The children woke up Saturday to find that the Easter Bunny had hidden (and filled) their baskets. They were most excited with the new books and sunglasses in their baskets. And I was most excited about the extra half hour of sleep afforded me while they searched for their baskets~ so we were all happy! :)
Sunday morning, we donned our new Easter outfits (thank you Oma and Opa!!) and headed to church.
After church, we decided to take a walk on the beach. It was cold and windy, but beautiful!
Of course, I had to take advantage of my children all being dressed up at the same time, so I snapped a few more pictures. It was a bit too sunny, though, as Grins' face reveals.
We had a lot of fun 'exploring'....
....and climbing....
....and snuggling... (It was cold!)
....and of course, posing. (Angel is a born model. She LOVES photo shoots and kept posing for more after I had planned to be done.)
Then we enjoyed a wonderful dinner with friends. Saturday, we enjoyed an easter egg hunt at church, which was also lots of fun!
Wiggles didn't bring any candy home - she had eaten it long before we left the building. Fortunately, she didn't find too many eggs or she might have been sick!
I LOVE that Thanksgiving comes right before Christmas! I adore Christmas, truly! But unfortunately I feel it often turns into a commercial, self-serving holiday (wish lists, visits to Santa to tell him what I want, etc.) such that the true meanings of the holiday (peace, joy, love, generosity, etc) play a less-significant role than they should. So, I find it especially meaningful that Thanksgiving comes in at just the right moment to remind us of ALL we have to be grateful for. Because remembering our blessings is a GREAT cure for (what we like to call) the "gimmies"!
We often put up little "hand" turkeys with things we are grateful for, but this year we decided it would be fun to make a chain, and to see how long the chain could be. Could it be taller than Daddy? Taller than the ceiling? Taller than the HOUSE? (this is a very exciting concept to a 4 year old - something larger than a house!) Each link in the chain contained something for which our family (or a member of our family) is grateful. This is what we came up with in our first 5 minutes (currently taller than the ceiling - we will need to revisit it this week to reach our 'taller than the house' goal). In the order in which they were shouted out by excited family members: (And I have to say, our children really impressed us in their creativity! We asked them to think beyond the standard answers....and they certainly did!)
The Temple
Books
Skype (Grins! - He loves skyping family!)
Repentance
Spell check
Ears
Stickers
Prayer
Church
Eyeballs
REAL maple syrup (not the corn syrup kind!)
Computer
Crepes
Toys
Love
Daddy
Water
Mommy
Bums (We thought Grins was just being silly here but he explained that, if we didn't each have a 'bum', we wouldn't be able to rid our bodies of waste....which would make us sick.....which would be bad. So we honor the submission. lol.)
9 years ago today I married my best friend and sweetheart. I thought our first year of marriage was wonderful, but that was only the beginning! The Mr. has been the picture of a (nearly) perfect husband from day one and, though we've had our ups and downs like any couple, things just keep getting better!
I could go on all day about what I love about The Mr. and our marriage, but due to lack of time because of the beautiful life we've created together :) I'm going to keep it short and sweet:
9 Things I love about The Mr.
1. He is an amazing father. Our children adore him, and I adore watching him with them!
2. He is the most supportive husband I've ever known. He supports my every whim, even the silly ones, without even rolling his eyes! :)
3. He is so gentle. He has never once raised his voice at me.
4. He is the hardest worker I have ever known. This is saying something, because I was raised by 2 incredibly industrious parents, so I know hard work when I see it!
5. He is incredibly strong. Seriously. As in, several people have asked him if he takes some sort of supplement (or steroids). No joke.
6. He loves the Lord. He cares far more about pleasing God than man.
7. He is so patient. With everyone, but especially with me.
8. He is constantly trying to better himself. Spiritually, academically, physically, etc. Amazing!
9. He is gorgeous. I know, petty, but let's be honest, my husband is a looker! (I have even had several friends comment on this fact so I know I'm not just biased!)
Thank you for the past 9 years, our beautiful children, and our incredible life together. I love you. Here's to 99 more!
I'm obviously behind on my game this year....I normally have my Christmas Cards sent out on the day after Thanksgiving (or nearly, at least), but Christmas is tomorrow and I'm just sitting down to write our now! Yikes!
Of course it's due to procastination on my part, but I'm blaming it primarily upon the inability to come up with a good idea. You see, I loathe the typical "look at how wonderfully perfect our family is and read about all the many amazing things we've accomplished this year" letters that seem to go around.**(please see end note) Not that I'm not excited for everyone's prosperity, it just gets a little old after awhile, and I start feeling more like a dean on an admissions committee than a friend interested in how her long-distance friends are faring. So, when the Mr. and I were married, we decided to send out creative, (somewhat) unique letters, to get our point across without bragging all about our wonderful selves (even though we know we're wonderful, of course.) :)
So far, we have tried the following:
2001 - Wrote our own lyrics to the tune of "Good King Wenceslas" 2002 - Listed tidbits starting with the letters in MERRY CHRISTMAS 2003 - Crossword puzzle 2004 - "Quickie" Letter about how not much had changed.....except our impending parenthood! 2005 - A letter in Angel's words 2006 - Calendar of Important Dates that year 2007 - "MasterCard Commercial" style letter; all about our 'numbers' that year (how many miles the Mr. ran, how many diapers I'd changed, etc.) 2008 - A plain-old-boring letter {Sigh.} Bear in mind, though, that my baby was only 1 month old at Christmas, so I was slightly preoccupied.
Unfortunately, this year, thanks to residency essays, primary sharing times and preschool lessons, my creative juices are currently spent. So, without further adieu, here's our Family's 2009 version:
This year we're "Going Green" and sending out e-cards to preserve our environment!
