Easter Weekend

A few weeks back you may recall that Kelly and I spent a day sewing with Dorothy, our new pastor's wife. On that date we told her that we would love to see where she used to live and go shopping in the town because apparently it is a cute area with nice shops. Dorothy put together a trip for us and a few others to go into the city for the day on Saturday.
Five of us went: Dorothy, Kelly, Brittany M, Sarah Rus, Me, and Ellie. So five adults and one baby. Dorothy, Sarah, Ellie and I left at 10:00 and stopped by Trader Joe's and Stein Mart. Trader Joe's is a hippie-style grocery store with a lot of specialty items and decent prices for organic food. Dorothy directed me to some choice cheese, crackers, and olives which I purchased for Jon's Easter basket. I realize candy is the traditional choice for Easter but last year I ended up eating all the candy myself and I wanted to avoid the sugar overload.
At Stein Mart I picked up a new tie for Jon for Easter along with some nylons. Somehow I had torn my two pairs I had bought for this winter. Perhaps it was because I had bought them from Walmart. Avoid those.
We met up with Kelly and Brittany near the center of Chestnut Hill. It was a beautiful day: sunny and in the mid fifties. We walked to a nearby sandwich shop and ate outside on their patio. I had an apple, craisin, walnut salad with chicken salad on the side. I could have ordered another entire meal it was so delicious. We then proceeded to walk over to the main street and mosey in and out of all the shops. We stopped for some ice cream, too. By the time we had to leave I feel as though we didn't even hit half of he cute stores and I'm definitely interested in going back sometime soon.

Beautiful sunny day!

Ellie was a gem during our outing. She slept about twenty minutes on the way into Philadelphia. Then she sat in the stroller until an hour or so after lunch when I put her in Clark's back-pack carrier. She fell asleep and slept for maybe fifteen minutes in there. Ellie just doesn't like to miss out on the fun. The lack of sleep caught up with her because she cried for five or ten minutes on the way home before falling asleep.

Shopping is fun

While I was away Jon spent a good portion of the day cutting up a tree with his Dad and Mark DiAddezio on Mark's property. Mark and Nelah then invited us over for dinner to thank us for watching their kids at the last minute and for helping with the tree. Mark made a delicious dinner of lasagna, garlic break, and salad. Nelah made a coconut, chocolate, and caramel bar cookie for dessert. They are both wonderful cooks and everything was delicious.
The long day was wearing on Ellie because she started getting cranky after we had been at DiAddezio's for a little over two hours. I felt bad leaving early but it probably worked out since the next day was Easter.
Sunday morning I originally was asked to be at church at 7:00. Fortunately after about five emails from pleading musicians, Ryan pushed it until 7:30. With the early morning looming I decided to make a breakfast casserole on Saturday evening so that we would have our meal figured out. It was a delicious recipe from Dorothy that you can find here if you are interested. The only alterations I made were at Dorothy's recommendation where I used a bit more basil, did half goat cheese and half cream cheese, and mixed half the tomato blend in with the bread and sprinkled the rest on top. It was delicious, in my humble opinion.

Jon's Easter basket

Jon helped by taking care of Ellie's beauty regiment and loading up the car. We drove together and Jon hung out with Ellie until nursery opened at 8:45. I put Ellie down for a nap between services and we picked her up after worship during second service. The choir sang and did a great job - shout out to Mimi!

Daddy & Daughter

We ran home and I made a chocolate cake and some pineapple stuffing. I was signed up to bring dessert for 15 but had decided I wanted to try the pineapple stuffing so I made both. The cake needed an hour to bake so we ended up being a bit late but only missed the prayer at Mom-mom's. We ate dinner and Ellie hung out with cousin Wyeth while Jon and I ate our dinner. She then took a two hour nap on the floor of the upstairs bedroom. Happy Easter to me!
We left Mom-mom's around 5:15 after the Easter egg hunt and as the crowd began to thin out. Stopping by Grandma and Grandpa's we met Great-Aunt Elsie and Great-Aunt Ida Jean. They are Grandpa's aunts who are in town for a week or so from Florida and Georgia. Everyone was saying goodbye to the DeWalts as we entered and were crowded around the door. Apparently Ellie thought they were all waiting for her because she smiled really big and kicked her feet when we walked in. We hung out for an our and heard Aunt Elsie's biography before heading home.

Mimi, Ellie, & Aunt Elsie

We love Grandma!

I put Ellie to bed while Jon tried to find a movie to watch on Amazon Prime. When I finally came downstairs he was halfway through a "Tank Wars" episode. We finished watching it together and decided to go to bed since we were both too tired to watch a movie. It felt so nice to go to bed at 9:30.

I tried to get a nice family picture at church but Ellie was tired at that point and wouldn't look at the camera (apparently my shirt was infatuating). So no nice family Easter picture this year!

Our attempt. Fail. 

Ellie wanted some soda

Hanging out with Dad.