Easter

On Easter morning we woke up and got the kids dressed and drove down River Road to Slumber Falls to attend the pre-egg hunt Easter service. It's out in the open by the river under huge live oak trees.

After what felt like endless singing and the praising, Scott started his sermon. Most of the congregation tuned out to think of important things like breakfast and the egg hunt. But Evan was very attentive. And he's not heard a rhetorical question in his life. So as needed he jumped right in. When Scott said "love him", Evan added "with my heart!". And then there was a rousing yell of "Chesus" a bit later. And when Scott asked (rhetorically again) if anyone listened to NPR both Evan and Vivian's hands shot up. By the end of the sermon Michelle was sure Evan's going to be a preacher.

Afterwards, the young lads who play the guitar and the drums at Nicolle's church played Happy Birthday for Evan. Then it was on to breakfast and the egg hunt. In the afternoon the cousins came over to Grandma's. Eggs were cracked open and all sorts of candy was dutifully snarfed down. By the time we returned to Austin it was past bedtime and the children were asleep in the car.

The day wasn't busy but there was so much going on that I realized that Evan had turned four and I had not given him a proper hug or wished him a happy birthday.

Wildflowers

After a nap after Easter dinner I asked Vivian and Evan to come up to the blue bonnets so I could take a photo. They hemmed and hawed and when the finally did, they had a bad attitude. So I sent them back down. I'll keep the one I took last year as my phone's lock screen for another year. Here it is.

But then I walked around and stuck my iPhone here and there and ended up with some photos of spring in the Hill Country. It smells as good as it looks.

Lady Bug

Last year Evan regularly graced the photo galleries of the weekly email newsletter from his pre-school. Back when his teachers called him Sweet Evan and he kept his turdish tendencies hidden from them. No so often this year. But here's a picture from the pages of the august publication from last week - Evan with a ladybug crawling at the end of his middle finger.

On Wednesday afternoon while Jo and I were enjoying a quiet lunch at China Cafe and relishing the feeling that Evan was going to stay at school an hour later than usual (for Soccer Shots) my phone rang. It was the director of his pre-school. Evan's ear was hurting. Could we come get him?

We drove to Evan's school and found him in Leigh Ann's arms. He was in tears and his left ear was bright red. We brought him home and Jo took him to Dr. Griggs. Apparently things didn't go that well there when the nurse tried to clean out his ear which was so full of wax that the doctor couldn't see very much.

Later that evening we had to put some drops in his ear. He resisted and threw a fit and got completely irrational. I tried to explain that it wouldn't hurt. That I was just going to put two tiny drops of medicine in his ear. That the medicine would take the pain away. I even had him hold the dropper and squeeze a drop on my hand. The trauma of the afternoon's experience obviously still bothered him. Till Jo said "OK - no medicine, no birthday party". And he lay is head down quietly on my lap and said "Daddy - I'm ready for the medicine". Just like that. I can only conclude that Evan actually fakes irrationality to get away with shit.

After he was done with the ear drops, Jo said "Evan, now you need to take some Tylenol". Evan asked if that medicine would also be given in his ear. I replied "No, we are going to drill a hole in the side of your head and pour it in". Payback. The look on his face for a second was worth it!

At the end of the day, while Evan snores softly, the image that I still have in my head is of Evan tightly holding on to Leigh Ann while tears roll down his cheeks. She sat cross-legged on the floor of her office comforting Evan on her lap.  Thank you Grace Garden for taking such good care of our children for so many years.

ps. And that was it. No fever. No pain after that.

Piñata

On Wednesday while Evan was at school Jo and I drove down First Street to buy him a piñata. This is what greeted us at the first piñata store - a gaggle of Easter Bunny piñatas looking rather creepy.

Jo ran in to the store and stepped back out in about 30 seconds with this beauty. Our own creepy piñata. Later we scared Evan with it. If you aren't up on your Star Wars or are unable to see the resemblance and are wondering why we bought home a piñata of a hairy short armed man in a gas mask with the Windows logo on his chest, it's Darth Vader.

Meanwhile, Jo has been churning out light sabers faster than a Chinese labor camp making pirated merchandise. This morning the dining table looked like this.

And then a box from Amazon showed up with the Darth Vader voice changer helmet.  Evan looks suitably freakish wearing it. But Vivian is the one who asked for it - so she can have light saber duels with Evan's birthday party guests.