When I was very young, Easter Sunday meant walking up the hill to church for morning Mass, wearing a pretty dress and hat, white gloves, and ruffled anklets. Later in the afternoon would be a traditional Easter meal – sometimes at our house but usually at Grandma and Grandpa’s. Following that would be a few chocolate treats and marshmallow Peeps from our Easter baskets – especially welcome after having gone without candy of any kind all through Lent.

When my kids were young, some things had changed – most notably the attire – but the tradition was basically the same. Mass in the morning, and Easter dinner later on. After the kids were grown and gone, and family members had spread out to different parts of the country, my husband and I usually had Easter dinner with my sister and her husband. Although Easter baskets had been long gone from our traditions, my sister always filled small, colorful, plastic baskets with chocolate eggs and jellybeans, and set them out at each place setting.

It’s now just my husband and me, living far away from the rest of our family, although we’ll talk to them all at some point during the day. We go to Mass in the morning, then come home and relax a bit before I start preparing our Easter dinner. Although it’s just the two of us, I still enjoy fixing a traditional meal: ham, potatoes and gravy, a vegetable side dish, and dinner rolls. Deviled eggs, too, which I used to make out of the dyed and decorated Easter eggs that were always part of the Easter tradition. Now I just boil the eggs, since I stopped dying eggs a few years ago. Still, I’m sure that for the rest of my life, the smell of vinegar will always remind me of coloring Easter eggs.

If you celebrate Easter – or even if you don’t – I wish you a Happy and Blessed Easter, and the joy that comes from celebrating your family traditions, or enjoying the memories of those from days gone by.

Happy Easter.

April 17, 2022
©Betty Liedtke, 2022

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