Resurrection Day

Well, this year I meant to stop calling it Easter and start calling it Resurrection Day, but I failed.  I did a lot of explaining to the kids what Resurrection Day is all about.  We made nests with eggs one day and I kept trying to trick them and tell them we made nests for Easter, and they would correct me that Easter was about Jesus rising from the tomb, but that nests were fun for springtime.  But the “Resurrection Day” switch did not happen this year. 

Well egg hunts are fun for spring too!  One year we did it in the snow (can’t find a post on that – I guess it was before I had this blog!).  Last year it was in our yard.  This year it was Grandma Debbie’s woods.  That was highly inconvenient for my photography, I might add… I had the telephoto lens on and ready to go, and then went outside and realized it was in the tiny little patch of  woods.  So not only could I not open up my aperture as much as my 35mm, but I also couldn’t zoom out far enough at times in the cramped woods.  Lesson learned: research the egg hunting environment and prepare accordingly before it is too late.

My camera issues certainly didn’t stop the kids from having loads of fun…

 

Oh yeah, and the sunlight wasn’t the “golden hour” I had envisioned.  The sun hadn’t quite set yet and the direct sunlight was super harsh, as seen above where half of Susie is lost! 

Mark and miss Morgan took off down a steep bank I wasn’t about to traverse in my dress and flip flops, so I followed Susie the other way.  She and her helper photographer found one egg in a tough hiding spot…

I was a good mom and helped her after snapping a few more photos of her struggling.

She kept right at it, finding more eggs others had rushed by…

Susie hunted until she was sure they were all found and then emerged from the woods victorious, purse full of goodies held proud.  Lucky we had that purse in the car; I always forget to bring baskets!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Grandma Debbie and my sister in law Shelby always have creative goodies inside their eggs.  From coins to candy to little oranges!  At our egg hunts in the snow at Grandma Sue’s we have always had some small toys in the eggs.  I love these ideas because I don’t love when my kids are on sugar highs!

Did you notice Susie’s egg hunting attire included these?

They were a gift from Leah, and I have been saving them until she fits them this summer when they won’t get ruined by our rainy and muddy weather.  They still don’t completely fit but they were a fun addition to her Resurrection Day outfit.  All the teenage girls at church were jealous!  =)

After a lovely meal and the egg hunt, the FIL (father in law) made us some excellent German Pancakes…

 

He sliced them up like pie and we added Bavarian Cream, strawberries and whipped cream… oh man!   I wolfed it down too fast to get a picture.

On the way home, we topped off the festivities with a random stop to take a picture with Tow Mater…

He was parked at a local tavern, and we had to go and check him out again.  I still don’t know if Mark believes this Mater is real.  We had to look inside and confirm that he does indeed have a steering wheel and a real human does have to drive him.  It’s a treat to have this work of art in our small town!

So is anyone else trying to call it Resurrection Day?  It’s kind of back to the whole “Happy Holidays” vs. “Merry Christmas” issue, but for me, it is silly to call it Easter (after a pagan God) which induces imagery of candy, chicks, eggs and passed out sugared up kids… at least for me it does.  Why not call it what it is supposed to be?  A day or rejoicing over the RESURRECTION of our Lord and Savior.  Because without that resurrection, He would NOT be my Lord and Savior.  He would be just like all the other religious leaders and teachers through time who have brought teaching for a time and then died.  Jesus died, yes, to sacrifice His perfect life to pay for our wretched ones, then rose from the tomb!  He is alive and will be active in your life, saving you from destruction, if you just “…declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”  Romans 10:9.

Godbless!