Happy Easter!

I have many fond memories of Easter as a child. 

Chocolate rabbits (hollow on the inside).  Somehow the chocolate wasn’t as good as a Hershey’s candy bar, so I had mixed feelings about those rabbits. 

Dyeing Easter eggs.  Always a big family event (there were six of us kids).  We would spread out on the kitchen table.  I think Mom would cover the table with newspaper so we wouldn’t stain the table.  She would be in charge of hard-boiling the eggs.  She would place six cups, each one with a different color of dye on the table.  She would always add vinegar to the dye.  I was never quite sure why, but I do remember the acrid smell.  We had little wire holders to hold the eggs, and we would carefully dip our eggs into the dye.  Sometimes we’d get creative and make half the egg one color and the other half another color.  It didn’t take too long to figure out that if you mixed the egg in all the colors, the results were not too happy.

New shoes.  I can remember getting new shoes for Easter when I was a wee laddie.  I was pretty proud of those new shoes.  My little sisters would sometimes get new dresses.  Yellow was a color I can remember for a new dress.  Also lavender.

Travel.  I can remember driving to Eudora, Kansas one Easter to visit Groff and Ruth Miller and their kids, David and April.  It was cold that Easter, kind of gray and rainy as I recall.  Groff could be gruff.  He compelled all of us older kids to do the dishes.  I guess that was alright, but I wasn’t quite sure what to think of him.  April was a cute gal with a smile that could downright charm you.  Fascinating, even when I was eleven or so.  But she was older than I was, and older girls were off limits.  Besides, I was only eleven.  But I still couldn’t help dreaming just a little.

Hiding Easter eggs.  Always a great sport at Grandpa and Grandma Schmidt’s place in Newton, at Grandpa and Grandma Bartsch’s in Topeka, and of course at our own home in Newton.  As we older kids grew up, hiding Easter eggs and hunting for them became a more juvenile thing that the younger kids did.  I think they got a little disappointed we weren’t as enthusiastic as they were.

Now of course, I’m an adult.  And I’m an adult who has staked his eternal existence on the belief that Jesus really is a hundred per cent God and a hundred per cent man; that he died to pay for my sins (believe me I have some); and that he really did arise from the grave on the third day.  God has assured me that if I trust in His Son, I am forgiven and possess eternal life.  As I said, I’m staking my eternal existence on that. 

It sure beats Easter bunnies and Easter eggs.