Easter 2009We had a wonderful Easter week. The week started with fun pictures with Heather. She has posted several on her Blog and several more on her website. Password is Thomas1 if you want to check them out.
Jonathan had an Easter Egg Hunt at Preschool on Wednesday. Last year he had to be shown the eggs before he would even think about picking them up. This year, he was a man on a mission! It was so fun to watch him. The only thing was, he wanted to HOLD all the egg. Was a little afraid they would disappear if he actually put them in the basket. And did not want to hold the basket either, much better for Mommy to have that job! Of course, I didn't mind, it was too much fun following him around trying to convince him to put the eggs into the basket.
Paw Paw came to visit on Monday and Tuesday. Jonathan was so glad to see him. They had fun hiding Easter eggs in the yard. Jonathan wanted to hunt them, then he 'hid' them again for Paw Paw to find. So funny!
Hunting eggs at school...not putting any of them into the basket!Paw Paw came to visit Wednesday through Friday. Jonathan was so glad to see him. They had fun hiding Easter eggs in the yard. Jonathan wanted to hunt them, then he 'hid' them again for Paw Paw to find. So funny!
Paw Paw holding the basket.On Thursday, Uncle Harry's Country Critters Petting Zoo came to Preschool. This guy is so nice and so easy-going with the kids. They love when he comes. Jonathan got to pet the bunny rabbit and gave the pony tons of hugs. He talked about it for days. We saw Uncle Harry the next week at Larry's Pizza. Jonathan didn't quite know what to think about seeing him out of context, but when Uncle Harry told him he was going to come back to school in the fall, Jonathan was VERY excited!
Petting the bunny with Uncle Harry
Saturday morning was the church Easter Egg Hunt. Jonathan had moved up an age division this year and was in the 2 to 5 year old group. Poor baby just didn't have much of a chance. The five year olds mowed the yard. They were a force that the two year olds couldn't keep up with. Fortunately, Jonathan was not too worried about how many eggs he got. He was MUCH more concerned about what was IN the eggs. And by that, I mean the ones with the candy, not the ones with the Bible verses or stickers in them. Luckily the 'mowers' passed over a few on the back side of the trees, so we did manage to get some. After, he had a good time on the playground with all the kids from church. And, for the first time, he actually sat with the Easter Bunny...well, he sat in my lap and I sat with the Easter Bunny. Close enough, first time to go near someone dressed up so that was fun. My parents came in for the weekend and went with us to the Easter Egg Hunt. I think they had fun too.
An actual picture with the Easter Bunny!!
We hunted eggs at home Saturday afternoon. By the time we put all his eggs together from the various hunts, he had plenty and had a great time hiding them all over the yard. We hid them all several times and he just thought it was so much fun. When we came inside, he dumped the bucket all over the floor and just played with them there. And we still have eggs everywhere. Of course, I always loved hiding Easter eggs when I was little so we will just keep them out a while longer to play with.
Sunday morning the Easter Bunny came and brought Jonathan a basket of fun. He had some eggs with Little People Easter people in them and a Thomas the Train Easter train. He thought that they were lots of fun and insisted on taking Thomas to church with him. My parents and Mark's parents also got him several things for Easter. This child is not hurting for love or expressions of love, that's for sure!! We went to church and Jonathan had a great time talking about the 'stone roll away'. We have been trying hard to teach him about the TRUE meaning of Easter. It is a hard thing to teach a two year old, but he is getting a little of it I hope. Mark and I filled in for some friends and taught 4-year old Sunday School on Easter. So we were very blessed to have a small opportunity to help some other children learn about Easter. We also had to Escort new people around the building before the service, so were quite busy! Brother Gary preached a great message that morning that was just very uplifting and very confirming of God's power and glory and ultimate love for us. We ate at home for Easter lunch and had a great time just being together as a family. I was just so very thankful for our many blessings.
MaMa Deb & Grandad with Jonathan
The next weekend we packed up the car and headed South. We went to the Seal Family Reunion. They are Mark's Grandmother's Family. She passed away shortly after Jonathan was born and before he was able to meet her. So it was nice to see her family and meet lots of family that we had never met before. Jonathan completely charmed everyone there. We were in Luling, which is right outside of New Orleans. Some true Cajuns came in and cooked some wonderful food. We had Corn and Crawfish Bisque, Jambalaya, and Chicken & Sausage Gumbo. It was great!! We then left there Saturday night and had dinner at Middendorf's on the way back to Vicksburg.
