Easter 2010

this was seriously the best easter that i can remember. i don't really know exactly why, except that i had such a good feeling all day. maybe because it was conference (click if you missed it, and click here if you're like, "what the heck is conference?") and we had our awesome family over for dinner, and we got to listen to the Prophet and other great speakers who filled our home with a peaceful happy feeling. yeah, that's gotta be it...

so of course we woke up to easter baskets, then we had our annual sanders family treasure hunt. the kids look forward to this every year. this time the final clue lead them to a box that was buried and they had to dig it out (how's that for authentic treasuring?). they were stoked about the cool treasures they got.

jas and i made my mom's famous rolls (the old fashioned way, by hand!), the boys watched peeps blow up in the microwave, and everyone came over to eat after the first session of conference. maryanne made the best honey ham, and everyone else pitched in with side dishes and desserts, and we stuffed ourselves silly (well i did anyway).

the little easter babies had fun playing together,

and after the last session, we went outside for a cousin easter egg/candy hunt. we were glad to have chad and brittney and the boys join us for the day too. we can never have too much family around:)

and this being mia's first easter, of course we had to get some cute shots of the little (big) girl

now i usually don't get too excited about coloring eggs, but van was so pumped to color his "monster" eggs, it was hard not to be excited with him. he was all into making the eggs faces as scary as he could (thus the "scary" faces we're pulling), and when we got done, he couldn't wait to show dad. he kept saying, "dad is going to be so scared when he sees these!" and sure enough when dad came over to look, he screamed and ran away crying because he was so scared (van couldn't stop laughing). we really had a good time with that.

side note about van:
he is such a sweet boy and is so kind and good at sharing.this is a fun age where he gets excited about the little things (like monster eggs), and still lets me pick him up and hold him in my lap and love on him. he's getting better about not being so hard on himself, as we are really working on positive reinforcement to make sure he gets past that.

side note about jasmine:
she got a new yellow easter dress that she looks super cute in, but wasn't pictured much because she was hibernating in her room all day reading the 5th book in the "Fablehaven" series. (we'll get some pics of her and her cute dress later)

after the kids were in bed, my handsome husband and i sat at the kitchen table and devoured the last of the cherry cheesecake while we talked and laughed at each other until we cried. i love that man.

in short, it was a fun/busy/exciting/spiritual/rewarding/filling/happy day.