Easter Sunday

Before Rachel went to bed we made the mistake of telling her that the Easter Bunny would be coming in the morning. After we put her to bed we realized that we meant to say that the Easter Bunny would be coming while we were at church because there was no way we were doing Easter baskets before church. Rachel, unfortunately, forgets nothing so we knew we were going to be in trouble in the morning when there was no Easter basket to be found.

Luckily, Grandma set out a communal basket of candy before she went to bed and Rachel found that in the morning and was as happy as a clam even though we told her that it wasn't all for her.

Church was lovely; we struggled through sacrament meeting, but the parts that I heard were nice, and then we taught primary. We sang two Easter hymns, which was nice, but seriously...what is with people here and not enjoying seasonal hymns while they can?! Why didn't we sing Easter songs last week?! I know no one will want to sing Easter songs in May, but seriously, there are so many pretty songs that we ignore for the rest of the year so I think that we should sing them all at least once during the Easter season!

Anywho...we also sang with the choir but had neglected to arrange other people for our girls to sit with while we did so. I just plopped Miriam on Phillip's lap when I walked past his family and she wasn't too happy about that so James ended up taking her into the hallway. Rachel chose to sit with my mom's cousin Burt and his wife. For some weird reason she boycotted the Gillespies and I can't understand why because she adores both Phillip and James. Whatever.

We sang There Is A Green Hill Far Away, which was fine...but, again...not an Easter song. I realize it speaks of the atonement and that's what Easter all about but I miss Easter songs. I crave them like I crave Christmas carols. Why won't they just sing them in church?

After church I herded the girls into the backyard to colour with chalk while the Easter Bunny hid their baskets.

Some of us have issues with chalk and prefer to chew on it more than draw with it unless we're drawing on things we're not supposed to, like the screen door or Mommy's back.

I also tried to get some nice pictures of the girls in their Easter dresses. Miriam got hers at Christmas from Auntie K and I was hoping she'd grow into it by Easter. It was still a little too big but I didn't have anything else "new" for her to wear as an Easter dress so she wore it, anyway. 

Don't they just look thrilled? Yeah, not so much. But then Daddy walked outside and Miriam started beaming. She likes her daddy (so do I).

I don't know what Rachel was doing but somehow she managed to completely zone out. She didn't notice when Daddy came outside and she didn't notice when Miriam ran off and she didn't hear us tell her the Easter Bunny Came.

"Hey, smile!" I prompted.

This is what I got:

She was kind of dazed for a while. She had trouble finding her Easter stuff and was just a little...off. I think she really needed some post-church "rest time."

We got the girls helmets and t-shirts and Grandma provided the stuffed animals and candy.

Miriam was much more quick about finding her treasures, which Andrew hid in a separate room of the house to avoid any confusion on ownership. She walked into the office and immediately snatched up her duckie and she found her eggs within five seconds and opened them and started eating the candy.

Rachel was seriously twirling around in circles trying to find her goodies and they weren't even hidden much harder than Miriam's were. She really must have been tired.

The "big kids" from BYU came over for lunch and egg-dying. It was a loud, busy afternoon. Rachel got some of her mojo back and was soaking up the attention from all of her friends. By the time we started dying eggs Miriam had already crashed into a sugar-induced coma.

Even after all that Eastering, Rachel wanted more. 

We went over to my parents' house for an egg hunt in the backyard. My aunt Marie did a blog post about how in France, instead of the Easter Bunny dropping the eggs about, the church bells fly off to Rome to deliver the sadness and mourning of the people to the Pope (and apparently to pick up chocolates, which they scatter on their way back to the steeples). The church bells stop ringing on Good Friday, which is when they supposedly fly off to Rome, and then start ringing again on Sunday morning, which means that Easter candy has been delivered. And that Christ has risen from the tomb.

It was very interesting to learn that and I almost like that tradition better than the Easter Bunny. In fact, I'm even contemplating getting a bell for us to ring and then...not ring...and then ring...if that makes sense.

Anyway, my mom had twenty one eggs for the girls to find in the backyard.

The first thing Rachel found was a flower, which she gave to me. That was very nice of her, but seriously...does she not get the whole "hunting" thing?

Miriam, once again, found and egg, cracked it open and devoured the treats inside before Rachel even realized that there were, in fact, eggs hidden in the yard. 

Rachel's usually so observant; I really don't know what was going on with her...

No matter, she eventually figured things out and both girls had a fun time finding the eggs.

 

Miriam used a basket that my dad wove to collect her eggs. 

It was a good Easter and it was certainly nice to get to share it with our family since we haven't done that in a couple of years.