here comes peter cottontail ...

Although I have had other things on my mind, I did want to post an entry about Easter. Typically, Easter is not a big deal to me or my family ... well, for the past few years anyway. When we were little, my mom would dress my sisters and I up in fancy (matching) Easter dresses, complete with gloves, and we would go church and put flowers in a cross. Then, we'd follow up our morning of religion with Kids Incorporated which my dad taped on the good ole' VHS. Awesome.

This year, Molly and Zach decided they wanted to host Easter in their new townhouse. My mom, Lindsay, and I thought that sounded fun so we agreed. However, what was originally a seven person gathering quickly turned into 20+ when they decided to include all of Zach's family as well. I volunteered to fly up on Thursday afternoon to help out.

When I arrived in Sacramento, it was pouring rain, but we soldiered on and went to pick up chairs from Zach's work, and then had dinner at Panera Bread ... yeah, we know how to party. The following day Zach got a hall pass, which included golfing with his buddies, so while Molly worked, I made two dozen edible bird's nests ... which we handed out as favors:

Molly had a long lunch so she and I went to Jack's and then ran some errands. After I dropped her back at VCA, I made two dozen red velvet cupcakes for Easter dessert. Needless to say, I was pretty sick of baking by the end of the day. That night, Molly and I originally planned on going to dinner and a movie, but after running some more errands, we decided to grab a Papa Murphy's pizza and stayed home painting her dining room, living room, and master bedroom. It was actually kind of fun.

The next morning, Zach stumbled home and fell asleep so Molly and I went shopping ... basically, I was her bitch in Old Navy running all over the store while she tried on different dresses in the dressing room. We came home and put second coats of paint on the walls, while Zach went to run errands. After some cleaning and arranging, Zach drove Molly and I, and his sister-in-law Jennifer to Midtown for happy hour at L Wine Lounge. The lounge was awesome, and we sat on the back patio which overlooks a large courtyard which was hosting the Second Saturday Art Walk. I don't know if it was the warm weather or the light-up hula hoops at the art walk, but was what supposed to be happy hour soon became let's drink five glasses of wine and eat dessert. Needless to say, when Zach came to pick us up, we were feeling no pain, as evidenced by the picture below, taken on our walk back to the car:

The following morning, we somehow rallied and were ready to begin hosting the day's festivities at 9:30am. We had TONS of food and lots of good company. In the morning, Zach's two nephews, Diego and Matteo, and niece Jillian decorated Easter eggs which was so funny to watch. They each donned one of Zach's plaid shirt (each with two pockets, not one!) to dye the eggs. Diego, being the oldest, was very patient and worked hard to dye the perfect egg, which Jillian would then pick up from the drying rack and dump back into another color :)

After the eggs dried, the Easter Bunny hid them and the kids had fun trying to find them all. Sadly, they thought there was an unlimited supply and wanted to continue hunting no matter how many times we told them there weren't anymore. After that, the big kids headed to the park for an adult egg hunt. Our eggs were filled with alcohol, condoms, Sierra Nevada ... and if you were lucky enough to win one of three golden eggs (which I was) ... candy and a $50 gift card to REI!!!

We then returned back to the house and eat until we were sick and played Wii. After cleaning up, my mom dropped me off at the airport, but I didn't stay for long. My flight was overbooked and delayed so I took the $290 Southwest offered and hightailed it back to Molly and Zach's where I feel asleep at 9:45pm. A perfect end to a perfect three days with my family!