Final Easter festivities

After church, Papa T & Mimi came by to bring the boys their Easter baskets. I think they could get used to all of these toys and candy....and Chris and I of course had our fair share of candy this weekend!

They were pretty excited about their money. Braden always says, "let's go to Target mom." :) I trained him well.

Thanks Mimi & Papa T for all the goodies! Braden has already watched both new Scooby Do movies. :)

After a morning nap for Ethan it was off to Chris' aunts for Easter lunch. When Carma and Granny are in the kitchen, it's all going to be yummo!!!! :) We had a great time and the rain stopped long enough for an Easter egg hunt.

Ethan caught on pretty quickly to what the objective was...he wasn't sure why he had to find these "balls" but he did it anyways. :)

Braden hurried to find as many as he could

Ethan enjoying his candy and sitting like a big boy next to Papa

More Easter baskets. These boys are spoiled rotten!!! Thanks Granny and Carma for all the great food, candy and baskets.

*What a wonderful Easter!! To be surrounded by loved ones, attend an awesome church service and celebrate the hope in Jesus! He is risen!! We are so blessed!!

Ready for Easter service

After the chaos of baskets of candy, we cleaned up and headed to church. :)

My handsome boys

Braden with cousin Izzie after church

The attempted shot of all 3 looking. hee hee

The Easter Bunny came!

The Easter bunny made it to our house despite the non stop raining and a late night out by the bunny's helper, mommy who was still adding a few details at 2:30 a.m. :) hee hee

Baskets waiting on sleepy boys to get up

Ethan had more fun shaking the eggs filled with jellybeans than anything else. :)

Braden was SO excited for his new superhero underwear. He kept saying, "how did the Easter bunny know I like super heros?" ha!

A sweet moment

Hilarious! Modeling his new undies that he had to put on right away. I said Buddy, we have to wash them first. He said, "but mommy they're not dirty." ha!

Lowe's build clinic

Chris and Braden went to Lowe's Saturday for another build clinic. This time they made a birdhouse that will go in the window-perfect! Matt and Carrie were there too so Braden got to build with his buddies Jace and Jacob.

Good work boys!

Coloring Easter eggs

Yesterday was the day to stink up the house with the smell of eggs and dye our children's hands for days to come. :) Braden had been excited to do eggs this year with his Star Wars kit.

Ethan isn't sure what we are about to do but he's thinking about getting excited. ha!

Braden gets busy...blue was by far his favorite color and instead of using the egg holders, he of course just used his hands.

Trying them all out

Ethan kept calling the egg "ball" and so of course he treated it like one. Chris was pretty good at catching a few of them, but several hit the floor! His eggs were a hundred crumpled pieces when he was finished "decorating." :)

Doing a little coloring

This one said Braden and Dad...of course blue

Blue hands for days to come :)

The beautiful finished products

Easter basket time!

Tonight Gma Cindy and Pop came over to bring the boys their Easter baskets. They made out like bandits! Lots of goodies and lots of yummy treats that mommy and daddy can't eat right now!! (we are on a "diet" type thing...it won't last though with Reese Cups on my counter). :) Thanks Gma Cindy and Pop for all the goodies!!

Braden, sporting his spider man gets ready to dig in. :)

Showing Ethan his treats

Braden was SO excited he got a new leapster game. He LOVES his leapster and has played his current two games non stop. He had been wanting the wolverine game so he was super excited to see it and played it until bed tonight.

Ethan loved his bat and ball and whacked it to Gma Cindy a few times.

Thanks for the goodies!!

Easter breakfast

Last Saturday a few of us took our kiddos to a cute little church in Charlestown for their breakfast with the Easter bunny. It was so cute and not crowded at all. For $5.00, they got an all you can eat pancake/sausage breakfast, they made a little Easter basket holder, iced and decorated a cupcake, had color sheets and tattoos and got their picture taken with the Easter bunny. You can't beat that. Braden hopped right up on the bunny's lap to no surprise and Ethan screamed his head off to no surprise. ha! Gotta love the classic screaming child on the bunny or Santa's lap, whatever and the mom snapping pictures. :)

Poor Ethan was just not sure about this guy!

