Easter, Updates, News

Hello Everyone!! It's been over two weeks since my last blog entry and I know that I have been slacking off! I do have a bit of a reason though...I have started watching a little almost-5-month-old boy named Justin in the afternoons. It's been fun adjusting to all the new changes around here. Cole and Justin get along pretty well. Cole is really great with him and entertains him very well. Justin is still not so sure about this guy who is pretty loud and can scoot around him like crazy. I worked at Enterprise with Justin's dad, Eric, and they asked me when they got pregnant if I would think about watching their addition. I am very grateful to finally be pulling in a little money and helping out with the monthly expenses. It is a nice feeling actually contributing something tangible to the family other than meals, raising a kid, laundry and such. I know that is what counts most and I'm so excited that the Lord has afforded me this opportunity to continue to stay home with Cole and to make a little extra cash.
Anyway...Mike has been on Spring Break last week and this week and is thoroughly enjoying spending time with Cole and me. He has needed a break for a while and is so happy! He will go down to CSUN tomorrow night for his classes, but other than that we have been taking it easy for the last week and a half.
Last Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday, we went up to Carpinteria and stayed with my mom and Emilie on their campsite. We were supposed to go up for the whole week, but I needed to watch Justin, so I just drove home for the 4 1/2 hours on Monday and Tuesday to watch him, and then drove back up. It was a ton of fun, and little damp. Mike, Cole and I tried out our new tent that we purchased a month ago...a huge 3-room deal with a doggy door and everything. It was quite an experience getting the thing actually up and ready, but once that was done, it was pretty cool. Cole did okay until about 1:30 a.m. when he woke up and I think was a little cold. So, I jumped up and got him and stuck him between Mike and I in our big double sleeping bag. He went right back to sleep, however, Mike and I didn't sleep at all for fear of rolling on to him! I saw the sun come up and was very excited to get out of the tent and move around. We walked over to the bird reserve about a block away from the campground and saw just a few birds and ducks. Nothing that I hadn't seen before, so I was kinda bummed. But it was still beautiful. We came home on Tuesday afternoon.
This is just a cool pic that Mike took of the beach.
Here's a great one of Cole and Grandma in the motorhome playing with his toys and having a blast!!!
This last weekend was fun...on Friday we went to the Passion/Good Friday service at Grace. It was AWESOME! My mom played harp in the orchestra and they sounded so amazing. I hope all of you had a chance to go that live in Santa Clarita! It was certainly worth it!! We just putted around on Saturday, saving up our energy for Easter Sunday. We woke up pretty early to go to church. We attended the 9 a.m service and then had nursery duty for the 10:45 service. I'll have to admit...we were not too excited about it, thinking it was gonna be packed, but it turned out to be just fine. There was actually only 6 kids in there and there were 5 workers. Not too bad!

Here is a couple of pictures of Cole in his Easter outifit...a three-piece that was quite a hit with the ladies! He decided that he did not want to smile for my camera, so I don't have any pics of him with that oh-so-adorable smile. After church, we headed on down to Camarillo to visit Mike's parents. Emilie, Brice, my mom and dad, Bob, Michelle, Brian, Lindsay, Ashlyn, Addison, Katy, Beau, and Beverly all had a great time eating, visiting, and eating some more! Michelle had quite the feast prepared for us. Bob and Michelle prepared an Easter egg hunt for Ashlyn and Cole and they had a blast hunting them down. Cole actually got it...it was really cute watching him find an egg, get so excited that he would shake :), pick it up, put it in his little basket, and move on to find the next one. He's so DARN cute!! Here's Cole and Ashlyn trying to figure out how to use a new toy that Grammy and PopPop gave them in their Easter baskets. Ashlyn and Addison had matching dresses on....TOO cute!
We've had a great last couple of weeks and we are so thankful for the sacrifice in which we celebrated over the weekend! It definitely has new meaning when you are a parent as you can see just how much God had to give up when he let his one and only son die for all of us. An amazing plan that I am so fortunate to be able to see and appreciate believing in Christ! God is good. He is RISEN!