What Family's For

Easter is one of my favorite holidays. I love spending time with my family and reflecting on the resurrection of our Savior, Jesus Christ. I loved finding the girls matching Easter dresses and my sister helped me take their picture in the Japanese Gardens in Woodward Park. Keira was quite photogenic, but both of them have been sick for the past 2 weeks, and Liana (who was getting a tooth on top of being sick) was unhappy every time I set her down to take a picture. Family pictures are always so much trouble, but I keep telling myself it's worth it.

This year I planned to sing a solo in sacrament meeting- a song I sang 2 years ago called "The Shepherd of My Soul." I had practiced regularly and was perfectly prepared and looking forward to performing, until Saturday morning I woke up with a terrible sore throat, swollen glands, and headache. My voice was unaltered at that point, but I was worried because I was in so much pain and there was no telling if I would wake up with no voice at all Sunday morning. I had no idea if I was going to be able to pull it off or if I should call it off instead.

I said and prayer and went to bed, then got up at 4 am Sunday morning and took some tylenol, then took some ibuprofen at 6, got a serious pep talk from my cough drops from 7-8 then sang my little heart out at 9:30. It was an Easter miracle for sure. Now my sore throat has retaliated against me for singing despite its efforts to thwart me and has turned into laryngitis. Now I won't be singing anything but the blues... in my head... but I know my prayers were answered Sunday and I am grateful for that.

The cough drop wrappers have encouraging statements on them. I found them incredibly motivating. :)

Our Easter festivities included a barbecue at my Grandpa Don Eslick's house on Saturday afternoon. It was a toasty warm spring day and we enjoyed some time outside visiting and I played several hymns on my flute for my grandpa who hadn't heard me play yet. He commented that he really liked the songs I played, but that his very favorite song is "Because I Have Been Given Much." I happened to have that in my music binder, so I played it for him. I could tell that made him quite happy. That evening, the weather cooled down significantly as a thunder storm moved in. It was a crazy stormy night Saturday night, then Sunday was beautiful, sunny, and crisp again.

My Grandpa Donal Eslick in his natural habitat (in front of his work truck and shop).

We had our Easter celebration at my house and did the Easter egg hunt indoors since it was a bit cold and muddy from the storm. After I sang in our sacrament meeting, Keira went with my mom to Kyle's sacrament meeting to hear him sing. While she was gone, I cleaned up the living room and hid her eggs around the room and hung her basket on the front door with a Happy Easter sign for her to see when she got back.

This was the first time we had an Easter egg hunt for her and she was sorely disappointed to find two $1 bills in a couple eggs instead of candy. I thought that was funny, because I thought kids always get excited about the eggs with money in them. Guess I was wrong. Oh well, ultimately she was happy and ate her weight in peanut M&Ms (which she insists are called jelly beans) and Reese's peanut butter cups (which she calls Daddy candy because they are Art's favorite). We had a tasty tri-tip dinner and enjoyed the day together with my brother Kyle, step-brother Caed, my sister Lauren, and my mom. Unfortunately, Brent and Vivian couldn't make it down to join us, so we ate some tri-tip for them. That is, of course, what family's for.