Easter in Quarantine

One of my goals as we wind down the school year and head into summer is to post some of the backlog of photos of these past several months, particularly to update the blog with pictures of Bridget! She's already 3.5 months old and, while I've taken lots of pictures of her, I just haven't carved out the time to post them. (Sorry, Number 5!) 

We were sad to have to spend Easter on our own (as I'm sure everyone else was, too). But we did make it a special day of celebration. We sang together and listened to a dramatized recitation of Jesus's passion, death, and resurrection. I put together Easter bags (vs. baskets) that the kids dug into eagerly. They've been enjoying the games, chalk, dot-to-dot books, coloring books, etc. that I included. Jeremy found our saved plastic egg shells and hid jelly beans in those around the backyard, and the egg hunt was a thrilling part of the day for the four older kids. We read a few scripture passages and opened the last Resurrection Egg (the empty one for the empty tomb). 

Jeremy and I were a bit too ambitious with our Easter menu so spent much of the day switching off with Bridget and cooking/baking. The coconut cream pie he requested took several separate steps before we put it all together in its glory . . . but it was a bit too rich for our tastes, so I'm not sure we'll go through the trouble to make it again. (Maybe for Pa the coconut lover we will, though!)

Chocolate babka is always worth it, in my opinion. The kids agreed.

Jeremy grilled lamb shoulder chops and put together a wonderful herb-garlic olive oil for dipping it into. Unfortunately some of it was undercooked. But Jeremy and the kids remedied that by "toasting" pieces of it on forks over the candles. The kids would love to eat like this every night! It certainly kept them entertained (and eating lots of lamb).

To Josiah's great delight, we had mashed potatoes with the lamb. He ate mounds of them!

Our neighbors to the west are trying to sell their house, and they said we could have some of their rosebushes. Jeremy kindly transplanted five rosebushes for me--I think I'll remember them as my Easter roses! He put three in front of the lattice of our front patio. He edged the area with bricks and mulched it with some rubber mulch, and it looks so nice. I just hope the rosebushes don't die. The shock of transplanting was hard on those three, and the weather has turned so hot that I'm afraid they may not survive. We'll see. The other two are in shadier spots, and Jeremy did them later--and more quickly got them into the ground again. You can see the vase of the orangey-pink roses on our Easter dinner table. That bush is my favorite, but we also got two pink ones, a red one, and a yellow one.

The twins got new dresses in their Easter bags that they were eager to wear. They're looking so much older these days! Abby unfortunately rubbed up against something black (charcoal? the grill?) and marked up the back of her dress that very afternoon. I haven't been able to get it out yet.

Clara's favorite colors are yellow and orange, so she was excited to find this big yellow egg!

The four big kids did their egg hunt while Bridget was napping. 

I promise to post lots more pictures of our littlest one. I just didn't get a whole lot of her on Easter. But here she is--our little Easter bunny!--in her outfit from Aunt Anna, Uncle Justin, Kezi, and Willow.

Thanksgiving in Flagstaff

We drove up to Flagstaff the Wednesday before Thanksgiving for our usual Thanksgiving festivities with the Neuman side. The kids eagerly anticipated the time spent with cousins, aunts, uncles, and Pa and Grandma. We knew lots of snow was predicted, so of course, they were very excited about that, too!

A little snow falling on Mt. Elden on Thursday--but it didn't come down to us

Because Anna had to work on Thanksgiving day, we pushed our celebration to Friday. That left Thursday for prep work, baking pies, playing, and hiking. The predicted snow didn't materialize on Thursday, but the kids still had fun . . .

Clara carrying a big stick

Josiah

Lydia

Abby

Anna came up with and brought supplies for some fun crafts over the weekend. The kids loved making pom-pom pine cone ornaments and stained-glass-style paper stars to hang in the windows. The girls all really got into the crafting! (The twins have caught the crafting bug and regularly love to pull out supplies to make things here at home. Recently it's been potholder looms and Swedish paper cutting [scherenschnitte].)