Investing lots of time and effort in learning the practice of medicine. (The Mr.) Never wanting to miss a moment with our kids! Counting our blessings: each other, beautiful children, wonderful family and friends, a great place to live, our health, our educational opportunities....and too many more to list! Recognizing the Lord's hand in our lives every day! Enjoying preschool, learning to read, write, and developing a love for learning! (Angel and Grins) Developing her own little personality while she RUNS around exploring (translation: gets into everything)!!! (Wiggles) Interviewing for Internal Medicine Residency (The Mr.) Blogging about our adventures as often as we can. (The Mrs.) Loving everything about our life! Excitedly anticipating what lies ahead (moving, beginning residency, starting a "new chapter" in our lives....)
Merry Christmas, from our family to yours!
P.S. Since our family has moved, we wanted to be sure you had our new contact information....but write it in pencil since we'll be moving again in May (when the Mr. Graduates and we move anywhere from Hawaii to Maine to anywhere in between.) We'll send an update in March when we learn where that will be, but until then, we wish you PEACE, JOY and the reminder of our Savior and His love for us all....this holiday season and always!
All our love, The Buchanan Family
**I am in no way implying that "regular" Christmas letters are bad/boring/unappreciated/etc!!! I LOVE hearing from friends and I don't think many of my own personal friends - such as readers of my blog - have bad letters at all! I am just afraid my own Christmas letters would turn into a little brag session if I didn't try to do something different, since I'm so proud of my kids (of course.) So, pardon my annoyance at some Christmas letters - it was certainly not directed at, nor does it apply to - anyone reading this!!! :)
So, I know I'm a complete dork, but I love dressing my kids up for Halloween in something that goes together. I just think it adds to the effect when there's more than one person. Angel and Grins, for example have been:
Salt & Pepper Shakers A Flower and a Bee Raggedy Anne and Andy A Prince and a Knight (Angel's idea, of course, but Grins loved the sword!)
Now that we have 3 kids, though, things are getting a bit trickier. I need a really good idea for a "threesome" they can do for Halloween. I've thought of the 3 Stooges or the 3 Musketeers but those just don't seem cute for kids (and they wouldn't even know what they were). And the 3 little pigs or 3 bears might work - but aren't super exciting. Any brilliant ideas out there? If you can come up with a winner, I'll give you a whole bag of Halloween candy to use any way you want - you can pass it out on Halloween and save yourself a few bucks, or you can hoard it all to yourself and I won't tell a soul. :)
Easter weekend was beautiful; though a bit on the chilly side, at least it didn't snow, and the sun even graced us with it's presence for a few hours!
Saturday, the Mr. was at the hospital (what's new?) so I took the kids to a local Easter Egg hunt. The sign said "10am sharp" and they weren't kidding - they had all the kids stand behind a ribbon at at 10:00 on the dot they cut the ribbon and let 'em all loose. I'm not sure how many kids were there, but the hunt lasted all of about 90 seconds - if you blinked you probably missed it. Lucky for us we were on time for once. The 'big kids' were fast, seasoned 'egg-hunters' and therefore scored most of the goods but fortunately my kids were content with their 3 eggs each just for the novelty of it all. (I'm glad they aren't yet to the stage where everything has to be exactly "fair"!) The thing that thrilled them most of all was the real, live bunny someone brought (on a leash!) - Grins was convinced it was the Easter Bunny himself! Wiggles enjoyed the hunt because I carried her in the front pack and let her have her binkie the whole time; she was in heaven!
Sunday, the children woke up before dawn even thought about cracking (a new trend these days....super!) Because it was a holiday, and to allow myself a shower, I let them watch "He is Risen" which they of course enjoyed since screen time is such a rare treat. We ate a quick breakfast and then donned our easter finery and headed off to church - the only TRUE way to celebrate Easter, I would say, it symbolizing the Resurrection and all.
We came home from church and found that the easter bunny had left some 'goods' which the children were of course thrilled about! Then we headed to Oma and Opa's house for Easter dinner. For dinner, we made 'easter tomb biscuits', in which you wrap a marshmallow inside a piece of biscuit dough and then bake; the marshmallow symbolizes Jesus' body, and the biscuit is the tomb. We also sprinkled butter, cinnamon and sugar on top, symbolizing the oil and spices with which Jesus' body was annointed. When an uncle asked why we were adding spices, Grins answered "So the body doesn't STINK!" After baking the biscuit, you open it to find the 'tomb' empty. Angel and Grins were a bit disappointed that their favorite part of the biscuit had disappeared, despite our reminding them "He is not here, but is risen!" Finally, Grins got it and said "Did Jesus melt?" We got a kick out of that. I've decided that, with my little loverlies around, there is never a dull moment! I truly don't know what I would do without these sweet little angels in my life! I am SO grateful for Easter and what it means to me to know that, because Jesus was resurrected and lives again, death is not the end. That knowledge is truly the greatest gift I've ever known, and I can't imagine living without it - especially now that I have such precious children whom I so dearly love!
Thursday, January 31, 2008
Since I don't have enough blogging friends of my own to do a swap (nor do I really have the time/energy/motivation), but I do enjoy a swap every now and then, I thought I would post about one a fellow blogger, Erica Grover, is putting on (to see her blog, click here. If you have never heard of a swap, it's basically a bunch of people swapping names (the "hostess" if you will assigns the partners and coordinates it all) and then sending one another little packages. Just a fun way for us adults to get some of our own holiday cheer since we're usually the ones GIVING (I know, I know, "tis better to give than to receive...", but you have to admit, it IS still fun to receive!) I don't participate in swaps very often but what I love about this swap is that she says "focus more on the simple and creative than on monetary value." Being the wife of a med student, that, to me, is key! :) So, I thought I'd spread the word in case anyone out there is interested. Click here for more details and to sign up. Happy Swapping!
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