Happy Easter to you. I hope you have a blessed holiday with family and friends. I'll be attending Easter services with the fam, then making a ham, spring pea risotto, and asparagus for lunch. And carrot cake. Carrot cake is a must on Easter, the Easter Bunny says so.
And I'm sure at some point I'll spend time thinking about what this holiday means to me. As a child growing up Protestant, I found Eastertime to be quite the interesting season. For weeks ahead of time there were preparations made in the way of Easter dresses and shoes and bonnets for my sister and I. Our dresses were always in pastel shades of yellow, pink, green, or blue and our shoes were always white. Palm Sunday was a big deal at church, like the trailer before the big show. What I remember most about those Easter services were the lillies that lined the front altar. Through little girl eyes it seemed like a thousand Easter lillies, but I'm sure it was closer to 75. There was always a contata on Easter Sunday, a big musical service with bunches of hymns and I could never keep up with what page in the hymnal the music minister said to turn to. The whole sanctuary singing in unison in their Easter finest was a sight to behold. I loved it.
What I didn't understand was what my beautiful Easter service had to do with the bunny who had broken into our house and filled my Easter basket with trinkets and candy. Even as a little girl I was cynical and suspicious. It didn't make much sense that we celebrated our risen Savior by hiding eggs, even if the eggs contained candy.
I never bought the whole Easter Bunny thing. Somehow as a child, the magic Santa made sense, but a giant bunny delivering stuff was proposeterous. Rabbits don't even have pockets, how were they supposed to bring me jelly beans? See? Ridiculous.
Even now, as a mom of three, I don't go crazy filling the kids' baskets because I want them to focus on the miracle of Jesus, not a make believe rabbit with candy and stuff. Plus, Molly caught on last year at age seven. She admitted she didn't think a bunny was responsible for filling their baskets because as she said, "mom, bunnies don't have money or elves to make Webkinz." I can't argue with logic.
And if someone wishes me a "hoppy Easter" I reserve the right to punch them in the face. Be forewarned, I hate that. I know that's not very Christian of me, but I have warned you. Happy Easter.
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