Reunion and Easter

I truly enjoyed our kid-free vacation last week, and I'm not going to pretend that I longed for diaper changes and calming tantrums, but I was extremely happy to be reunited with Evie last Saturday morning.  Seth and I had flown in to Nashville late Friday night and took the shuttle over to our car and headed straight down to Memphis, finally arriving at my parents' house at 2am.  We slept on an air mattress in the living room at my request because I didn't figure we could sneak into the second guest room where Evie was sleeping without waking her, and Ryan and his family were occupying the larger guest room.  At 7am I woke to Evie crying out and thought I was going to be the one to go get her, but Grannadaddy beat me to it (apparently she had cried out earlier and I slept through it).  Granna and I were standing together in the living room when Grannadaddy came downstairs.  Evie took a brief look at me, then looked at Granna like she was going to go to her, but did a double-take at me and then lunged for me.  She snuggled with me for a good few minutes.  It was a very sweet moment.

I guess Evie felt fairly confident that I wouldn't be abandoning her soon because she left my arms and went over to the magnet board which was on the other side of the air mattress.  After a few minutes of play, she became interested in the air mattress and then realized it was occupied by Daddy.  Daddy woke up when she touched the mattress and looked down at her and said, "Hi, Evie!"  Evie replied with, "Dada!" and proceeded to climb up on the mattress.  So that was a sweet reunion too.  And then Evie promptly took over the air mattress.

After a little while, Addie and Will joined us downstairs for breakfast, followed by Ryan and Aimee.  Then we all went to Somerville for their egg hunt.  I'm told Granna and the kids had an indoor egg hunt of their own on Friday and Evie used a basket to collect eggs.  Well, she was decidedly disinterested in using a basket for the outdoor egg hunt.  

This may be my favorite video ever of her.  I love that little scream as she runs away, the adamant rejection of the basket, and the button on the end, the quiet, "No basket".

Evie did love looking at the horses (the ishies, as she calls them), and climbing the stairs to the porch on the house.  She collected about 4 eggs and I made sure we gave all her candy away, though Granna was doing her job at being a little more permissive.

Looking through the fence at the "ishies"

All the cousins liked looking at the horses

Her 4-egg haul

Evie enjoying a Reese's peanut butter cup on the porch

After the egg hunt, we drove back to Memphis and Evie seemed in great need of a nap.  Seth had had trouble hearing from his left ear since our flight out to California, bless his heart, so he opted to stay home with Evie while the rest of us went to a restaurant for lunch, the idea being that Evie would nap.  Apparently that was a futile exercise because Evie was not interested in sleep, which resulted in her falling asleep on our drive over to my cousin Daniel's house where we were gathering with Granna's side of the family for dinner.  Evie slept even through me picking her up and taking her inside, through the greetings and comings and goings of the Whitehorn/Gafford clans, and through being shifted by me as I held her for her nap.  I had nothing to complain about; after a week away from her it was delightful to snuggle with her for an hour and a half.

Evie did eventually wake up and joined the other kids (Addie, Will, Nyla, and Naomi) out on the patio and she quickly found the backyard slide and kept Granna busy with that while I ate dinner.

We headed home after a while and I got to put Evie to bed for the first time in 9 nights, and it was really nice.  She had given Granna and Grannadaddy a hard time about going to bed without a fuss, and I wish I could report that my presence made it all better, but she did still fuss for about 10 minutes after I put her down, and cried out a couple of times over the next couple of hours while we visited with Cristaldawn and Matthew, and Kathy and Olivia who came over after the kids all went to bed.

Easter morning was amusing since Granna, I mean the Easter Bunny, left some Easter treats.  Evie quickly spotted the Winnie the Pooh characters in the pail and enjoyed playing with them.  She was kind enough to share her Easter treats of yogurt bites with her cousins who seemed more interested in those than in their own chocolate candy (strange priorities, in my opinion, choosing astronaut food over chocolate).  

The toddler version of chocolate for breakfast on Easter

Evie and Addie both needed baths that morning so Evie had her first time to get a bath with another kiddo.  Aimee bathed them and complimented Evie on how well-behaved and cooperative she was.  Then all the kids sat down for a real breakfast of scrambled egg and cantaloupe.

We got many compliments at church on Evie's Easter dress.  Evie picked it out herself.  I held up several options while we were at the store and she always came back to this yellow dress (she does love the color yellow, if frequency of naming a color is any indication).

Over the week, it seems Uncle Rickie became favored.  Evie enjoyed allowing him to wear her hat and handing him imaginary objects while we waited for the tables to be set up after the service.

We stayed for the lunch at church, but Evie was fairly uncooperative.  I ended up taking her to the nursery because she was just overwhelmed by the people and a little tired.  We played in the nursery for a bit (hopefully that will increase the likelihood that she'll agree to go there during the service in the future) and then she joined the other kids for another Easter egg hunt, though she couldn't be dissuaded from the slide which was covered in red mud that would have ruined everything she had on.  So Granna and Daddy gave up and brought her back in.

We left soon after and headed back for Granna and Grannadaddy's, and Evie fell asleep in the car on the way home and remained passed out when I put her down on the couch while Seth and I gathered all of the bags to go back home.

Evie slept for the first half of our drive back home and then was a pure delight the rest of the way.  She requested that we all sing "Itsy Bitsy Spider" and performed all of the motions.  She enjoyed playing peek-a-boo with Daddy too.  We got back home to a pile of mail and three very excited dogs.  And Evie was certainly happy to see them too.  They played together for quite some time, Evie petting them and leading them around from one side of the living room to the other.  We had dinner and then I put Evie to bed in her own crib.  After being gone from it for 10 days, I think she was glad to be back in her own room and her own crib because I heard not a peep out of her after I laid her down.

Monday was kind of a rough re-entry for all of us back into the work/school routine.  Evie and I both slept until about 7:30am and I managed to drop her off at about 8:30, in time for snack.  She really did not want to go to daycare that day and got upset when I left, but she was all smiles later that day.

Tuesday went better, and Wednesday Seth was working late so after daycare I took Evie to the park, which was a big hit, of course.  This time she was more interested in swinging than sliding, though she did brave going down the big slide by herself.

Yesterday I also received a call from the daycare director who said she had three spots opening up in the next age level class as of next week and asked if we'd be okay moving up.  She said the teachers all agreed Evie seemed ready for new activities and challenges and new friends (though she'll have already been in class with 4 of the other children), and I agreed that moving up would be fine with us.  Hopefully the transition next week will go well.

As I've been typing this, Evie has been sitting and watching Cinderella, which we introduced to her the week before we left for California.  I guess she got tired of the Pooh movies last week because she initially requested Pooh, and the quickly changed her mind to "Rella".  I feel fairly certain Cinderella is the gateway princess movie.  It's pretty innocuous and has a mild villain.  I'm not sure what princess movie will be next, but it's interesting to me how quickly she's become enamored with Rella, since she's asked for it several times since we've been home.  Though I think Pooh is still the reigning champion.... for now.