I'm sure by now that some of you have to be wondering whether or not we have fallen of the face of the earth, but rest assure we haven't. Unfortunately the past couple of weeks Bruce, Brinley and I have all had the sniffles. Bruce's orignally started a few weeks ago, then Brinley came down with her case about a week and a half ago, and then I finally started mine last weekend. After a couple of days of sneezing, runny noses, congestion, and sore throats I went down to the local Rite-Aid and picked up some Zicam and Emergen-C for Bruce and myself, as well as some throat drops, kleenex, tylenol and the like to replenish our supply. After all that, Bruce ended up acting like most men (stubborn as a mule) and decided not to take the Zicam and Emergen-C...that he didn't
need it. Well, just for the record, guess who is completely well and guess who isn't...
Anyway, under normal circumstances, I would have cooked us ham with all the trimmings for our Easter celebration yesterday, BUT once Wednesday rolled around and I was still feeling a little blah, I decided to place an order with our local Honeybaked Ham. I figured that if I wasn't feeling well by the weekend, the last thing I would want to be doing is slaving in a kitchen over a hot stove. I have to be honest that I was pretty skeptical about 'their world-famous ham', but to be honest, it was pretty good! Infact, I may have to keep them in mind for future holidays. In my opinon their side dishes were just 'okay', but the half-ham I ordered has been very moist and tasty.
Last year, since I had just had Brinley, I have to be honest that we didn't attend mass, so this year was our first year to attend mass for Easter as a family. Usually we are Saturday evening mass people just because it can be difficult getting a little one going in the morning, but we REALLY didn't want to drag Brinley through an 8PM Vigil mass. I think we would have all been pulling our hair out by the time it would have been over. So, we decided to attend the Sunday morning mass, and by the grace of God we actually made it on time--even though the parking lot was FULL and we had to park a block away--with a few minutes to spare. I have to say that the full parking lot was nothing compared to what it was like inside the church. It was beyond standing room only. There were SO many people standing that there was only a narrow, clear path between the last aisle of chairs (remember we don't have pews thanks to Katrina) and the crowd of people standing. Bruce and I had never seen anything like it during the two years that we have been attending St. Michael's. With all that said, I do have to mention that Brinley was a very good girl. She did only want Mommy to hold her, but other than that she was very easily entertained by the crowd of people, especially the other little ones.
Brinley and Mommy posing for a quick picture before Easter morning mass.
Brinley and Daddy posing for a quick picture before Easter morning mass.
After mass, we came home, and I got busy putting all the food in the oven to be heated. While the food was warming, Bruce and I decided to grab the camera and try to get a picture of Brinley outside in her Easter dress. Unfortunately, it was a very windy afternoon, and she did not like the wind trying to blow the quilt up around her or Easter eggs going every where. I guess I can't blame her.
Even with her Daddy sitting with her, Brinley wasn't too happy about getting her picture taken outside.After our attempt at trying to get pictures, we went back inside, and changed into comfy clothes while lunch continued to warm. After enjoying our lunch and cleaning up after it, we just spent our day relaxing together. Bruce had recorded The Ten Commandments the previous day, so we watched that and napped and then watched Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. I'm normally not one to watch television, but for some reason I decided to give the laundry and cleaning a break and take the night off. ;-)
Brinley playing with her activity table after church. As you can she, she has a new fettish with sticking out her tongue while she's REALLY busy with something.
So, that was our Easter. Not much to it, but sometimes that's the best way to celebrate special days--without a lot of fuss. Today, we ran a few errands and drove around a particular neighborhood here in Ocean Springs that has a number of houses for sale. I did do a little laundry today--just diapers--my favorite kind. Other than that, we spent our last day together for this weekend relaxing together and just enjoying each other.
I hope all of y'all had a wonderful Easter weekend filled with many blessings and love.
Yesterday evening one of our dear friends took some family pictures of Bruce, Brinley and I. It is something that has been on our "to-do" list for a while, but it seems like something would always come up--we would be out of town, she would be out of town, the weather would be bad, one (or all) of us would be sick, etc., etc. Our original plans were to have pictures of us taken down at the beach, but when we arrived, we realized that it was much too windy. Not only was my hair blowing every which way, but Brinley was clinging to me like a tick on a hounddog (for those of you that need a visual). So, we all decided to go a few blocks inland to Marshall Park, which is the same park that I took Brinley's picture for our Christmas cards this past December. Overall, I have to say that Brinley did well. She didn't let us set her down on a quilt to have individual photos of her taken, but as long as Mommy or Daddy was holding her, she would at least look in the direction of the camera and sometimes even smile for Amanda. After we felt like we had a good assortment of poses, locations and postions from the park, we decided to head back to the beach to see if the wind had died down any. It had a little bit so Amanda tried taking a few shots of us there. Unfortunately with the wind blowing, there was only a certain direction I could stand without my hair blowing every which way, so I think a lot of the shots are going to have the Biloxi/Ocean Springs bridge in them....oh, well. As I write this, Amanda has uploaded a couple dozen photos of us at the park to her online album. Here are a few of my favorite ones, just to give y'all a taste:
