Spring Has Sprung!

Spring is officially here, not only by the date (the vernal equinox was last week) but I officially see my crocuses in the front yard, and we’ve already celebrated Easter. I guess one good thing about an early Easter, is that it’s only March 24th, and I could officially wear white shoes if I was so inclined.

We had a great Easter weekend, it was Spring Break for the kids here, so Jake was out of school Friday (well he was actually out all week being sick, but Friday no one else was at school either). We didn’t really do anything exciting on Friday, we were trying to give Jake another day at home getting better before the holiday weekend started. I took off a few hours early on Friday to do some shopping as I still didn’t have any new Easter outfits for the family. I was hoping to find me a new dress I’ve been looking for while but I’m just not finding anything I love. I ended up getting 3 new dress shirts and 2 new ties for Rob, some new shirts (that I can wear with my skirts) for me, and a cute suit for Jake; so we would be shiny and happy for church Easter day. Then I came home and made a shrimp salad to take to mom’s on Saturday.

We were up bright and early for Scott and Circe’s annual Easter Egg hunt, which is definitely (along with their Halloween Party) one of the highlights of the year. There are always tons of eggs, and all the kids can go completely fill their Easter Baskets. We feel very blessed that Scott and Circe put all the work into this, so that Jake is completely unaware that Easter Egg hunts that involve a bodily struggle with a bunch of other kids all for 2 or 3 eggs even exist. Jake thinks an egg hunt involves casually running about and filling your baskets with a couple dozen eggs in a few minutes. Back in my day you had to walk up a hill in the snow with no shoes, just to find one measly egg, and they weren't even “good” candy filled eggs, nope all that work for the hard boiled kid. Really Jake, and all the kids had a great time, and got enough eggs that the Easter Bunny didn’t even really need to visit. Thanks Scott and Circe for having such a fun tradition for the kids to look forward to every year.

After the egg hunt, Jake and I headed over to Grannie Annie’s with mom & dad, Nikki & Clint, Jeff, Jer and Jen, and Ryan and Jen; and a various assortment of kids for breakfast. Jake was pretty excited to have a pancake that was almost as big as he was, and of course I got one of their famous scones with honey butter. Yum!!! It's a good thing we only go there a few times a year. Although the guy behind us had a cinnamon roll which looked pretty darn tasty (he said it’s the best he’s ever had) so I may have to give that a try some morning. Rob headed up to get in a quick hike before the rest of the days festivities, and ended up changing a flat tire on the Mazda, so his morning wasn’t quite as fun as ours. Luckily all our car tires are under warranty still so we dropped it off and they gave us a new tire, and only charged us the $10 labor charge to put the tire one and do a tire rotation. I was never much into warranties, but Rob likes to get them and they have actually come in handy quite a few times, esp. the car warranties, and the warranty we have on the house (covers all the appliances & the heating and air conditioning systems, and we've used it quite a bit). Jake and I did a bit of shopping for birthday presents, and to get some last minute things for Easter dinner at home (I somehow managed to loose a 2 pound salmon fillet Friday, I have no idea how that happened, so I needed another). Then we all headed up to mom & dad’s for Easter lunch.

Easter is one of the few times every year that we still get together with all my cousins, and all of Uncle Marlin’s family as well as Shelly, Lynn and Sky’s family. Uncle Ken and Aunt Loretta were in St. George, and I'm not sure where Jodi was, but we missed them. We had the normally fabulous lunch, with turkey and ham, and all the trimmings. Mom also made her banana cake with penuche frosting that she used to make when we were kids. I liked it as a kid, but it’s been awhile and I forgot how good it is, I’m going to have to make that again, I think my Sunday School class would like it. Mom and dad also got a new trampoline with a big basketball hoop, similar to the ones they have at Cherry Hill, so the kids had a blast playing on that; and we also had another egg hunt (well actually we just skip the eggs, and go directly to throwing candy out for the kids to find). We had a great day, and Jake was out like a light the second we left mom and dad’s, which allowed for the Easter Bunny to stop early at the Crane house.

Sunday morning we were up bright an early to see if the Easter Bunny showed up. The Easter Bunny got tricky this year, and when Jake went into the living room where his basket normally is, he said "the Easter Bunny forgot to come", and all he saw was a trail of chocolate bunny eggs. Apparently the Easter Bunny hid Jake's basket in a different place, but left a nice ‘bunny trail” a la Hansel and Gretel for Jake to follow to his basket. The Easter Bunny was very good to Jake, leaving him lots of treats and apparently he had heard that Jake was really into High School Musical, as he left some HSM books, a new CD, a HSM towel, and a copy of HSM II movie. We had the traditional Easter breakfast of cereal and chocolate, and then had to hurry and get ready for church which started at 9:00. Thank you mom for letting me steal some brownies and some sugar cookies for my Sunday School class, we only had 3 kids there this week (I guess everyone was going places for Easter) but 3 teenage boys can pack away quite a few cookies and brownies. We had some nice Easter talks in Sacrament Meeting and it was a very nice Easter service.

After church Rob went on his usual Sunday afternoon hike and I made our Easter dinner. We had one of my favorite easy Spring meals: balsamic glazed Salmon, procuitto wrapped asparagus bundles, gorgonzola rosemary smashed potatoes, and strawberry banana trifle for dessert. I was super yummy, and a meal that looks impressive, but can be done in about 40 minutes. After lunch Rob took a nap, and Jakey and I watched HSM II (this was the second time for Jake) and then went and laid on Jake’s bed and listened to his HSM CD's, and took a short nap. Jake was ready to have a HSM marathon, but I was a bit High School Musicaled out myself.l Jake was asleep by about 7:30, and Rob and I ended the evening by watching a movie and Dexter (yes, nice Easter viewing there). We had a wonderful weekend.

Today Jakey was invited to go to the zoo with Circe, so he was pretty excited about that, and I’m back to work, and Rob gets to go hiking and then clean up the mess in the kitchen that I so nicely left for him after making Easter dinner yesterday (I do the holiday meal cooking, and Rob does the cleaning, it's a deal that works out really well for me).

It was also our anniversary yesterday which kind of got put on the back burner with it falling on Easter this year, but we’re looking forward to really celebrating the first weekend in April when we are taking a get-a-way weekend to Vegas. I'm really excited, our "vacation" to California was really busy, so I'm looking forward to a just sitting around relaxing with some nice meals, and tickets to see Barry Manilow (yes we're old and geeky). I can’t believe that we have been married for 7 years already, the time has flown by, it just seems like yesterday that we got married. I feel extremely blessed to have found someone that loves me completely for who I am, warts and all. I can’t imagine spending my life with anyone else, or finding anyone who brings me such joy, love and happiness. I love you Rob for all the hard work you put into being a good husband and father!!! I now a lot of the time you don't feel well and it's really hard, but you really work hard to keep our lives centered. You take good care of us, and always make sure that everything is nice, we have a wonderful home to live in, and be together in. Here’s to many more years together, I love you sweetheart!!!