Montes Familia Established June 9, 2007: Easter Sunday

Last year we planned to go on a family vacation the week of my birthday, I told Manny that's 'all' I wanted for my birthday since in years past we haven't been allowed to have Marcus at all for birthday celebrations with the exception of last year [we got to pick him up the day of my birthday for the majority of morning/early afternoon.] When we planned to do our vacation the week of my birthday I didn't realize that Easter Sunday was that weekend so we decided to post pone the trip and just keep our extended parent time since it was already scheduled as this would be the first time Marcus would be able to come to my family birthday dinner. I was so excited to just have my whole family there, crazy how when you get older it's the 'simple' little things that make the difference. With Easter Sunday and my birthday weekend I was stoked to have Marcus with us and to have 9 whole days off of work to spend with the kids and Manny. I planned all these fun things for Easter since we had the time off and Marcus with us (this is the first year we had Marcus for Easter where he was excited or interested to dye eggs and really get into the festivities of the holiday, not too mention Elaina is at a fun age too.) Slowly all my plans and fun things started to get unravel. It all began with my Dad going into the hospital the Thursday before Easter, then finishing touches on remodeling the bathroom prevented the traditional dying of eggs, which took away the traditional egg hunt as well; one thing after another it was all falling apart. I still had Sunday though, Easter Day and my family birthday dinner/party. Right before we were sitting down to eat, Manny got a call that his brother had been in an ATV accident and was in the ER so he raced down to see what was going on. The first year I was going to have the blessing of having my whole family there and my Dad ended up not being there as did my husband. I suppose some of us aren't meant to have it all. It was bad enough Dad wasn't home that day, I tried really hard to not let the irritation get to me and still enjoy my time with the ones that were there but I only ended up getting mad at myself for feeling cheated and selfish for not wanting my husband to run off on Easter Sunday and my birthday dinner. Having my family together is the only real gift I could ask for, two and three years ago - that's all I could of asked for was to have everyone together. It was still a nice day, lots of sweet moments with the kids and lots of hugs and kisses from Marcus and Elaina which kept me from losing it truth be told. Plus we had a very nice dinner and at least all my siblings and nieces and nephews were there this year.

Anyways, the Spring General Conference weekend fell over Easter weekend which in the LDS church means, no meetings at church that day. It being Easter, of course, I wanted pictures of the kids in their Easter outfits so I dressed them up anyway to grab a few shots. It was freezing cold and snowing all weekend and by the time I made time for pictures Elaina was grumpy and desparently needing a nap and Marcus was too busy having fun with cousins, I knew if I didn't get them then, I wouldn't get them at all. Marcus was still my Prince and was a good sport about letting me interrupt Spidey/Batman time for a few pictures and we ended up getting a few smiles out of Elaina before she lost it. Kind of disappointing to miss out on a lot of the traditions and things I was looking forward to for as long as I've waited for them to happen but life's about learning to dance in the rain right? I have way too many picures from Easter morning to try and choose from but here's a few snapshots of our good lookin' kids on Easter Sunday.

SO stinkin' cute!

He was sweet, he reached for her hand to help her down so I had to pause to grab a picture. :)

Running to meet Justin who pulled up to the house as we were taking pictures. So excited to see her bud! All the ones of just Elaina she is screaming in or has her dumb binky so these two cute ones of the back of her will do.