The plan was to get up Sunday and go fishing on Paw Paw's lake before we came home. Of course, if you know us, then you know that our "plans" rarely come to pass as we thought they would. Jonathan woke up Sunday and almost immediately got sick. He was complaining of his back hurting and did not want to go to the bathroom and then started throwing up. I knew he probably had an UTI so I got on the phone with OKC trying to get a resident to answer the phone on a Sunday morning. As you can imagine, he was ooohhh soooo helpful (sarcasm) and would not call anything in. We started him on Tylenol and Motrin, packed the car, and headed home. He finally fell asleep and we booked it back to LR and a decent doctor. I called ahead to the After Hours Clinic at Arkansas Children's Hospital and they were able to see him. He did have an UTI and they got him started on an antibiotic. They were so nice and so helpful and got us in and out in about an hour. Fastest that has ever gone, that's for sure! We hightailed it to Kroger and got there with five minutes to spare before they closed. That night he started running a fever and kept running one continuously for three days and sporadically til Friday. Needless to say, it was a completely exhausting week and he just did not feel well at all. They had to switch his antibiotic on Wednesday after the culture came back. Of course he would be drug resistant to the first one. Mark was wonderful and kept him at home Monday, Tuesday, and Friday. We sent him to school Wednesday and Thursday thinking he was ok, but he just was so worn out that we kept him home again on Friday. Please say a prayer for our sweet baby that he will feel 100% better soon and that this medicine will do it's job and that this will not be a setback for him medically. We have come so far and this has just been hard. Everyone agrees that this happened because he is starting to try and potty train and that we just did not give him enough opportunities to stop and potty on the way down and back to Louisiana. Never been a problem before, he just would go in his diaper, but now he wants to go in the potty. Mark and I felt so very bad that he got sick, but who would have thought? He is feeling better, but still just really tired, as are we all.
Friday night was our true happy spot of the week. Mark had bought tickets several months ago for us to see Disney on Ice. I am so glad he did too, because we definitely needed something fun to do as a family. After the last month, we were all just a little down. We were on the second row from the stage and the show was just great. Mark and I enjoyed it as much as Jonathan did. Mickey and friends introduced each segment and Jonathan was just beside himself to see them. I would not have been surprised if he had gotten on the ice to get to them!! They then did an ice skating thing to a couple of Disney movies: Lion King, Lilo and Stitch, Little Mermaid, and Peter Pan. They were all amazing but we liked Lilo and Stitch and Peter Pan the best. Jonathan loved the aligator coming to get Captain Hook. He thought that was hilarious. Of course, even here, we had to have a little drama. Mark took Jonathan up to the bathroom at intermission (as you can imagine we are a little potty happy at our house). I could see Mark carrying him back down the stairs holding his shoe. I'm thinking, "Oh no, he peed on his shoe." Mark gets to me and says, "I can't find his other shoe." And the sad thing is, I had thought before we left the house, No crocs, he'll lose one, so he had on his tennis shoes. Now how they lost a tennis shoe, I have no idea. So Jonathan sat through the second half of the show with only one shoe on. Luckily someone turned the shoe in to the Lost and Found and we were able to get it after the show. Jonathan got a new spinny light toy, I got a picture of him with a plastic lifesize Mickey and Minney, and Mark got Jonathan's shoe back! So everyone left happy which was nice. We took it easy the rest of the weekend to let Jonathan's body have time to heal.
Jonathan with his light up spinny toy wearing Mickey Mouse of course (and two shoes!)Back to school and work today. Busy as always. Mark presented at the student meeting for IEEE tonight at Lousiana Tech. Weird to be old enough that someone wants you to come back to your college and talk to the students. But also very nice that someone thinks that highly of him and his work.
So there you have the ups and downs of the last month. As always a little excitement (wanted or otherwise) here at the Thomas house. Thanks for reading, I know that I get too wordy. That's what happens when Mark goes out of town and I'm left to my own devices!!
ADDED EASTER PICS. STILL HAVE NOT DOWNLOADED PICS FROM REUNION WEEKEND. HOPE TO HAVE A NEW POST (AND PICS) SOMETIME THIS WEEK.
Jonathan and the Birthday Girl
