Celebrating Easter

I hope you had a great Easter! Holidays are the hardest for me when it comes to living so far away from home.  That being said, I try to make the holidays a little special for the girls which helps me take my mind off the fact that we live so far away and I get to focus on all the memories we are making with our kiddos. With that being said, here is a look at what our Easter looked like!

^ our Easter officially started when the Easter Bunny showed up with Easter baskets for the girls ;). ^

^ the Easter Bunny brought them some Shopkins and Hatchimals and it was fun to hear Emma exclaim, "it's like the Easter Bunny knew exactly what I wanted!". hahaha, kids are the best. ^

^ the girls were super excited about Easter this year and they were counting down to the big day. about 5:30, I heard Emma wake Everly up and tell her that it was Easter morning. we tried to get them to go back to sleep, but ten minutes later they were back up and ready to see what the Easter Bunny had left them. ^

^ she was pumped! ^

^ that smile!! ^

^ Everly couldn't believe she was going to get Shopkins of her very own! if you remember, Emma got some for her birthday and we have had a little bit of jealousy ever since. ^

^ they wanted to go out for the Easter Egg hunt right away, but since it was dark outside, we convinced them to wait until the sun came up. the minute it was peeking through - we were outside for the hunt! ^

^ I already mentioned this on Instagram, but long gone are the days of our slow and easy Easter egg hunts where the girls toddle around and can barely pick up all the eggs; this year definitely had more of an "off to the races" vibe. with a few hurt feelings mixed in. next year, I am going to do assigned colors so no one gets their feelings hurt. ^

^ after we got done, Ev's asked Wes if he had stayed up late to "catch" the Easter Bunny this year - he came through ;). ^

^ going through the loot. ^

^ you guys, we did all of that before the sun even really came up. mama needed a nap and it wasn't even 7:30. ^

^ Ally gave me a new cinnamon roll recipe where you let it rise over night and it is life changing (thinking I might post the recipe here at some point so I don't always have to refer to screenshots on my phone) so these sat out at room temperature and were ready to bake. also, I have officially decided, that homemade cinnamon rolls are my favorite treat to eat. ^

^ we got ready for gymnastics and had no trouble easily making it there by 9am (Emma rejoined Ev's class since we had afternoon plans). when we got home, I went to get my hair cut and the girls played around the house. ^

^ the girls dressed themselves (while I was gone) and they looked so cute when I got back, how could I not take a zillion pictures of them :). ^

^ new favorite picture of Everly :). ^

^ I love/adore/am obsessed with being a girl mom. ^

^ I always feel like I hit the jackpot with these two!! ^

^ when they said silly face picture, apparently all we know how to do is stick out our tongues. ^

^ Emma loves turning the side walk into her balance beam. ^

^ we have a beautiful cherry blossom tree in front of our neighborhood, so we walked over to take a few pictures. ^

^ how in the world did she get those long legs and where have her chubby baby legs gone! ^

^ we picked the cherry blossoms up from the ground and threw them in the air to mimic "snow". ^

^ haha, picture fail. ^

^ love this picture of them :). ^

^ my family :). ^

^ it was not all cherry blossoms and sunshine ;), classic Everly pout right here. ^

^ that was right before they gave me sweet embrace. as soon as I snapped this picture, Emma kissed Everly just so gently right on the tip of their nose. ^

^ back at the house, we worked on testing out our egg painting activity. Emma told me that morning, she wanted to paint eggs, so Wes hard boiled some eggs for our friends that were coming over. I thought we would just pull out our watercolors and let the kids go to town. Low and behold, we couldn't find our watercolors (and still haven't located them) so we had to pull out our paint sticks and make do ;). ^

^ I love that this guy has embraced my love of having people over - I love making sweet memories with him and our friends in our China house. ^

^ the eggs! ^

^ after we all ate, we had another egg hunt with the five kiddos! it was crazy and so much fun!! ^

^ after our friends left, we drove our scooters to get a view of the sunset. It was the perfect way to end Easter day. ^