holidays sure are different with babies

Before you have kids, all you have to worry about on holidays is making sure you wake up in time (since you most likely were up late having fun the night before), get ready, and then head on over to wherever you need to be. And unless you're just super high-maintenance, this can be accomplished within an hour to an hour and a half. For most people, even that's stretching it.

Once you have a baby, holidays like Easter become a tad more complex. Not only do you have to get yourself up and ready, you now have to make sure the little one(s) are fed, clothed, changed, and are reasonably happy. If things like church or family time happen to fall during a normal nap, well then, may God be with you.

I've been working very hard to get Noah on a normal schedule, just so we can start going to church without a sleepy/fussy/hungry/screamy baby. Honestly, the kid is a total angel 90% of the time, even if he's missed a nap. But still. When that happens, I spend the whole time stressed that he's going to lose it any minute.
Anyways, for the last few weeks, I've had Noah on the same nap schedule. I was so excited. All my efforts were leading up to this one day. There was no way I was missing church on Easter. He normally gets up around 7:30ish, then goes back down between 9 and 10am. This would give him plenty of time to get a good nap and us still make it to church on time.

So the Big Day arrived. E-Day. And wouldn't you know it... Noah refused to sleep. We think it has something to do with the fact that Brad is just too much fun. The poor baby wants to stay and party with him, and he just can't wind down. So of course, he's exhausted by the time we put him in the car. He fell asleep on the way there, but naturally, only slept for like 20 minutes.

We got him up, into the church, and he was perfectly happy just sitting on Brad's lap. He watched all the people, listened to the music, smiled at NaeNae and PopPop... then a loud voice started reciting scripture. Noah didn't seem the least bit alarmed. In fact, he was amused by the big screens above the stage, and he loves the music.

The first song begins playing, and Brad looks at me with murderous eyes. I lean over to see what's wrong, and he says, "Noah just peed all over me. You didn't put his daiper on tight enough, and now I'm covered in pee."
Ok, so we were in kind of a rush to get out the door, so it's possible I didn't pay close attention to how snug it was.
So I scooped Noah up, grabbed the daiper bag, and we headed to the ladies room. I knew we had brought a spare set of clothes; however, they were not in the bag. They were out in the car.

I don't know if maybe I'm just slightly crazy or something, but I never panicked. No big deal. I changed him, and then wrapped him up in a blanket. Who cares if my baby is in a nice button up shirt and no pants? Does this make me a bad mom? I certainly hope not.

Anyway, Brad mopped up what he could off of his nice dress pants, and he proceeded to hold naked Noah, with his blanket, for the most of the service. Noah did amazingly, especially for having gone through such an ordeal on barely any sleep. How did we keep him from babbling or crying during the sermon? We gave him the bulletin. Sure, we got a few "head turns" as he kept crinkling and clapping and rustling the paper, but once they saw how cute he was, they gave us a big smile and dealt with it.
I mean, I may let my baby go naked in church, but I'm certainly not letting him go to the nursery yet. I'm sure he'd be fine... but we wouldn't be.
Towards the end, Noah decided he wanted to join in on the fun and help the former Detroit Lion tell his testimony. So Brad took him to the back, and he miraculously got quiet again.

So yes. This Easter was much different than any other Easter I've ever had before.

We spent the rest of the day at my mom's. Normally, we spend Easter at my grandparents with my dad, but my dad and stepmom went to visit my brother in GA for family weekend. We had still planned on going to my grandparents' anyway, but I felt bad for my mom. Turns out, everyone on her side cancelled. She hosts Easter (and almost every holiday) every year for my grandmother, uncle, and cousins. For some reason, this year my grandmother told everyone that she didn't think my mom was doing anything for Easter this year. So they all made other plans. My mom found out on Wednesday. When she asked my grandmother why she did this, her response was, "Well, you just hadn't said anything, so I figured we weren't getting together." This is the same grandmother who calls everytime she sees something on one of those morning shows about childhood obesity and how it can start at the age of 2. My mom keeps reassuring her that if the doctor was worried about Noah, then he'd say something... also Noah is 8 months. My grandmother is something else.

Anyway, so I felt bad for my mom. We decided to spend Easter with her, and I'm glad we did. We were going to visit Brad's family, but his mom has some kind of kidney virus. His dad tried to assure him that only kidney transplant patients are at risk, but you know Brad. She might as well have leprosy.

We took pictures of Noah with his Easter basket. We forgot to take the tag off. Oops. I'm planning on taking more pictures of him outside tomorrow with some flowers. Of course, Brad wants me to make sure it's early morning or at night. And he bought SPF 70 sunblock. I love my husband. He makes me laugh. Yes, I agree that Noah is to be protected from the sun. That's certainly nothing to play with. I just love how Brad operates in extremes. He cracks me up.

Hope everyone had a wonderful Easter!