Happy Easter!

I'm a little behind in uploading pictures which explains the delay in my Easter post!  A bit of back story - three years ago, Nick and I claimed Easter as our holiday to host.  We are willing to travel all other holidays and given the size of my family, we definitely put on the miles but we wanted one holiday that we didn't have to go anywhere.  Easter has never been a big holiday with either of our families so we weren't disrupting major traditions by claiming it.  I also remember how much fun it was when grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins would come over to OUR house when we were little and I want to give that same experience to our kids.  Through all this rambling, a tradition was born.  We host Easter.  Just a side note, the first year we hosted is actually when Rich and Linda met my mom and dad for the first time.

We open Easter up to whoever wants to join us and this year was our largest gathering yet!  We hosted 18 people!

To make the day even more special, it was Miss. Madelyn's first Easter.  It was also the first holiday I felt like she actually understood something was going on.  Obviously, she couldn't really participate but she was so tiny and Thanksgiving and Christmas she slept most of the time.

Onto the pictures!

Prep started a few days before Easter!



Nick helped me by ironing!  Thanks babe!

Ben painted some eggs - no dye this year!

And I made this beauty!  Many many layers of jello.

Before you know it, the Easter bunny had arrived!

Ben's goodies

Madelyn's goodies

Happy First Easter!

Ben and Madelyn - it's tough getting a picture of Ben with his eyes open

Then Nick made breakfast while I set up the tables.

Nick made pancakes on a stick.  He is obsessed with putting food on a stick.  I don't know why.

I opted for scattered, small tables vs. one big table.

And then we celebrated!

Yummy food!

Munchies and drinks were outside

Rocking her first pair of flip flops!