Our fantastic Easter

Easter came right at the beginning of April this year. We had the most fantabulous weather you could imagine, all weekend long. The previous Wednesday evening, 31 March, the kids and I were down by the pond in shorts and shirt-sleeves, with nary a speck of snow on the ground (other than the pile in one corner by the next-door parking lot), and I’m pinching myself, thinking “Can this really be March 31st? MARCH??!!?” (Just two years ago, we still had about 2m of snow on that date!!!)

Good Friday we reached a high of about 25 degrees and sunny; Saturday hit 27 and sunny. Sunday was a tad cooler – a “mere” 20 or so with a few clouds (let’s see now, average highs for this time of year are about 5 above!), and Monday the low 20s.

It was so beautiful the kids biked while I scootered to the Good Friday service at the neighbourhood church close to their school. After the service, and a scooter ride home, we had a quick lunch and then headed off to the off-leash dog park with Lovely for a romp. The kids had been there before with Nanny, but it was my first visit. It’s quite pleasant – some wide gravelled trails, some dirt paths through the woods, some flat areas and some hilly spots. It was very fun to watch Lovely playing with the other dogs. They are all quite well behaved, and if two or three dogs “hit it off” they’ll race around playing tag and just romping for the thrill of it.

We went back there on Saturday, and again on Monday. Saturday afternoon we also played in the forest and coloured some more edible Easter eggs, to take to the special Easter breakfast at church on Sunday. The kids also were a big help, peeling potatoes, chopping bread and onions, and peeling and cutting carrots for Sunday dinner, as I’d decided to go all out and have a bunch of company over for roast turkey.

Frist thing Sunday morning we had a little Easter egg hunt. I’d hidden about 60 small chocolate eggs outside on our property. The kids had a blast running around finding them. They found all but two, and when I went around to look I couldn’t find those two either, so I just hope some neighbourhood dog doesn’t get them. I’d also picked up a large chocolate bunny for each child. (They had fancy chocolate puppies and kitties in the store that the kids would have loved, but they were about ten bucks a pop. I just got the cheap $1.99 bunnies…) We then set the table for 10 so that job would be done.

After that we headed off to church. Easter breakfast is always a treat – we had paska and spread, boiled eggs, fruit and cheese. After eating, we sang Easter hymns for about an hour, then it was time to clear the tables and chairs away, do dishes, and get ready for the service. During the service the children’s hour featured a special craft – making a little Easter basket – followed by an Easter egg hunt. They announced it was kids aged 2 to “8ish” so – given that it was to be fun – Mustang and her friend wanted to join in. I asked if a 9 and almost-10 year old could join and the leaders said sure. Since the older age group was so large, we split it into two and I took one group, helped them with their Easter baskets – not that they needed much help – and then shepherded them through the egg hunt. This egg hunt was for plastic coloured eggs filled with candy. The older kids were told to leave the really obvious ones for the little kids to find, and to look for ones that weren’t so easy to spot.

We then headed home to get dinner on. With the pressure cooker the potatoes were done in no time, and the carrots cooked quickly on the stove top. I hauled the turkey out of the oven, carved it up and made gravy. Along with the salad and dessert our friends brought, we had a feast! Everyone set to and did good work demolishing the food. Some turkey, potatoes, and gravy were left over but not much else. Between dinner and dessert we all took a walk through the forest, as it was another lovely day.

As our guests headed home, I offered to drive home the two teenagers who’d joined us while their Mom rode her bike home. My kids of course wanted to ride too, so we made a deal – the Mom would ride with them to their house while I drove the teens, then my kids would ride back home while I drove alongside them slowly down the back streets. It worked find – other than my needing to backtrack a couple of times for want of knowing which back streets offered the best connection from their place to ours. We passed by a playground on the way, so had to stop and play there for a while. The rest of the afternoon was spent relaxing at home and reading stories.

Easter Monday was a bit of a work day. We started off with a jaunt to the dog park – I do like that place! Then the chores began: clean piggy’s cage, tidy the house some, and so on. Actually, it wasn’t bad, and there was even time to play in the field and forest.

All in all it was a most delectable weekend, especially with the gorgeous weather. As my camera was still misplaced I wasn't able to take any pictures, unfortunately.