Forced Frost Fun-- AKA White House Easter Egg Roll 2010

Yes, it is that time of year again in Washington D.C., time to win tickets to the White House Easter Egg Roll. And these are no easy tickets to come by -- I had eight different people put their names into the egg lottery, and only one of my minions (Crystal) was lucky enough to get these golden tickets .

I was excited to go again, but Mike's view of the White House Easter Egg Roll was tarnished because he wasn't invited to have breakfast with Obama last year. But this wasn't going to stop me from going.

The Monday after Easter was the big day. Our assigned time was 11:45-1:45 and we needed to be there at 11:00 to get in line. The fact that this is right in the middle of lunch and Henry's nap didn't dissuade me -- I packed extra snacks, and I knew as long as we kept moving Henry would be fine. But the unexpected downfall of the whole event was the unseasonable high temperature and humidity.

Two hot kids waiting in the hour long line, but still (kind of) tolerating the the heat to get inside this great event.

Yay, we made it onto the White House grounds. This is where Megan's discomfort won out (we have only been here ten minutes), and she didn't think this event was as great as Mom had made it out to be. But note she is still at least trying to smile.

The famous White House Easter Egg Roll. Henry liked it, but it is hard not being able to walk. Megan was too hot to even try rolling an egg in the big race.

The Famous picture in front of the White House.

No longer even trying to to smile for the camera. Just whining about the heat.

Story time with Betty Degeneres (Ellen's mom).

I just knew the kids would love this.

This face is perfect.

The stage, with Sara Somebody

One last try for the perfect White House picture.

It's ironic this year's theme was "Ready, Set, Go," because that pretty much sums up our day.

P.S. Obama made his entrance the time frame before us. Again.

P.P.S. Thanks again, Crystal.

Mike's phone sleeps with the fishes

Optional soundtrack for this post


For Easter weekend we joined up with our friends the Browns and the Lamberts and rented a house from VRBO in Port Republic, MD. This was the view of the Chesapeake Bay from our deck.



We woke up early Saturday morning and ran down to the water. Megan was loving these binoculars.




Henry has become quite daring (reckless) lately. He just wanted to get to where the other kids were.


Meg and Henry sword fighting. Megan is pretty good, she usually whacks my fingers bloody when we do this with our firewood in the backyard.


The cabin had some sea kayaks for us to borrow, and I headed straight out to open water as soon as I could. Sadly, I was a little too excited to empty my pockets first, and my phone was lost at sea.


We had over 900 channels, but none of them were carrying conference (way to go, Comcast), so we got it through a radio app on someone's iPhone, and connected it through the TV so that we could hear the audio. We also used the iPhone to locate the churches nearest to us, and then looked on google maps for one that looked like it had a satellite dish so we could go there for the priesthood session. At this point, the opportunity to replace my lost phone with one of these handy devices was pretty appealing.


The next day we got in some more time at the beach. The weather was pretty warm, but it was still early April, so the water was not worth venturing into. Somehow, that didn't matter to Megan at all.


Henry continued his balancing tricks.


Once Megan got too cold, she decided to make herself as dirty as possible before getting back into the car.






Like the incredible mom that she is, Kim brought all kinds of great Easter things for the kids. We had a good time dyeing eggs.








The kids loved finding their Easter baskets.


Megan raced all over the yard in her bare feet, impervious to the liquid amber seed pods that were everywhere in her haste to beat out the other two year olds that were part of the easter egg hunt. She definitely won.




P.S. If you ever want me to be able to call you again, email me your phone number.