Good Stewarts, good times and Good Friday

This week has been great. My mother-in-law, Ruth, came for a visit at the beginning of this week, and we got to go to the Outlet mall and P.F. Chang's, and have tons of fun with her. She got the girls lots of adorable outfits at the mall, and just spoiled them rotten. We also got to visit with Dave's brother, Daniel, and our sister-in-law, Xiaolan, while Ruth was here. We were sad that Granny Ruth had to leave on Thursday. Thankfully though, we've had a lot of stuff to do to distract us from that sad departure. Thanks for coming Granny!! We all miss you.

After Ruth left on Thursday, we got to go to a great Maunday-Thursday church service. We enjoyed it, and were thankful to have a service that ushered in this Easter weekend.

Unfortunately, Dave wasn't off work on Good Friday. The girls and I made the most of it though. We went for a walk, watered our new flowers, talked about Jesus' death and resurrection, and opened a very fun box from my parents for Easter. In the box was playdough, pez dispensers, a book that has my parents' recorded voices reading it, and a lot of other fun things. The girls have taken turns listening to the book, and often try to respond to their Mimi and Papa like they are there. They love it. The pic below is of them playing with the playdough they sent.

Here is the home-made story aides I threw together.

Today, the four of us spent most of the day outside. Dave mowed and started a garden out back. I spread weed killer and came very close to breaking our washing machine. We both lopped branches from bushes and trees and then did clean up. I made a lemon poppyseed pound cake for tomorrow and started marinating our pork tenderloin. We usually grill the pork, but...we got rid of our grill when we moved. So, we are baking it this year.
I also hard-boiled a dozen eggs, but only 10 lived and were dyed. First we colored the eggs, after that, we dunked them.

Here's the finished product.

I hope that everyone has a wonderful Easter!!! I'll post the girls in their Easter dresses soon. (Thank you Grandma Christie and Grandpa Dan for their dresses.) Love, Amber