Traditions and Spontaneity

We had a bad storm over the weekend and lost our power for about 15 hours as a result of it.  With three sick kids already, this made for a looooong night.  Addi was the first to wake up to a cold and completely dark room.  She was up and down the rest of the night.  Would have just put her in bed with us, but this child hates to cuddle; at least with us.  She has a blanky she can't sleep without.  She likes to cuddle up to it at night and fall asleep as she listens to her christian lullaby CD.  Rocking her is out of the question.  Won't even let us hold her bottles for her anymore.  Guess she has turned into little miss independent.

Now when the boys woke up, they woke up in a panic.  We were woken up by the boys, mostly Daniel, screaming for mommy.  He was terrified!  Crying so hard I never thought I'd calm him down.  Nathan and I dug through their toy boxes to find their Thomas and Percy flashlights.  We found them; big mistake!  These lights only stay on for about 15 seconds each time the botton is pushed.  Each and everytime the bottons are pushed, a loud train whistle blows.  It doesn't take anymore then three minutes to drive anyone insane.  So after some searching and banging around in the dark, we find and trade the boys their flashlights for their portable DVD player.  This kept them quiet the rest of the night, but now Addi is up again...

Despite all the chaos and lack of sleep, we had a fun morning without the TV or video games to keep us entertained.  At least almost no TV.  We had fun building a fort with the boys with blankets and chairs.  Once our fort was built, we all crawled in to watch Megamind.  Addi even joined us once she got up from her nap, but not before forcing Maddie out. 

On Sunday, mom drove down and went to church with us.  Afterwards, we went to the 2nd Annual Easter Egg Hunt in Princeton.  Turned out to be a waste of time.  They were out of parking places by the time we got there.  After finding and making our own parking place, the egg hunt for the boys age group was over.  It was hard to hear what they were saying over the loud speaker, but it sounded like there was to be another hunt for the younger kids in 30 minutes.  The flyer offered free lunch, so we decided to grab a hotdog while we waited.  After standing in line for about 30 minutes for a cold hotdog, we had missed this hunt as well.  We decided just to head home and have our own Easter egg hunt.  The boys came with Easter baskets ready to find Easter eggs and we weren't gonna disappoint them!  $40 and 40 plus Easter eggs later, we had us an Egg Hunt!!  Mom and I probably went a little overboard when buying the eggs and candy, especially since we still plan and have everything ready for our traditional egg hunt on Easter Sunday, but it was worth it. 

We also jumped the gun on coloring eggs this year.  Like every year, it's always a chaotic mess!!  Boys fighting over whose turn it is to use what color, Denton spilling the red dye all over the table and floor, daddy eating the eggs faster then we can color them, Daniel deciding he'd rather color his hands instead of the eggs, Addi crying because she can't have an egg...at least not without trying to shove the whole thing in her mouth.

It can be stressful, but Easter just isn't Easter without all our family traditions.  This is how memories are made!  Not only are traditions a great way to help build and store memories, but spontaneity is as well!  And pictures help us to remember these.  I have some great memories from my childhood and I want the kids to be able to say the same.  Kids need parents who takes time to be in the present to build memories for their future's past.