilities as well as her desire to communicate despite her lack of vocabulary, has me laughing all of the time.

She's a big fan of "beebees" (babies) lately. She has two little dolls that she mothers quite well. Here she is caring for her "children" by reading books to them, carrying them lovingly and pretending to sleep by them.
The latter has proved to be quite a task for me to learn my role in the process of putting her babies to "sleep." She empties all of her blankets out of her dresser, then hands them to me one by one and through a combination of jabbering and gestures I surmise that I am to spread them out on top of one another. She then places the babies on the blankets. Sometimes she lays down by them and I'm supposed to cover all three of them with a blanket. Other times such an idea is utterly preposterous and is met with a complete meltdown on Lydia's part at my lack of understanding what she wants. Trust me, it's a precarious position to be in when you're the interpreter of one who is truly speaking her own language.




A few weeks ago we visited a place called Creative Minds -- once with my friend Lila and her son Max, once with just ourselves. It is a darling indoor play place with a pretend grocery store, farm, castle, pirate ship, house, auto repair shop, wood shop, theater and more. There are dress ups in each station and all the props necessary to let your mind run wild. Lydia had a great time!






And what would life be like the spring in St. George without plenty of outside time? I absolutely love this time of year and I am loving that I have time to play all the games Lydia and I want to play. This is the first spring I've been working just part time and I continue to be so grateful that we are able to make this work for us. It is such a blessing to be a mom.

Biggest Losers

Well, we weren't the winners or the losers but my mom, Derek and I -- joined by Lydia in her stroller -- had a lot of fun participating in the Biggest Loser 5K at the end of March.
Although I was sorely out of shape -- what can I say, winter has been a difficult hurdle for me to overcome -- I was still able to run the entire race and only came in about 2 1/2 minutes behind my time last October when I had trained more effectively.

Before...

...during (I'm in the gray shirt on the right)...


After (trying to stay warm).

There were six past contestants from NBC's The Biggest Loser. For any of you who are fans, they included Sam and Koli, Darrus, Ada, Adam and Sara. (pictures below). They were supposed to do a Q&A after the race, but the cold rain got in the way of that, so they were just signing autographs etc. Not being on who likes to wait in line to talk to people, I just snapped a few pix from the side and then we went home to warm up.

Last days in the Lonestar State

{March 18-19, 2011}

Our last night and day in Texas included a pre-birthday party for Mike Sharp, a stroll around a lake near Kevin's house, lots of delicious food and an exhausting day of traveling.
It was a fantastic trip! The perfect balance of everything I wanted to do.

Mike's party was a cookout and pool party that included these fabulous cupcakes Karen made that looked just like hamburgers. Just one more reason my sister is amazing.

Looks like we pushed her pretty hard that day.

Lunch at an El Salvadoranian restaurant with Kevin and Leslie.

A walk by the lake.

Although Lydia did well on the flight, it was still a long day!