Happy Easter!

This Easter was literally right on the heels of losing our beloved Great Grandma Shwartz--after a very brave battle with cancer, she passed away at the end of March.  Easter was always an awesome holiday with her--she made an amazing ham, always remembered the lamb-shaped butter, and was the only one who ate the hard-boiled eggs.  When my sister, cousin and I were little, she had an amazing egg hunt for us, and always bought the coolest egg dye kits for us--glitter, swirly, tye-dye--so much more fun the the homemade vinegar and food coloring that my mom did! :)  We missed her so much this year, and it definitely wasn't the same without her.

Easter was also a strong memory day for me and my Dad....this is going to sound weird, but when Jessica and I were in our teen and pre-teen years, every year, he delivered our Easter Baskets with a variation of this story: He'd awaken to some noise, a bustle, if you will, out in the kitchen. He armed himself, and a scuffle ensued--well, it was a flurry of Easter grass and fur, and he shot that intruding bastard. He dragged his bleeding carcass to the roadside, and bagged the evidence deep into the garbage cans.  All that remained was this basket of goodies--covered in "blood".  Every year, he shot the Easter Bunny, and surrendered his blood-covered treats to us--the only remaining "evidence".  I loved that story every year.  He was quite dramatic about it too....God I miss him.

Even with the looming sadness, I was able to enjoy Easter--again, like Christmas, it's hard to be sad with toddlers in your life!  We kicked off the festivities and invited our buddies over on Friday for a pre-Easter brunch, egg hunt and trip to the park.  Finally something went my way and we had more than 70 degree weather that day!!

We rounded out the weekend with some egg-dyeing, basket-finding, ham-eating fun.  We spent Easter afternoon with the Schwartz family, and though it was rimmed with a little sadness, we enjoyed time together and being thankful for the true reason for the seaon--He is Risen indeed! Halelujah!