Easter memories

Easter. My memories are vivid. My grandparents visiting. Going to church on Sunday. Dressing up in a new Easter dress. Getting an Easter basket in the morning filled with candy, chocolate, a hardboiled egg that we colored the day before... and a stuffed bunny of some kind.

As always Mom made it special. How thankful I am for those memories.

And there were always flowers. Mom would buy some for my grandmother... maybe lilies, maybe tulips... usually one would be for me too.... Hyacinths were my favorite. Probably the reason I always have to buy one when Easter comes around each year. When I smell the fragrance I always stop in my tracks and .... well it just brings me back... instantly... Isn't that nice?

This time of the year there would be tulips and daffodils blooming in the yard outside of my New Jersey home.

So this year is no different. I colored eggs because I love to participate in the memories that are still part of my present...

And I buy some flowers. And drink in their sweetness... and all the love I remember ...

Easter memories

As a little girl Easter was a happy time. My grandparents would come to visit on Friday and stay until Sunday. Mom would make a fish dinner Friday night, and Saturday would be a time for visiting. The house would smell like hyacinths and tulips, daffodils and lilies!

On Sunday, Easter morning, we would don our new Easter outfits and go to church but not before we found our Easter baskets which had been put out the night before. Inside would be chocolate bunnies, jelly beans, and whatever else mom picked out that year. Usually mine would also include a stuffed animal rabbit. I loved that!

Included in the mix would be one or two of the colored hard boiled eggs we had dyed the day before. I have been coloring Easter eggs for five decades and I'm not about to stop now! Some years I'd color them with my mom and brother.... later with my own daughters... Sometimes they'd be fancy and the mix would be messy. Sometimes they'd be simple with stickers.  Although now I often color them by myself it's still fun and worth doing because it brings back fun memories ... and they are so pretty... and edible!!

I've come to know Easter as the most important holiday of the year. Jesus didn't just die a cruel death on Friday, but he proved that all his previous words were true by rising from the grave on Sunday morning! This historical fact gives hope to a confused and suffering world. 

And I'm very grateful.