Resurrection Sunday was full of family and friends and lots of feasting. After church, we went over to Ben’s cousin’s house and we ate. Then, we went to my mom’s house and ate some more. Don’t forget to throw in all the sweet stuff and candy filled eggs, I think we were definitely eating more than we were supposed to.

My mom doesn’t know the meaning of the word simple and when she plans for a meal, she goes all out. Always. In fact, my parents went to the port at 2am to get all the seafood as fresh as possible. 2AM!!! My parents are crazy! Somehow my mom has the talent to cook for 50 people all the time, when in fact there usually is only about 20 people coming, and all she makes is delicious. No joke. Neither my siblings or I got that talent of hers. She definitely has the gift of hospitality. Sadly, it didn’t rub off on me too much. I’m horrible at hospitality!

The girls got to do another egg hunt, we all had lots of fun feasting, and I had a blast eating crab. It’s one of my favorite things to eat. My hands get all stinky, I break shell with my teeth, and the juice splatters everywhere, but to me, it tastes so yummy. It was my request for the Easter meal. There was fried calamari, salmon, yellow tail, shrimp, mussels, and lots of fruit and desserts galore. We left with our tummies full, hearts happy, and very tired little girls. It was a wonderful day full of joy to celebrate the day our Lord has risen. We most definitely had a glorious Easter!

Sundays are filled with gathering with our church family, then hopping from Ben’s family to mine, so we made sure to do our own family Easter thing on Saturday. We went to Citrus State Park to go on a family picnic and do our egg hunt in an orange grove. Every time we have passed this park, True always wants to go and roam, but we never do, so we knew that a little time at the citrus park that afternoon was going to be perfect to celebrate Easter together.

It’s a massive orange grove, so we limited our eggs to one row and within 4 trees on each side of that row. Ben did a good job hiding the eggs and if we left some, then someone will get a surprise one day when they find it. The girls were totally into it, especially that little Glow. She watched what her big sisters were doing and she immediately knew what to do! It took us a bit of time to get situated after the girls ran around, Ben laying the eggs out, then doing the egg hunt, that we didn’t get to actually have our picnic. The park close time was earlier than we thought, so we had to skedaddle out of there. Instead, we drove down the road a bit, pulled over on the side of the road right next to the orange groves and had the picnic in our car. With 4 kids, you’ve gotta try and stay flexible when things don’t go as planned. I don’t always flex so easily, but this day, we all just rolled with it. Thankfully.

It’s a place not too far from us, so we’d love to go exploring more when we’re able to. Next time, we will be sure to allow for ample picnic time in the orange grove. Despite our picnic getting cut short, I think it’s obvious from these pictures that the girls still had the most lovely time. Wouldn’t you agree?!

I didn’t have any particular plans to celebrate this day, but True went to do an errand with Ben to a party store and she overheard the sales clerk telling Ben that tomorrow is St. Patrick’s Day and then her celebrating imagination ran wild! She came home jubilantly telling me that tomorrow is St. Patrick’s Day and how excited she was to celebrate it because she exclaimed, in these exact words, “I’m going to be rich!”

Oh my. She had these grand ideas that there was going to be some sort of pot of some sort of gold for her somewhere. Before bed, she even made sure to pick out her green outfit for church and encouraged her sisters to do the same. Well, this mama got in a little panic mode because I wasn’t going to do anything, but thankfully I remembered some pinterest ideas floating around that were easy and quick and that’s what I did. While they were sleeping, I taped up a little sign across their door, so they wouldn’t leave their room and wait for us. Then with an index card, I wrote a little note for each of them to follow the rainbow. The note was attached to a yarn leading them all the way to find their little bag of gold. The bag of gold was more like a couple quarters, dimes, and pennies, but I think it did the job. They were mighty giddy to have their bag of gold!

