Easter

Easter Sunday was such a wonderful family day.  Amazingly wonderful for having one of us in the hospital.  The kids and I stopped at Toys R Us on the way to the hospital that day and bought some extra special gifts for Daniel's Easter basket.  We picked out a giant blue bear, a new car mat, a Thomas the train set, and some duplo Mickey Mouse Legos.  This was paired with a Nike blue shirt and a World's Greatest Brother outfit that I had already purchased.

The World's Greatest Brother outfit ended up being what we buried him in.

For the past 7 years, we have eaten family style at Maggiano's Italian Restaurant on Easter Sunday.  This year we picked up take out and brought it to Children's Hospital, with promises for going to the real restaurant when Daniel came home.

After our dinner we headed to the tiny courtyard at Children's.  Within a few minutes my baseball loving family had figured out a way to play "ball" (as Daniel called it) in that small courtyard.  They used a blue and white tiny football from Daniel's Easter basket (that the hospital gave him) and their arm as a bat.  They made up rules about how people were safe and out depending on when the football was back to the pitcher.

They argued about calls (which made it feel like we were in the backyard) and Daniel and I sat on a bench and watched.  He was so happy watching them. And it was a great opportunity to capture that newly missing front tooth.

I loved when he clasped his hands like this sitting cross-legged.  So glad I snapped this photo.

He was a lover of selfies too, so we took a few as we watched together...

 And every few minutes, we would take out the real bat and ball so Daniel could hit.  He was too sick to run much, but he loved hitting the ball.

This was one of his favorite things to do in excitement with his daddy...

...they are both exclaiming "BALL!" after a great hit.

These are the last photos I have of my five kids together.  I will treasure them always.

 He was the World's Greatest Brother.  And he has the best brothers and sisters in the world.

Lizzy has sleep with the giant blue bear every night since he died.  It was not until after he died that we noticed the bear has beautiful brown eyes.  Just like Lizzy and Daniel.