Happy Easter!

First, I want to wish everyone a blessed and happy Easter!

We started our weekend off with my birthday on Friday where we did our traditional breakfast in bed, cool gifts (I got a couple of orchids and a Eee PC --- awesome!), drank wonderful champagne and went to dinner with Bryan at Tall Grass, one of Chicago's top 10 restaurants. We were surprised to learn that this restaurant is located in Lockport which is fairly close to Joliet. The chef and owner, who is self taught - very cool, came to our table a couple of times to make sure we were enjoying our evening. It was a great dining opportunity and fabulous company. What an absolutely perfect day!

Saturday was spent decorating a bee hive cake, decorating eggs and getting ready for the big bunny himself - the Easter bunny. Mia enjoyed her first beater licking and thought that buttercream frosting on a beater was good stuff.

When I asked if Sasha thought we should all go to bed to make sure the Easter bunny hadn't passed our house (surely he operates with the same rules as Santa, right?), he whispered with big eyes, "Yes, we need to go to bed right now!" This is also the only night that I know of where Sasha was ready to go to bed faster than Dad could move.

We awoke to find two baskets of goodies for the munchkins and two stuffed additions to our family - Quack Quack and Bunny. Blake thought for sure that both were meant for him after all they were plush and would feel good in his jawlies but alas, Sasha had other ideas. The kids dressed in their new Easter outfits and started to make their rounds.

This was Mia's first celebrated Easter but she seemed to get into the groove of the holiday as if she were born ready to eat and search for candy. Soon, her cheeks were filled with chocolatey goodness and her eyes danced wildly with the rush of sugar ... lots and lots of sugar. She was hooked! She found her first egg and that was all she needed.













Once she dropped an egg and discovered that they were filled with candy, it was hard to keep her motivated to continue. She was planning on eating her way through the day and got rather irritated when we dumped all the eggs into a large communal bowl.

We decided to do dill feta scrambled eggs, bacon (for our best friend, Blake) and some fresh fruit for breakfast. We made deviled eggs and plan on having a leg of lamb for dinner. I think the kids would prefer to polish off the bee cake and have their whole bowl of candy for the main course but alas ... sanity must prevail.

One of my high school friends who is now a chef posted a Peeps idea to float one in hot chocolate. I thought it was SO cute and knew that Sasha would be an instant fan (something about cheap .. no pun intended ;) candy floating in chocolate, what's not to like??). Interestingly enough, the Peep never melted which led me to wonder what exactly a Peep is made out of. Hmmm ...

Everyone is off to the playground to burn off some sugar while I enjoy the peace and quiet of sharing a house with just Blake.

Happy, happy Easter to everyone!