"You're so cute, aren't you pretty girl, yes you look so pretty in your fancy dress, yes you do," Jo cooed as she tickled her fingers over Helena's belly.
Jo bounced Helena on her knee as her baby giggled. The two of them were sitting in Meredith's backyard wearing matching frilly flowered dresses next to Maggie and Winston. Alex and Amelia were inside with the other four kids, holding them off as Meredith and Link ran around the backyard as they set up the Easter egg hunt hiding dozens and dozens of eggs around the yard. Although they were still in the midst of a pandemic all the adults had worked to make this day as normal as possible for the kids.
"All right, we're ready," Meredith shouted, having placed the last egg.
Not two seconds later Alex and Amelia opened the back door and Zola, Bailey, Ellis, and Scout came barreling out and started racing around the yard trying to find as many Easter eggs as possible. Jo smiled as she watched them run around, until Alex appeared in front of her with the tiny little Easter basket that they had for Helena and scooped her up and she giggled.
"What are you doing?" Jo asked, but she laughed as she watched Alex run around the yard and pick up a few eggs, handing each one to her before putting it in the basket. "Those aren't for her."
Everybody else laughed and no one moved to stop him so Jo sat back and pulled out her camera as she watched her husband and daughter in their first Easter egg hunt. She loved that he went out of his way to make sure that their daughter had the perfect childhood.
"Uncle Alex," Ellis stopped in front of him and grabbed one of the eggs from his hand. "Those aren't for you, the eggs are for the kids, you're an adult act like it."
Jo's eyes went wide as she giggled. Ellis was so adorably like Meredith that sometimes it was uncanny.
"Aw, come on Ellis can't Helena have a few eggs?" Alex asked, kneeling down and set Helena on her knee.
"Uncle Alex is right, we should share, but since Helena can't have any chocolate, how about we just give her all of the plastic eggs without candy?" Zola said, offering the baby an opened purple egg.
"Okay that seems fair," Ellis said as she opened one of her eggs and put the chocolate in her basket, but put the egg in the basket Alex had.
With the compromise settled Alex came back who sat next to her as Jo laughed and playfully smacked his chest. "Why did you do that?"
"I don't know, it's just that it's her first Easter and I know she won't remember it, but she can still enjoy it and I wanted to make it special," Alex said with a shrug as he looked down at Helena who chewed on a purple plastic egg.
Jo softened and reached over to put her hand on his neck as she leaned in to kiss his cheek. Growing up Jo and Alex didn't have typical Easters. For Jo, it meant being forced into an itchy dress for pictures and smiles and churches with foster parents who only cared about the dress and not the girl wearing it. For Alex it was barely even a holiday, his dad was too drunk to care and his mom was usually off her meds, butJo knew that Alex tried to make it nice for Amber and Aaron when they got older, by stealing a little bit of candy and letting them each die one egg with food coloring. When it came to their daughter, both of them wanted to make sure that every holiday was special.
"Who's got the best Daddy in the whole wide world? You do, yes you do," Jo said as she leaned in and kissed Helena's cheek as she laughed and reached out for Jo who scooped her up.
"She's got a pretty good Mommy too," Alex said, wrapping his arm around her waist and pulling her in closer as he leaned in and kissed her lips.
They both watched as the rest of the kids raced around to find the last few Easter eggs. Helena squirmed and Jo sat down in the grass with her as she leaned against Alex's legs. Helena played with the dozens of Easter eggs that her cousin's spilled all around her and it was so wonderfully perfect. Alex leaned down and kissed the top of Jo's head as she looked up at him before they looked back and watched their daughter play.