easter

i've decided something important.  easter is my new favorite holiday.

i love the time of year that it comes - everything is green and fresh

and it is either sunny and nice out, or rainy with a feeling of the earth 

being cleansed.  expectations are low.  there are fun and interesting 

things to do outside.  most importantly, i love the meaning and symbolism

that comes with easter.  the idea of new life through the resurrection of our 

Savior has become more meaningful to me this past year.  when i think of hope

and how she is here on earth with physical and mental challenges, then i think of 

the beauty of being cleansed through the atonement and made perfect through

the enabling power of it, i feel peace.  when i think of her little body being made 

perfect when she is resurrected, matching her perfect little spirit, i feel joy.  

"the easter bunny goes hippity hop, hippity hop."

 

coloring easter eggs started out just fine...

 

but in the end we ended up with hands and floor that were more colorful than the eggs were. 

minnie was pretty excited about the basket the easter bunny left for she and hope. 

my parents came over for breakfast.  we ate cinnamon pull aparts and fresh fruit - a tradition from my family.  i loved easter and christmas breakfast as a kid.  then we had an easter egg hunt with symbols of easter in the eggs (a piece of bread, a rock, a piece of string, an "olive" leaf and an empty rock).  we read the easter story with the girls and bore our testimonies of the resurrection.  then we watched an easter video from lds.org.  it was a really special morning.  did i mention that easter is my new favorite holiday?  well, it is.