Hippity Hoppity!

Sam's First Easter!

We had a great Easter! We celebrated an early Easter (and Phy's 60th birthday!) with Chip, Phy, Aunt Meredith & Uncle Mike the weekend before, then headed to North Carolina to celebrate with the Stricklands - Nana, Papa, and Uncle David.

Sam's favorite part of the holiday: EASTER EGGS! Nana gave him a big bowlful of plastic eggs, and Sam dove in headfirst! He played with them all weekend. He pulled them apart, put them together, dumped them out, threw them around, shook them, banged them, dropped them, picked them up, and...of course...ate them.

Sam and Dad made some delicious Easter cupcakes with sprinkles...now, Sam just wishes he were allowed to EAT one!

Hopefully Sam will pick up his Dad's culinary skills!

Sam loved his Easter basket! Mom couldn't wait for him to see it...so she convinced the Easter Bunny to arrive a day early! Sam is a lucky little man; apparently his mom, Nana, and Phy all talked to the Easter Bunny and convinced him to bring THREE Easter baskets...lucky guy!

On Easter Sunday, we spent the whole day at The Cabin -- on Papa Hal and Grandma Janie's farm. This is a very special place for our large and ever-growing family - its where we "Swarming Stricklands" have spent every holiday for as long as we all can remember!

This was our first holiday without Papa Hal and Kati, and it just didn't feel the same without them. We planted two cherry trees for them at the farm as a reminder that they'll always be with us...especially when we're there.

After the planting was complete, Sam had a blast hunting Easter eggs with all the other great-grandbabies. Grandma's egg hunt is a long tradition, and it was fun to pass it along to Sam's generation. He may not have found many eggs, but he sure had fun doing it!

Hallie took the prize with 80 eggs!

After we finished planting the cherry trees, Aunt Tricia told us about a recent sermon from their church about "the thin places" - the places where, for you, the line between heaven and earth is very thin. For all of us Stricklands, the Cabin is one of those thin places. It was another gorgeous holiday spent with the people who matter most to us, enjoying God's amazing blessings...and missing those who couldn't be with us.

It was a HOPPY Easter!