Happy Easter! He is Risen!

Today didn't turn out quite like we had planned, but overall we still had a joyous Easter because Christ is Risen!  :)  

Johnny threw a tantrum at the beginning of mass and wouldn't settle down long enough for us to feel comfortable taking him into a crowded church, so we ended up having to leave early.  That really set the mood for the day, because we have really been struggling with Johnny and his behavior during mass every week.  Most days he is so bad that one of us has to take him out of the church and you can still hear him screaming.  We've tried leaving him in the church daycare, but he will open the door and flee and they aren't equipped to deal with a child who has separation anxiety.  We don't have a babysitter nor can we afford one, so we've been reduced to switching on and off every week to go to mass.  This makes us feel guilty and frankly, a little irritable, because we want to go to mass as a family and we have always been weekly mass goers except in extreme illness.  Missing Easter mass today too just pushed me over the edge in regards to Johnny and his church behavior.  We've tried everything, and we seem to be getting nowhere.  This tries our patience and not being able to go to mass and receive Eucharist every week doesn't help us to build up any patience either.  It is a vicious circle, and all we can do is offer it up and hope and pray that it gets better soon. 

After having to leave mass early, I was inclined to cancel our egg hunt in the park.  After calming down, though, I realized that Johnny shouldn't be punished with Easter activities because he is at an age of the Terrible Twos: extreme edition.  So, we went to the park.  It was really windy and cold at the park, so we didn't stay long.  We did find a nice grassy area and scattered some plastic eggs around and let Johnny pick them up and put them in his dinosaur Easter basket - he had a lot of fun. :)  He broke out into applause when he was done getting all the eggs, which is his favorite thing to do when he accomplishes something.  We tried to get pictures of us with Johnny too, but he was antsy to run around, so the pictures didn't really turn out too well.  At least we got some pictures though. 

Once home, we did some projects around the house while Johnny napped (finally!).  I had plans to dye some eggs with Johnny after his nap, but he was in a really grumpy and destructive mood for most of the day - especially after his nap.  I didn't think it would be a good idea to give him eggs and set him next to cups filled with colored dye while he was feeling destructive.  If he decides to behave well enough not to throw things and hit people, then perhaps we will dye some eggs sometime this week.  I want him to experience dying eggs, but it might just have to wait until next year.  It isn't worth giant stains on my carpet.  

Dinner went better.  We had baked spiral ham, homemade mashed potatoes, and candied carrots...we forgot to start the rolls before the ham because we were trying to settle the Terrible Two down for a nap, so we ended up not having those.  Dinner was delicious though! :)  For dessert we were going to have carrot cake and Rainbow cookies, but the boys filled up on so much candy that I didn't bother making them today.  I hope to make Rainbow cookies this week, however.  We have ham leftovers coming out of our ears.


Johnny and I are watching a movie together right now and John is at work.  He had to work from eight until midnight.  These are always rough nights because Johnny has trouble falling asleep without his daddy here.  So, yeah, the day didn't exactly turn out as planned, and we were 1000 miles from family & friends, but it did end up being a joyous day about Christ and our little family.  I hope everyone else had a wonderful Easter, and even if things didn't turn out as planned, I hope it was still a good day with your family. :)

Now for pictures...

Here is Johnny's Easter basket - we toned it down a bit since last year, but it was still filled with goodies:
 

He loved the animal eggs again and went for the frog eggs first - just like last year!:
 

Then he saw the chocolate bunny and went for that:
 

He especially loved the whales from the animal toob...he even made Orca noises (I think he learned them from Free Willy) - it was amazingly real sounding.  Here he is playing with a bunch of different toys:
 

John and Johnny hunting for eggs:
 

My two special guys:
 

Mommy & Johnny:

Johnny and his dinosaur Easter basket:
 

The boys ready for dinner:

Johnny was more interested in making the tongs talk to people, growl at them, and give them kisses than to eat his dinner (it was pretty adorable):

That was our Easter this year.  Not what we expected, but so much more than we deserve because of Christ's sacrifices so we can spend eternity in the Kingdom with God.  Keeping that in mind, makes all else seem not as important in the large scheme of things.  :)  Happy Easter everyone!  Love to all & God bless!