Grandma Walker's Easter Eggstravaganza 2106

It's become a massive tradition.

It involves 21 grandchildren and 630 eggs.  

It's epic (and a little bit crazy...as in loud, messy, nuts and the kids love every second of it).

It's Grandma Walker's Easter Eggstravaganza.

The Walker Family Grandchildren...all 21 of them.

The amount of work and $$ my mom puts into this easter egg hunt is phenomenal and I so appreciate it.   It also gets me out of doing much for Easter as far as the bunny goes which makes me even more grateful.   This was the first year that the entire Walker family attended the hunt.  Jon and Caprice flew in from Seattle and Jolyn and Dan drove down from their new home in Kennewick.  

A few shots of my egg hunters.

Grady in all his three year old glory.

The Colbsters

Princess Herself.

My almost teenager.

The wild one.

....I don't even think he noticed the eggs right underneath him.

To make this year a little more exciting, the bunny hid a few eggs in a super high tree.

The teenagers had to work a little for their candy.

 

And come to find out, the bunny has a sick sense of humor and left random stuff in some eggs.

Mwhahahahaha.

(All was fair and right in the end.  Andrew's big eggs were chock full of candy and it was just his little eggs that had treasures like business cards and Tums in them.)

There were a few mishaps as well as a few eggs dropped into precarious places.

Thank goodness Super Hero Jared was there to make things right!

 I tried hard to get pictures of all the grandkids in their "groups".

Holly, Walker and Andrew

Leah, Sadie and Saylor...and their matching boots.

 The little boys...even though they aren't very little anymore.

Dawson, Colby, Wes, AJ and Dean

Wyatt and Carter

These two are the absolute best of buds.

There is never a cross word or argument.  Wyatt stayed two nights at our house and the giggling (manly of course) was heard way past 11pm.

Annie, Whitney and Meg

Three of the kindest girls I have ever met.

 We attempted the four littlest boys, but only managed three.  

Bentley, Blair and Grady.

Grant was inside feasting on candy at this point.

Blair ran off lickity split- so this is the best shot I got of these two.

Two Month Recap in Pictures...in no particular order...aka huge photo dump

The last (almost two) months have been a blur of activity and my computer still hates my phone.  

Last night, Steve and I spent WAY too much time getting my phone pictures onto the computer...so in honor of the hour of my life I will never get back, here are a bunch (boat load) of pictures from the last two months.

 The front of our house just a few days before we closed.

My blue door.

Yeah...I love it.

This place is all mine.

(ok...really the bank owns it...but in 20 something years it will be all mine.)

Our move in day was as crazy as could be expected.  This included moving our new fridge into place.  The fridge BARELY fit...as in maybe a centimeter clearance on the top.  The cabinets above it are rendered useless as we cant get them open.  But, I really don't care because my fridge is huge and amazing.  Who knew I could love a kitchen appliance so much!

 We had some fun teenagers help us move in and we paid them in pizza.  I so love Andrew's friends.

I think I took this picture for my sisters...the house was obviously cleaned for the photo.

Because lets be honest, our house usually looks like this.

Not long after we moved in, Valentines Day happened.

I made the kids my usual homemade cards and bought them Fredrickson's caramel hearts.

Saylor love the chocolate...wasn't too keen on the card.

She's a fickle one this girl.

Steve got about 6 or so cards from me stashed around the house Valentines Day.

Too bad he was super sick with strep and didn't really get to enjoy them.

It was a rough couple of weeks with almost everyone falling sick.   We might have to name those weeks something dramatic like "The Dixon Plague of 2016" as it felt that horrible.

Yuck.

Andrew got signed up for driver's ed. 

He officially starts in April. 

He's ready to drive and I'm ready to have a driver.

Colby had his second Pine Wood Derby race and he came in 2nd in his den and 2nd overall.

He was pretty happy about the whole thing.

My niece Holly had a bad sledding accident where she broke her eye orbit in two places and has to have surgery to repair the breaks.  The day after the accident we visited her and Andrew and Holly compared their Asian eyes.

Andrew may have still won.

Oh...Andrew is growing out his hair and desperately wants a Man-Bun.

I declared what he has now as a Man-Piggy.

Maybe by August he will have a proper bun and not something that resembles Saylor's hair at 12 months. 

We have made LOTS of gluten filled chocolate chip cookies since moving in.

Steve had me write down the recipe and then he taped it on the inside of the cupboard for easy access.

I think everyone here is grateful for two ovens!

Colby finished his Native American diorama.

I will say there is big difference between a first child school project and a third child project.

Call it laziness, being overwhelmed, or whatever you want to...but we were just happy it got done.

Our firepit project got finished too.

I'm super grateful Steve was willing to trade this project out for dental care. 

The firepit and flowerbed retaining walls are just beautiful.

Steve and I discuss often that Andrew lives a way more exciting life than Steve and I ever have.

He's a lucky punk.

New baby cousins are the BEST.

We love love love baby Cole.

Carter had his spring time orchestra concert.

Steve went and I stayed home with the little kids.

I can't wait until it's my turn to go.  Carter loves the cello so much and keeps hinting for me to buy him one.  Sigh...I wish I could.

Grady loves to be beautiful. 

Andrew is running for Junior Class Treasurer.

I hope he wins, it would be a fun opportunity for him.

Colby rocked the science fair yet again.

(My last year running the fair.  Super happy about that one!)

Saylor is adorable...and we really love hand me down boots from cute neighbor girls!

Steve helped our nephew AJ with his Pine Wood Derby car when Jared was out of town.

AJ got 3rd in his den.  Awesome!

We've worked in our yard...mostly moving rock where we want it and removing it where we don't want it.  I honestly cant wait for our grass to be planted!  I get giddy when I think of it being warm enough to plant flowers.

 Carter, Colby and AJ played hookie and went skiing with Grandpa.

And really...Andrew has more fun than the rest of us combined!

Grady turned Three!

 Our Grady Paul turned three yesterday.

I'm flabbergasted that he's already three...it has all gone so fast!

We lit the candles for him and sang at least four times...because Grady is the youngest, singing Happy Birthday is his favorite thing ever,  and it's the only way to get enough pictures.  

 The whole gang helped in the celebration including Walker visiting from Boise.

The singing got rowdy at times.

 Really rowdy. 

Our ears were splitting by the time it was over.

But I dare say that Grady loved every crazy second of it.

Cutest candle blower I've ever seen!

 Older siblings were attentive and loving...even making the best homemade cards and banner ever.

Grady received a new truck, a book, and a bunch of lizards that somehow crawled on his cake. 

(Kind of love family birthday parties.  They are small, fun, minimal, and full of love.  I also love birthday gifts for three-year-olds.  They really don't car what they get!)

Got to love that little (growing up way too fast) face.

Earlier in the day, Grady's birthday buddy Jeff Bulkley and family showed up with balloons for the birthday boy.  We are so lucky to have such wonderful friends and neighbors who love our children!

Happy 3rd Birthday Grady!

Grady went to bed for the first time as a three-year-old with three lizards and his new truck tucked in under the covers next to him.  Perfect ending to a perfect day.