Easter Traditions

Easter is fast approaching. Every time a holiday nears, my thoughts turn to our family traditions and what I can do ahead of time to prepare for the day. Easter is a unique holiday. From my experience, there seems to be a lot of variety in the way families celebrate.

When I was a child, the Easter Bunnny would come and spread candy all over the basement. My brothers and I would stand at the top of the stairs, eyes wide, looking at the candy strewn all over. We'd have to wait for Dad to get downstairs with the camera before we could scramble and fill our baskets with candy. After a mad dash through the house, collecting everything our baskets, hands, and often even our shirts could hold, we sat down and sorted our candy. Even though everyone selfishly gathered the candy, we always divided it equally in the end. I guess it was just the fun of trying to get the most that made us act like crazy people.

Somehow, that tradition has led to our own family tradition of hiding the Easter baskets already full of candy. They've ended up som very interesting places: in the dryer, in closets, under chairs, outside, and even in the shower. Believe me, wet chocolate eggs just don't quite taste the same and the jelly beans stick together.

Easter always mean a new dress for me and a shirt and tie for my brothers. Now we have a large family and it's not economically possible to do that for my other children, but we still take a little bit longer getting ready for church on Easter morning, wanting to look our best.

Some years, we've participated in as Passover feast, which is always around Easter. Brigham Young University does one every year and I strongly recommend going if you ever have the chance. It makes you look at the Passover in a whole new light.

Then, of course, there's the favorite tradition . . . coloring Easter eggs. I've found some fun ideas for coloring eggs that I'll share with you next week, so be sure to check back. I'd love to hear some of your Easter traditions, so please leave comments.

YourLDSneighborhood has added exciting new things to its website. Please drop by and take a look, browse around, check out our vendors, our radio station, our authors, our musicians and more. Check out the Neighborhood.

And while you're there, subscribe to the yourLDSneighborhood Newsletter. In addition to being able to shop in the new virtual neighborhood, the newsletter brings you articles, products, services, resources and interviews from around the world-all with an LDS focus. Look for issues delivered to your email inbox every week on Monday, Wednesday and Friday.