Peter Cottontail Has Left the Building (About Two Weeks Ago)

Okay, I have a confession to make. I am so far behind with this Easter post that I actually considered back dating it. As though writing that this post was published two weeks ago would fool anyone. After Ryan called me out All on my own, I came to the conclusion that honesty is the best policy. So here it is. A post about Easter, over two weeks late.

Ethan participated in his first Easter egg hunt last year, which some of you may remember from this post (which was on time, by the way). He sort of understood the point then, and after 365 days of growth and development I was sure that he would be super jazzed about searching for eggs this year. With that in mind, we scheduled not one, but TWO Easter egg hunts this year. The first one was a community event at a local park, and the second was a small private affair in our own backyard.

For those of you who have read The Hunger Games, here's a quick description that may sound familiar:

- A mob of kids formed a ring in the grass, surrounding all of the Easter eggs and shiny wrapped candies, laying in the grass in plain sight (Cornucopia style).
- The Head Gamemaster counted down from 10 over a loudspeaker, signaling the participants to smash their way to the center with an enthusiastic "GO!!!"
- At this point, all rules of civility were off. Elbows were thrown, kids were pushed to the ground, necessary sacrifices were made to obtain that candy at all costs.

(For those of you who haven't read The Hunger Games, read it! It's fantastic! And then come back and reread this post... it will mean more to you than it just did. I promise.)

As for my little fighter? He just stood there, hands behind his back, taking it all in. Watching the other kids act like fools for little plastic eggs. Sixty seconds later, it was all over, and his basket was empty. Total Easter egg hunt fail.


Easter morning, we set up our own Easter egg hunt in our backyard. Oma hid the eggs, and together with Pa-Pa helped Ethan find each and every one of them, on his own time, without injury. It was much more our speed. Ethan opted to gather eggs in his Zebra backpack instead of an Easter egg basket. He ate the candy in each egg as he went along, and had a great time.



After the Easter egg hunt, Ethan found his Easter baskets (without competition), free to tear them apart all by himself. And that's exactly what he did.

A Halloween Post (that's not about Halloween)

Of course it's not, because in order for the post on Halloween to be about Halloween, I would have to be up to date with my blogging. Which we all know is just not the case. At least this post is about events that happened in the month of October.

Or, as I have renamed it, the month that Sarah was wrong about everything. Allow me to explain.

1) I stated with authority that the San Francisco Giants would not make it to the World Series. Wrong.

2) My dad and I took Ethan to the zoo, sure of the fact that he would love the animals. Wrong. The morning was spent deflecting shouts of, "No [insert animal name here]! Bye bye, [seriously, insert ANY animal name here]!" He did love the petting zoo, so technically I was only half wrong.

3) I thought that Ethan would get a kick out of the planes during Fleet Week. Super wrong. He was terrified. Thankfully, Ethan did get a kick out of splashing in the frigid waters of the Pacific while Ryan and my dad watched the air show, which distracted him from crying every time a plane zoomed and sonic boomed overhead.


Despite being full of failed predictions, October was a really great month! My dad came to visit for a week, and stayed with us for the first time. Ethan was able to wake up to his Pa-Pa every morning and see him until the minute he went to bed. As usual when we have visitors in town, we packed the week full of activities. One of my favorites was a trip to the pumpkin patch. As my long time readers may remember, I've been waiting years for Ethan to be old enough to enjoy Halloween. From dressing him up when he was itty bitty, to taking him to a pumpkin patch when he wasn't even old enough to sit up on his own, and the trick or treating plans that were ruined by a nasty bout of H1N1, Halloween has always been filled with good intentions, most of which just didn't work out for us.

I don't want to jinx it, but this year may be different. The pumpkin patch trip started us off on the right foot. Ethan had a blast "splashing" in a pool full of beans
and running through the hay mazes and tunnels.



Ethan picked his own costume this year, and we're going trick or treating for the first time ever tonight. If we're lucky, all will go well and Ethan will have a fantastic time. If you're lucky, I'll have fodder for another post about Halloween mishaps. No matter how it shakes down, it's kind of a win-win situation.

And unlike the over/under on the Giants winning the World Series, I like those odds.