We enjoyed lots of festivities for Easter including studying the Holy Week in Come Follow Me (which the whole family really did have fun with), attending delicious Easter meals and hunts, and dressing up for the occasion. (As a side note: I didn’t get around to really decorating the mantel. I put my adorable ceramic bunnies up along with the new sign Josh got me, but that’s as far as I got. 🙁 )

I have been super excited for my Easter dress since about February when my inspiration hit. But, for the same reason the mantel never got decorated, it almost didn’t come together. (That reason is: life.) But, as I learned last year, God truly is interested in my priorities and He provided multiple miracles that helped my dream dress come true!

Back in February, it hit me that what I wanted for Easter was white gloves. Not big long formal ones, but super classy wrist length gloves. I started searching pinterest for ways to create an outfit around white gloves and I found Jackie Kennedy. I still don’t know much about Jackie Kennedy as a person; but after the past 3 months of looking up her outfits and use of gloves, I have to say she’s up there in my style book.

My original design for the dress was a single piece A-line dress. But one enormous mystery turned me a totally different direction. I used a pattern that I had drafted (in the past 2 months, I know, because it is on the new parchment paper I got). But after I had the whole thing constructed with darts in place, I realized it was NOT the pattern I thought it was. And I have no idea where it came from or why I drafted it. The pattern I thought I was using was very fitted, and I found that pattern later in my sewing box. The pattern I used was very loose and there was NO way I could turn it into an A-line dress. I even tried, and it was a miserable failure.

Fortunately I decided to follow a different Jackie trend and do a boxy top with a nice fitted skirt. It turned out great! Way better than I deserved! I wore pearls and a simple up-do with my gloves to further channel Jackie without having giant hair.

Anyway, here is a picture of the whole family in our Easter outfits. My smile was getting tired by the time we got everyone to look at the camera. 🙂

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We celebrated 5 wonderful years of having our boy in our family this past Sunday. (My apologies for being so late on this post.) Carter was very proud of the fact that his birthday fell on Easter this year and mentioned the fact to anyone who would listen: the primary, the clerk at the grocery store, the doctor, etc. I must admit, it is pretty great to have your birthday on a holiday!

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One of my favorite things about Carter is that he likes to be a helper. He is the first one to agree to help clean up the house or work on the yard, he will run grab Helen’s blanket for her when she’s sad , and he loves that it makes parents happy when he happily obeys. It is a huge blessing and help for me. I hope it lasts and lasts!

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Carter is a builder! He is very creative at free-building and also very patient and determined with following instructions for building things. He got some Hotwheels car tracks for Christmas and he wanted to take time to try every single different assembly. He loves to share what he has built and get it documented! I love documenting it, so it works out!

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Carter also loves super heroes (Hulk is still his favorite), coloring and drawing, and playing outside. He now prides himself on liking spicy foods, and asked for/received Cholula hot-sauce for his birthday. My favorite thing about it is that he talks all the time about how he likes spicy things and he loves Cholula; but he won’t ask for Cholula if he doesn’t want it. So he probably has it 1 in 6 times Josh and I do. I just love that he doesn’t feel like he has to prove anything to anyone by eating it when he doesn’t want it.

Here are some more moments from our joyful life with Carter.

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Once upon a time–before Carter–I thought it would be fun to have all girls. I am SO GLAD that Heavenly Father knew better! We love our boy so much and totally need his low voice, sweetness, and enthusiasm for saving the day! We just wouldn’t be complete without him.