They even picked out a green dress for me to wear, but it didn’t quite fit, so green pants were the next best thing. I reminded Ben to make sure he put something green on too and we all had ourselves a green day. Ben and I are discovering that True loves holidays. Any kind of holiday! She just has a thing for celebrating and the fact that her birthday is next month is getting her celebrating spirit even more ready. Had we known that the kids were going to be this excited about St. Paddy’s Day, we would have planned a special meal with some green cabbage and potatoes. I guess next year this mama better be ready to give her kids a St. Paddy’s Day feast!

Do you do anything to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day?

on me: shirt, everlane. denim shirt, madewell. pants, urban outfitters. necklace, oh, hello friend. shoes, anthropologie. on the girls: soulie’s dress is misha lulu, the rest of the dresses are vintage, and target leggings for all. moccasins on soul and glow, c/o freshly picked.

We had a little celebration to welcome March. I made this cake again because it’s so good. I used fat free milk instead of whole (and a quarter cup less sugar) and it wasn’t as moist, but still good enough to eat. Obviously, if Soul was licking the plate clean, it definitely was still good. If that girl loves what’s on her plate, she will almost always lick her plate until it is completely gone.

Chocolate cake was a good way to ring in the new month! Actually, we also had a special family milestone to celebrate that day (no, I am not pregnant), so it was another good reason for indulging. The celebrate banner topper is from Lisa Leonard and the perfect little topper for our March 1st celebration.

Now, I have to admit that it’s dangerous to have that cake here because I keep going to the fridge to sneak a bite. I have a hard time resisting dessert sometimes. The girls loved their little surprise snack on Friday afternoon, and even Glow got her first slice of cake and she’s definitely a fan! This is definitely my go-to chocolate cake recipe. What’s yours?

A wee bit late in sharing, but things have been kind of crazy over here lately hence the light posting this week. I’m hoping our lives are back to normal next week, so depending if I get to it tomorrow, I may just bid happy weekend today.

This was our happy Love Day last week. I woke up to a homemade card from Ben and some flowers. Then, Ben gave all of his little girls flowers too. His mom is here, and because he’s such a sweet fella, he showered her with love too. We had little gift bags for the girls filled with simple things and they got showered with more gifts from both grandparents (my parents stopped by). You can imagine the day was filled with lots of sugary low nutrition things, but that’s okay in moderation.

It’s cute because the girls made presents for each other or wrapped their toys and used it as a gift. It totally is always hilarious when they do that. True had a present for Soulie, which was a pony doll that was Soulie’s, and then when Soulie opened it she was all giddy, excited, and jumping up and down. I don’t think if Ben wrapped up a pair of shoes I already have that I would be that excited to receive it again, but maybe that just shows my lack of thankfulness and creative spirit. Kids get excited about the littlest things and I need to relearn that myself.

Other than that, our day was pretty low key and simple. Ben and I did manage to put in a late Valentine date on Saturday evening and it was nice. Getting out was a breath of fresh air and a stress reliever. I can’t believe we’re nearing the end of February and I don’t think I have ever been so excited for the end of a month than this month. Our household has been out of sorts this month (for a few months really) and I’m hoping once March comes we can get back to our old normal. Whatever that was.

Oh and I still owe Ben a Valentine’s. We agreed to just make each other homemade cards this year, but let’s just say I’m a little behind. Total fail on my part, but I think I shower him with enough kisses everyday that he knows how much I love him. If I don’t come back tomorrow, happy weekend friends! Grandmama has been here for a week and a half and we will be so sad to see her leave on Saturday. What are your plans this weekend?

This was totally last summer, but it just came out in the newest issue of Babiekins. It was such a sweet little party to plan for our Bravey. She’s the one that can always be found dancing, so this party was especially designed with all the things she loves in mind. The best part of it all was that the parents came back to pick up their kids (it was a drop and go kind of party)  and they were treated to their very own special performance of Swan Lake. Check out the entire article here.

Thank you to Kimberly Genevieve and her skills in beautifully capturing our Bravey’s 5th brithday! Check out her talent here and here!