Happy Easter from the Peaden Family. I was so happy when we looked at the calendar and saw that Easter was the week before General Conference this year. I love both Easter AND General Conference, but when they fall on the same Sunday it's hard to give either of them the full attention they deserve. We usually do a full Holy Week celebration, walking through the life of Christ and his final week on earth. This year we didn't do as much as we normally do. There are several reasons, including some busy weeks, a stomach bug that hit, and grief-related inability. I did buy a massive amount of candy, as will be explained below. Even knowing that we hadn't done Holy Week the way we usually like, we made the push for Easter Saturday and Sunday and it ended up being a really nice weekend together with our family, celebrating and worshiping our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
On Saturday we delivered our traditional Easter Surprise Egg Hunts to several people in our neighborhood. Earlier in the week I had asked the kids to brainstorm who they might like to take the eggs to. We decided on:
-A new mother/daughter family in our ward, Ilse & Nyah. Nyah is in David's primary class and we thought it would be a nice way to welcome them to their neighborhood.
-The Lambson Family (Caleb's choice)
-The Ward Family (Lydia & Austin Pick)
We sat together in our family room and filled more eggs than we expected (remember that I bought a massive amount of candy?) so while we were out delivering, we spontaneously added:
-Bishop Olsen and Family
-Amelia Perkins
-Maya and Ely Avrahami
It’s one of my favorite traditions because I love incorporating the service aspect into our holiday celebrations. A few neat things from our experience this year include:
-the Avrahami's (our Jewish neighbors) seeing us taking eggs to the Wards and then happily agreeing when we asked if we could share the tradition with their kids.
-the response from the Ilse saying that Easter had been hard for them that week and that Nyah was very excited about the eggs
-the text from Carli Lambson late Saturday night (after her initial thank you text) saying that it was a tender mercy for their family, even more than they thought, because when she was pulling out her Easter things for the next day she realized she hadn't bought enough supplies for an egg hunt but then her husband reminded her that they had already gotten to do an egg hunt that day. We told Caleb about this and talked about how he had been the one to receive guidance from the Spirit to choose them. (He insisted we go to the Lambsons even when we tried to talk him out of it for someone who "needed it more".) He was so proud and it was such a good opportunity for him to feel the joy that comes from being an instrument in the hands of the Lord.
The tradition was made a little sweeter when our kids came out to a surprise egg hunt of their own on Saturday morning (compliments of the Kuck Family, our ministering brother's family). They loved getting surprised and were extra excited to deliver their egg hunts to others.
We woke up Easter morning and ate German Puff Pancakes in lieu of our traditional sugar-cereal-in-Easter-egg hunt. I explained to the kids that I wanted to have an extra Christ-focused day and that after breakfast we would have a "Jesus Egg Hunt". Breakfast was delicious and the kids got to work hunting for all of the eggs they could find. 12 of them had papers with scriptures and small items from the last week of Christ's life and the rest were empty. We read through the scriptures and David shared a beautiful testimony of the Savior. Austin got a similar set of 12 eggs at his Primary Activities and he asked if he could share them as well, so we read through the similar scriptures that he had, too.
I put on the Lamb of God musical performance DVD and we listened to it while we dyed Easter Eggs and prepared for church. The block was only 1 hour today and was a beautiful musical Sacrament Meeting.
I’ve been pretty emotional the past couple of weeks and my feelings have been pretty close to the surface. I just miss Sue deeply and am just really, really sad. There have been multiple times where I have had to leave group gatherings early before my emotions overflow (sobbing on the way home), crying in the church library with Sister Gail Ferrin as we talked about the death of loved ones, and sometimes feeling so overwhelmed by grief that I can't do much more than hold my hands to my chest while tears leak out. I am trying to balance letting myself feel my emotions while still trying to juggle all of the balls. I've been surprised at how that grief has impacted so many areas of my life that are just harder than usual. This Easter Sunday was a beautiful moment in that grieving process, a time to simply be filled with gratitude for the Atonement and Ressurection of Jesus Christ and what that means for me and our family.
I am holding close my faith and gratitude for a Savior who overcame pain, sickness, and death.
Caleb wrote this paper during Sacrament meeting today. Even though he was climbing all over and bouncing on the couch this morning during our family lesson, it is clear that he is internalizing the things that we are trying to teach him. He just recently started listening to the Book of Mormon each night before he goes to bed and is trying to finish the whole thing before he gets baptised and I have been so impressed with the impact it has had on him. He wrote:
"I know God was resurrected for us. I believe Jesus really lived."
Lydia sang a beautiful song with the YW group and Austin, Caleb, & Lucy performed with the Primary.
After church we came home to open our Easter baskets. (There was some pointed connection making in the car about how the disciples must have felt while they were waiting after Christ was crucified and before he was resurrected, ha.) We usually do Easter Baskets on Saturday morning, but I had been sick. We ended up enjoying having them in the afternoon instead.
This evening we went to Matt and Brooklyn's house in Orem for Easter Dinner: Ham, Potato Supreme, and lots of yummy sides. We all brought eggs and put together a giant easter egg hunt for the kids, which of course, they loved. We missed spending this Easter with the Peaden family, but were grateful to be with the Walkers. We are blessed to have such wonderful family here and for eternity.
We came home and did one last Easter gathering. We read through a list of "Names of Christ" while lighting candles on a clay spiral the kids helped me make earlier and talked about what Christ does for us and who he is to our family. It was a beautiful way to close our day in worship and celebration of our Savior.
Happy Easter!
