Easter Babies

I cannot help but think of Mary on Easter. As a mother myself, I cannot imagine anything worse in this world than having your child ripped away from you the way Jesus was from her.  I know there are mothers who know the pain of losing a child.  I am humbly grateful that I cannot fully understand the magnitude of that anguish. What I do know is the love of a mother. A deeper love than anything I could express in words. When they are happy, I am happy. When they are sad, I am sad. When they hurt, I hurt.  We are connected in a way you cannot articulate.

I think of Mary watching her son suffer unimaginable pain, brutal beatings, mockery, and finally an undeserved death in the most atrocious manner- crucifed on the cross.  Her innocent boy.  I cannot imagine her pain.  During this Easter weekend though, I try.  I want to live in that place of loss, of unimaginable pain and sorrow for what Jesus went through.  He was not my son, but what He endured, He endured for my sake.  Something that is also unfathomable to me. I want my heart to break for his sacrifice.  To hurt for what He willing went through to save me. I am undeserving. I should have suffered and paid the price for my sins; yet He went willing to an excruciating death- for my sake, and for yours.  He offers us the free gift of Salvation. He paid the price that we owe with His own sinless, precious blood.  And while the sky is still darkened with the sting of death, Sunday is coming. Praise the Lord. HE DEFEATED DEATH. He rose again. He conquered death so that we might live. Praise the Lord.

 Praise the Lord.

My Easter Babies..

Happy Easter!
xo

My little loves

So it is increasingly obvious that I am having a hard time "keeping up" on my blogging. I never even got around to posting Christmas pictures, but when you have three kids and two of them still babies- it's hard to do much of anything "extra." Lately any "extra" energy/adreneline has been used planning parties and crafting, which I love.  Sean actually says I'm a happier person when I have some kind of craft I'm working on.  So I guess it is just part of how I am wired.  I love blogging too because this is my way of chronicling life with my three littles and my guy. I long ago gave up on actual scrapbooking, so between this and my annual My Publisher books that I make- that's pretty much where all of my memories are being stored.  Lord knows my brain doesn't have much room for them :-)    

I took these pictures on Valentine's Day with the intention of posting them and writing about my three little loves.  Clearly I didn't quite make it, but it doesn't really matter.  

Emmalise is 9 months in these pictures! She is such a little doll! She so wants to walk and keep up with the other two kids! She is so observant and loves looking up at the birds or airplanes in the sky. She throws her little hang up as soon as she hears them! She squints her eyes and smiles when she knows she's being cute. She's got such a little personality already!

 

 

 

 

 My little Jacky boy! He's getting to be such a big boy now! He is so smart and he has such a winning way about him. I love all of the funny little things he says these days! For example: after he had been carsick, and threw up, the next time he said," Mommy! I felt all my good yummy things coming back up, but my spit chased it back down!" Or like when Claire told him Dinosaurs scare her, he replied, "Dinosaurs are all gone Claire, they're distinct!" After having several episodes of Emmy finding tiny things to put in her mouth Jack told her, "Emmy- tiny things are off the menu!" He also excitedly exclaimed that, "Emmy is almost getting to be a person now!" Some of my favorite Jacky quotes from lately: 

"Something funny just flew into my mind!"

"I cant understand you anymore Emmy! I speak anguish not baby! Mommy what kind of anguish do I speak?"

To Mia- "I speak English but Emmy speaks animal. She does! She speaks Duck! Say Quack quack Emmy!"

Claire was saying "no" to everything I was offering her for lunch, kind of whining/crying like a very tired 2 year old does, and Jacky quips, "This is like trying to figure out a puzzle!" Sean and I laughed and Sean says, "Yes- yes it is! Get used to it buddy!" 

He is also the sweetest little guy in the world! He recently said, "Mommy, I wish I could marry you!" (1/22/13) {annddd my heart's a puddle}

"I love all the people in my whole, wide family!!"  Seriously love this little fellow!

This little baby is so busy that it is almost impossible to get a picture of her lately! She doesn't want to stop for a moment! I used these pics for her birthday party because I feel like you really get to see her.  She feels deeply, she is compassionate and she loves deeply.  She much more aware of her surroundings and others, than most of the kids her age. She worries about Jacky and Emmy, when someone gets hurt, she wants to make sure they are OK. She is scared of shadows, and tells me in her tiny voice in the middle of the night, "Mommy, shadows scare me too?" I reassure her that shadows are just something blocking the light from her night light. She is so cute and runs after Jacky yelling, "Here comes me!" She is so girly and loves her "pretty dresses" and her make-up (which sounds like naked when she says it :-) We read Pinkalicious over and over and I know I've said it before, but her little sweet singing voice is one of my most favorite sounds in the world!  

  

My little deep thinker

These little people LOVE being outside, and we have made a habit of going for afternoon walks with my Mom.  We feed the ducks or mud hens and go to the secret path and to a big hill that Jack literally will run down over and over again. I love it and so do they.

love.

Hello Claire!!!

We celebrated our little Claire turning two a week after her birthday, with a Hello Kitty party! It was so much fun and we were so blessed to have our family and friends come play and celebrate her birthday! 

The table

 I had so much fun making the decorations and desserts for this party! Pinterest is full of so many cute ideas...I sometimes get in over my head with so many things I want to do! I love to try new things and I love "doing it myself"! Even if I could buy it- I'd rather make it myself! So I watched some Youtube tutorials on pipping and royal icing and made these hello kitty cookies! It was my first time actually pipping and they weren't perfect, but they turned out pretty cute!

These little Hello Kitty cake pops were the hit of the party! My in laws gave me a cake pop machine and recipe book for Christmas, so I new I wanted to make some for her party! I found this tutorial on Bakerella and thought they were so cute that I had to try them! I've seen other Hello Kitty cake pops that really just didn't look like Hello Kitty at all (eyes too small and whiskers not in the right place... I'm a bit of a perfectionist) but these looked just like Miss Kitty! While they were time consuming- they did turn out pretty cute and really tasty too!

the Kitty Pops

"C" is for Claire

The wreath: one of my favorite DIY details!

Cupcake time! I made chocolate and confetti cupcakes and I made cute little cupcake toppers from a free printable I found on the interwebs :-) I  changed the colors and added some text and matted them on the teal and red card stock! Voila! I love free stuff! And I'm actually getting the hang of photoshop! 

She licked her frosting right off her cupcake!

Always dancing!

This party was fun because it was so low key in terms of activities. The kids jumped in the trampoline, played on the swings and slide, and I set out a couple Hello Kitty games they could play whenever they wanted- I didn't have any "structured games," but it was really fun and the kids had a great time! Most of them are four and under so they are still easy to entertain!

bowling and ring toss games

  I made these little Hello Kitty headbands for the girls (also an idea from Pinterest) but I made my own ear template and bow. Maybe I'll get around to posting those tutorials one day :-)

Hello Kitty ears for all the girls!

Of course Claire wanted nothing to do with them! They looked cute on the other girls though :-)

Thank you to our friends and family who came to celebrate with us!

 We had such a fun time celebrating our sweet Claire- Hello Kitty style!