Happy Easter!

What a beautiful Easter weekend!  We've had lots of fun already on my Spring Break and it is only Day 2.

First of all, thanks to my dad, Nicole, and Val for sending me some pictures and videos of the boy's party.  It was quite hard to narrow down which ones to put on here, but these were my favorite ones, mainly from opening gifts:

This picture is by far my favorite one of Ellis.  I don't know why
 he has the facial expression he does, but it just cracks me up.

Ellis was NOT enjoying the fact that I was holding him in my lap.  He just wanted to go play.  Guess I should've realized that one year olds don't really get the whole open presents thing.

Also, here is the video that Nicole edited down to about 6 minutes, from eating their cake:



Now for our fun the past few days.  What a nice surprise on Thursday when I got the boys from my mom to see that she prepared a cute little Easter basket for the boys (complete with a little treat for me and Troy too!).  How fun!!!  My favorite part were the little plates for the boys.  

We don't use plates at this point and just put their food right on their tray, so I wasn't sure how they would react to using them (whether or not the plates, along with the food, would end up on the floor, was my biggest concern).  Well, today I decided to give it a try.  Today's lunch, PB&J, pineapple, mixed veggies, and an arrowroot cookie.  And no that wasn't a typo - their sandwich had peanut butter on it.  They hadn't had peanut butter until this point since it is suggested to wait until after 1 year due to possible allergies, but I thought today was as good of a day as any to try it.

Ellis was up before Logan, so he was our "new plate and PB&J" guinea pig.  And he did awesome.  He gobbled up his entire meal and didn't throw a piece of it on the floor.  I did have to put a piece of sandwich in his mouth to get him started though.  He was a little skeptical at first, I think.  Usually we just put a little food on their tray at a time so he was probably wondering what all this food was!

A fun little tidbit about Logan when he was done eating:  I was taking this tray off his high chair and went to pick him up.  The second I grabbed him and lifted him up, he shouted out a big, animated "ma ma."  I heard it clear as day too, and so did Troy.  Although both him and Ellis have said "ma ma" in the past, it was maybe only a handful of times when they first started gabbing.  For months, they have consistently said "da da", then "ba ba", then "na na", but never consistently "ma ma."  How fun to hear that!

We started the transition to sippy cups for milk, now that they are off formula, and so far so good.  They've always had water out of a sippy, but I wasn't sure what their reaction would be if their milk was in it.  Well, today I actually put away our bottle drying rack, because they've been doing so well drinking  milk without their bottles.  I guess my biggest "concern" is that they rarely drink all that is in their cup while they drank every drop when it was in a bottle.  So, parents out there, is it a big deal if they don't drink it all?  Again, during the day it doesn't seem to be a big deal, but I'm wondering if their sleep will be affected if they don't drink their entire bottle.  Last night we gave it to them in a bottle, but tonight's plan was going to be putting it in a sippy cup.  Obviously we'll at some point transition them away from milk before bed anyway, but I'm sure hoping that less milk before bed (on their own account) doesn't translate into waking up earlier because of hunger.  Any thoughts, experienced parents?

Our other fun for the day was going on a wagon ride.  It was so beautiful, I couldn't resist.  And, since it was so sunny out, I thought it would be a good time to try out their new hats from Grandma and Grandpa Frahm.  They quickly took them off multiple times before we left, but once I started moving the wagon, I think they were distracted by the movement and everything else around them.  They didn't take them off once the entire ride.

No plans for tomorrow.  At some point, maybe next year, I'd like to start some Easter traditions, but I think they are just a bit too young now to understand any of it.  Happy Easter to everyone.  I hope everyone is having as good of a weekend as we are!