Happy Easter and Happy Birthday Alexander

This is a full month, so I'm combining some of the posts. Easter was a busy week for us since I played nearly every night at church. The choir had worked really hard, but it really paid off in the Masses. On the mornings of both Holy Thursday and Good Friday, I played Morning prayer services. I also played the masses both nights. Then there was the Easter Vigil on Saturday evening. It's my favorite Mass of the year, and I love how they do it at St. Bridget's. There is tons of music intertwined with the readings, lots of candles; it's very high liturgy and extremely fulfilling. But it also lasts for about three hours, so I didn't get home until close to 11. Then, after meeting with the Easter Bunny, I crawled into bed for a few hours before I had to get up and be at church by 5 to prepare for the Sunrise Service. That was complicated by the fact that rain the previous day had prevented us from getting everything set up the night before. So we had to wipe dry the seats, get everything plugged up and running. The 6:00 mass was pretty much our dress rehearsal for the later Masses. But it was a beautiful day outside, very sunny, but not too hot. In fact, I was wearing my leather jacket at the early mass (I was ticked since I had invested in a new Easter dress), but managed a sunburn at the later masses. We had a hummingbird present and hanging about the alter at all three masses, it was gorgeous. Tony brought all the kids (which he had to dress and feed since I left before they got up) to the last mass of the morning. Not only was he on time, he was early, I was so proud. And the kids looked great too. He forgot the camera, so we don't have proof, but you can take my word for it. We took a few pics once we got home.

The kids had a big weekend too. On Saturday, Tony took them to the YMCA Easter Egg hunt where Florence got to chase down her first eggs. We then all met up for lunch at Village Inn where the Easter Bunny was hanging out giving out balloon hats/animals. What a fun and special weekend for them. This is a poloroid they took for us while we were there.

That afternoon, we had planned on celebrating Alexander's birthday since the three families (Bigleys and Dawsons) were going to be together anyway. Knowing that I was going to be exhausted from working, and having visited Enchanted Island in Encanto park during spring break, we decided to hold his party there. Enchanted Island is an amusement park for the younger set - according to their website, they cater to the 1-10 year olds (Hey! That's us!), but really, it's more for the 1-6. Lucy and Charlie were a little bored, but they had a great attitude for the party. These guys did EVERYTHING for us. They did let us bring cake (they would've provided, but since it's not personal, they encourage people to bring their own), but they gave us ice cream, a table in the shade, a host to make sure we had everything we needed, drinks, food, balloons, a tshirt for Alex...and all for a reasonable amount of money, especially when you consider how much fun the kids had on the rides and how I didn't have to clean up either before or after the party. Alexander loved his Power Rangers party, though he got so many Spiderman gifts, he then adopted Spiderman as his favorite superhero of the day.

He did get to have a home party as well. More presents, more celebration of Alex. Here he is with our neighbor friends. And here he is with Florence planting flowers, one of his favorite activities.