Ethan enjoyed a little coloring...well some coloring on the table. :)

Good job Braden on your bunny holder!

Icing his cupcake

Ta Da! The licorice was the handle but kept falling down. It was an Easter basket-too cute!

Big stuff

Ethan is just getting so big so fast and just cuter everyday in his actions and speech. I love listening to him add a few new words each day. This age is SO fun! Everything he does is just hilarious to us!

He LOVES shoes just like Braden did. Here he is sporting my rainboots. :)

He also loves to unload the dishwasher. He takes out all the silverware (minus the knives) and takes them over to the drawer. Of course I have to reorganize a bit but he does a really good job. :) When I open the dishwasher door, he comes running!

Stitches Day 5-Out of the hospital!!

On Thursday morning, Dr. Lane came to the hospital to see Ethan and we decided he looked SOOOO much better. We were discharged pretty quickly and on our way. Ethan was pretty used to the whole hospital scene by the end but he was so happy to be home. Braden and I took him to Chillers to celebrate that he was out and well! He will be on antibiotics orally for 8 more days and we continue to pray that the infection is gone, gone, gone!! :)

Stitches Day 4

After a few rounds of the antibiotic, my little buddy was starting to look and feel better! I was so thankful the medicine was working. Praise God!!!! I know there were many people praying for our little guy and we are so appreciative!! Since there was still some redness and swelling, we stayed one more night to continue the treatments.

So as if we didn't have enough going on already, mom of year here helped Ethan get this nasty scratch on his face!! :( I had his sound machine plugged in and he kept pulling it out of the outlet. So I was putting the cord up on top of a high shelf with the machine and as I was doing it, he reached up and yanked on the loop part and the plug came down and scratched his little face! No one was in the room with us at the time but I still stood there and went "really?!?!?!?" out loud by myself! Sheesh!!! I kept thinking, if we get out of here without something else busted, it will be a miracle!!

Stitches Day 3

On Tuesday morning when Ethan got up he had redness around his eyes, on his forehead, and on the bridge of his nose. Plus the swelling had got worse. :( I definitely knew I was going into the doctor's office as soon as they opened...I didn't care if they all thought I was nuts. ha! You know in your mommy heart when something isn't right!! So I called at 9:00 the second they opened and left right away. As soon as Dr. Lane saw Ethan, before we even made it to the exam room she knew he had an infection. She got the admission paperwork faxed over from Floyd filled it all out and sent me on my way so we could get right in. I wasn't even sure at that point we would be there over night but it ended up being two nights. I was just completely in shock any of this had happened! How in the world did this happen? Dr. Lane said she has seen this with just a splinter or a little scratch...I guess bacteria could have got in at any time. She said it was a traumatic stitch up with so many of us holding him down...maybe then? Of course then we had to glue it...maybe then? Or really, even the germs on the slide I guess could have got in. Who knows? She said it was cellulitis, a bacterial infection. After googling it, I read it can be caused by strep or a staff infection so if Braden really had it, or Ethan, maybe that was a possibility. I guess we'll never know. Anyways, they put him on an antibiotic (clindimiacin) every 8 hours through his IV. Thankfully we didn't have to leave him hooked up to the IV pole at all times. I can't imagine that with this busy boy! Really none of these pictures show his redness and the swelling....I needed my good camera to show it but I wasn't really in a picture taken kind of mood. :) Ethan LOVED the two wagons in the hall. We probably took 100 rides! Poor baby was exhausted! My mom drove down the second she heard we were going to the hospital. She was a big help with entertaining Ethan. After a few hours, Ethan thought he owned this place! He'd hang in the halls with "his" wagons and his new friends the nurses, then cruise back in our room and back out again. It was nice because there were no other patients at all around us. Papa T and Mimi came to visit...Ethan enjoyed some cozy coupe rides with Papa

Then Gma Cindy and Braden came to visit. Ethan was missing "bubby." :)