I was in school Monday through Thursday and it was a bit frustrating because the weather was nice most of the time and I could only work in the garden in the evenings. The days leading up to the weekend seemed to drag by so slowly. On Wednesday we had a nice event. Kurt bought a new tractor and it arrived that afternoon. When I got home from school, he had already tilled new rows out in the big garden. We have big plans for this year’s garden and it’s nice to have a fine piece of equipment to do the hard work.
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| The new tractor. |
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| Kurt tilling new garden rows. |
With a few days of nice weather, the growing world has burst forth. The first of our daffodils, the little tete-a-tetes, are open as are the first hyacinths. In the woods and wilder places, the alder trees are in bloom with their silky gray flowers, and the willows, wild cherries, and maples have broken bud. The hills are showing new color. In my orchard, the crab apples, always the first to wake up, have broken bud and the hazel hedge is flowering. Around the garden, the lilacs are leafing out. In the lawn and the flowerbeds, thousands upon thousands of maple seed have sprouted. When I mow, which I hope will be this week sometime, that will take care of the sprouts in the lawn, but the sprouts in the flowerbeds will have to be weeded out by hand. Everywhere I look there is new life springing from the earth and it makes me so happy.
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| Corydalis blooming. |
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| The first little daffodils. |
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| Lilac breaking bud. |
Thursday afternoon we left for Toeldo and our big celebration weekend. The drive across Pennsylvania, New York and most of Ohio was uneventful. We arrived at the Foster’s house at 9:30 that night. The Thayns arrived at 1:00 AM.
We had several big events on Friday. We went to the Toledo Zoo. I love to go to zoos and the Toldeo Zoo was a nice one. We had a fun time exploring the park and looking at the animals. After the zoo, we stopped for ice cream.
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| At the zoo. |
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| On the carousel at the zoo. |
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| June with a friendly ray. |
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| Hazel with her ice cream cone. |
Friday night was the first night of Passover, and in keeping with our family tradition, we held a Seder. As we read our Haggadah and told the story of the deliverance of the Children of Israel from bondage, we discussed how at the Last Supper, Christ and his disciples were holding a Passover Seder and how the symbols of the Passover point to the Savior and the redemption of mankind. As always, the food was outstanding. We had our traditional menu of apricot chicken, asparagus, potato latkes, and haroset, and almond bread and pound cake for dessert.
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| Passover. |
On Saturday we had a little work project in the Foster’s backyard. We trimmed bushes, power washed the patio, and tidied the yard. When that was done, we had several Easter egg hunts. Later, we dyed eggs. Dinner that evening was delicious tacos. That evening we had a birthday party for Mabel. She’ll be five this Thursday and we wanted to celebrate while we were all together.
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| Easter egg hunt. |
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| Dying eggs. |
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| Mabel's birthday party. |
Easter Sunday the Toledo Stake, where Sarah and Tosh live, had a Stake Conference, which we attended. The main speakers were Elder Neil A. Anderson of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles and his wife. It was a very nice meeting and afterward all the Thayn girls got to shake Elder Anderson’s hand. After church we had our traditional Easter dinner – ham, funeral potatoes, zesty carrots, fruit salad, and rolls. For dessert we had cake. And all weekend we ate chocolate covered peanut-butter and coconut eggs that Miriam made. After dinner, we played games and visited. The Thayn’s left to go home that evening. We stayed one more night.
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| At Stake Conference. |
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| After church. |
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| Hazel, June, Mabel, and Florence with their Easter baskets. |
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| Our Easter feast. |
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| Miriam's chocolate Easter eggs. |
We left the Fosters house for home at 9:30 this morning. It was raining all the way, but as we got closer to home, the rain turned to snow – of course. So we are home now. Our great weekend is over. Kurt took care of my animals while we were gone and I’m thankful for that. Now we will return to our usual routine. It looks like the snow will only be with us through tomorrow and then it will warm up and it will go away -- again. We plan on getting new chicks this week. I found packages waiting for me when we got home and I have asparagus and strawberries to plant. We’re all a bit subdued after such a fun weekend with so much family, but we have some big events coming up in May – a trip to Gettysburg and the Washington D.C. Temple open house. And Josiah will be coming home for a visit and bringing his girlfriend for us to meet. And so life goes on.
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When we got home this afternoon.
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Dan
