Our Celebrations of Spring

Caryn the Midlife Guru has lovely traditions for celebrating Easter, and looks forward to enjoying them with her grandchildren as they grow up. Read more from Caryn on her blog, The Midlife Guru.

There is no better declaration of Spring than the Easter Season, a time of rebirth, renewal, and faith. A wonderful time to create, continue, and share special Easter family traditions.
Our past Easter family traditions, of course, included dying eggs and then hunting for those eggs on Easter morning. In the beginning, each of my three children got their own dozen eggs to color. After all, we had to make this project worth their (and my) while. We were partial to the Paas Easter Egg Dye Kit that came with all sorts of embellishments: white crayons that mysteriously kept the dye from adhering to the shells, tattoo stickers, even dress up outfits. It was always fun to see what creative flair the kids could come up with in decorating their one dozen treasures.

The whole Easter family tradition of dying eggs was a carry over from my growing up years and it ended up not being all that relevant for my own family. For one, except for my husband, the rest of us were not big fans of hard boiled eggs. So, there was always the quandary of what the heck were we going to do with 3 dozen, hard boiled eggs. There is just so much egg salad and deviled eggs one man can devour. As the years went on, we got further and further away from the egg decorating and opted for refillable, plastic eggs instead. After all, these eggs were recyclable and were certainly a lot more appetizing having candy inside rather than a hard, egg yolk.

Everyone loved the Easter Family tradition of an Easter Egg Hunt. Finding plastic eggs filled with candy (or even better yet, money), was a much anticipated event. And if we got together with cousins, we’d also have an Easter Bunny piñata.Another one of our favorite Easter family traditions was wearing new Easter outfits. Matching dresses for my daughters, (some I even sewed) with new, white, patent leather shoes. My son also got a fancy a new outfit, but not as elaborate. Having new dress up clothes really added to the specialness of the day.We weren’t real big on the whole “Easter Bunny” gimmick. The children did receive an Easter basket which was filled with their favorite Easter themed treats (when Peeps only surfaced at Easter time) and a small gift. One year, my mom made the mistake of giving my children a real, live Easter bunny without asking permission from their parents.That didn’t go over very well with my husband. He “put up with it” for a couple of weeks and when the kids quit paying attention to the cute little varmint, he returned “Penny” to the land of her forefathers. Enough on that sad topic.

Of all our Easter family traditions, our favorite, by far, is watching “The Sound of Music”sometime during the Easter weekend. With the movie celebrating its 50th anniversary this year, this tradition has become even more beloved. The first time our children were introduced to this wonderful classic was when we spent an Easter week vacation in Carlsbad, California.From then on, they were hooked. Our oldest daughter was especially taken by the whole “Sound of Music” magic. She has memorized the movie so well that she can act out perfectly her favorite scenes much to everyone’s amusement. For her birthday one year, to appease her fetish, we girls went to the Hollywood Bowl to do the “Sound of Music Sing-a-long” which ended up being an extremely crazy, fun evening. A few years later, that same daughter went with her husband to see where it was filmed in Austria and take the official Sound of Music Tour — her dream come true.“The Sound of Music” is definitely one of our most cherished Easter family traditions.

It goes without saying, that our most important of our Easter family traditions is attending church on Easter Sunday. Singing hymns of rejoicing, hearing words of encouragement, and renewing our commitment to Jesus Christ, keeps us grounded on what truly matters most.

With the arrival of grandchildren, it will be interesting to see which Easter family traditions continue on with our next generation. (I’m sure Pinterest will play an important role). The key for me as a grandparent as I watch my children and their families create their Easter family traditions, is to appreciate the familiar and embrace what is new — just like Spring itself.