Abby and Lydia with the pom-pom pine cones

Cutie-pie Willow

Crafting cousins

The snow finally came Thursday night. We woke up to more than a foot--and it was beautiful--and cold! The kids were so eager to don snow gear and head outside, where they tramped and made snowballs (mostly Josiah) and ate fresh snow and attempted sledding in Grandma and Pa's cul-de-sac. It ended up not being steep enough--and the snow was a bit too powdery. So they pulled each other around or roped Jer into pulling them when he wasn't trying to shovel the cars out.

Clara keeps up with the big kids pretty well these days!

Abby

You gotta watch out for this guy around snow

Jeremy shoveling

 

Lydia just lay in the snow and ate it straight from the drifts

Lydia

Workhorse Daddy

 

Abby and Lydia trying out the sleds

Josiah pulled Clara around a bit

 

Coated with snow and headed in for hot chocolate

We had a late, big breakfast together with Jer's home-smoked bacon and Justin's sourdough waffles. The kids ate . . . and ate . . . and ate. I think Elias and Josiah had close to 10 pieces of bacon each. They enjoyed their feast together:

Between breakfast and Thanksgiving dinner, the kids read books, crafted, played, got a little wild, and tried some sledding on the Pipeline trail. The sledding was only half successful, but they had fun. The wind and snow picked up and drove some of us back to indoors and warmth earlier than others. Jer and Justin stuck it out with Kezi, Lydia, and Abby for a bit longer.

Willow and Clara

Beautiful Elden

 

Abby climbing the sledding hill, and Josiah headed back home through the trees. Doesn't it look like Narnia?!

Pa and Grandma with their brood of grandkids--all 8 (until January)!

I'm so glad to be mama to these four--soon to be five!

We all pitched in to help make the Thanksgiving feast of turkey, bread, salads, mashed potatoes, gravy, and cranberry sauce, followed (of course) by pies and whipped cream. Clara discovered that she actually does like mashed potatoes, and Josiah about ate his weight in multiple servings of them--and still had room for pie!

After the dinner, we kept up our tradition--begun by Justin and drawn from his family's Thanksgiving celebration--of folk dancing. This semester during our homeschool co-op I taught our kids the Virginia reel, so they were eager to do that one with the relatives. Justin also found another couple dances that he taught us and everyone enjoyed. It was chaotic but so much fun!

Unfortunately Clara ended Friday night by throwing up. Evidently she picked up the stomach bug the cousins had had earlier that week. So she and I stayed back on Saturday when the rest of them trekked out to the Kaibab forest to find and cut down a Christmas tree. They reported that it was sunny and cold, with lots of deep drifts of snow. But they were all successful in finding and cutting down trees, and when we got back to Phoenix, we set ours up in the usual corner and wound it 'round with lights. We'll wait til a little later in Advent to decorate it. Currently it has a lone pom-pom pine cone hanging from a branch.

Poor sickie

Clara was on the mend by Sunday and feeling well enough to eat, play, and even go out in the snow for a bit. We stayed in Flagstaff through Monday and headed down the mountain around noon, managing to avoid the holiday traffic. Life at home is always a bit of a let-down after holiday with relatives, and there were many tears that first night at home. 

This was our last planned trip out of town before the baby arrives. We'll have a quieter Christmas here in Phoenix with Pa and Grandma from Flagstaff, and then my mom will come around New Year's to wait for the baby with us. 

Abby decided one day last week that she doesn't really want a baby to come, because it will be "so much work" for her. Then she decided it would be okay as long as the baby is a boy (we haven't found out gender, and I think this caveat is only because it means a boy won't crowd the girls' room more). But I think she's back to being reconciled now to the reality of the baby coming and the goodness of welcoming it. I am glad I have some older kids who are much better helpers than they were at ages 4 and 2.75 when Clara was born! I'm more excited about them enjoying the baby with us than just doing all the work, though, of course. :)

Happy Easter(tide)!

We got all of one picture from our Easter celebration, which included an earlier-than-normal service at church (at which Lydia wept when Jeremy and I went up front to serve communion); the traditional all-church breakfast (involving donuts and bagels, much to the children's delight); a drive up to Prescott; an afternoon at Lynx Lake with the grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins (so fun!); boating on the lake; an Easter egg hunt; lots of good food; lots of mud; a great blue heron; a sad leave-taking; and an exciting night of camping (in which sleep was interrupted by many bodies, cold, and coyotes). Whew! 

Hey, it's all of us!