Clan Buchanan: Easter

After a busy, busy spring break week, we decided to have a pretty low key Easter day. It was nice.

Mina and Siena were nice enough to help us dye all of our Easter eggs that Friday that they were at our house. I would say those 24 eggs were all dyed in 10 minutes flat. They were all fast and effective and wha-la, we had colored Easter eggs for the Easter Bunny to hide.

Scott and I wrote a special letter to the Easter Bunny this year asking him to please come on Saturday morning instead of Sunday so that we could focus on Jesus and his resurrection on Sunday (and so we could be dressed and ready for 9am church). So, just as we had requested, the Easter Bunny was nice enough to have our baskets filled and an Easter egg hunt ready all over the front yard when we all woke up on Saturday morning. It worked wonderfully.

The Easter Bunny was good to us - a few jelly beans, a few malt balls, twister crayons for each kid for the church bag, some stickers, a silly straw, a chap stick and two new church books (one is a cool "I Spy" book about missionaries). Oh, and three big boxes of peeps for Kate to share with me!

They found all the eggs! And of course, what comes next? A breakfast of mashed up hard boiled eggs with a little butter and salt, warmed in the microwave. An Allred tradition.

We then got dressed and ready for the big event of the weekend - Siena's baptism. We got to be with all of our Buchanan family and see Siena baptized and confirmed. What a perfect opportunity to help remember what Easter is about. It was wonderful to be with everyone for such a special occasion.

This is what I found as we were herding kids to the car to leave. Sneaks. And still no shoes on????!!!

All of the Buchanan cousins.

On Saturday evening we had a special Family Home Evening to talk about Easter and it's meaning. We watched the lds.org Bible videos of the Last Supper, Garden of Gethsemane, and the Crucifixion. We also opened 11 of our 12 eggs that each contained a scripture and a little something inside to remember each of the events leading up to Easter morning (a nail, a thorn, a piece of white linen, coins, dice, stone, smelling spices, etc.).

In the morning, on Sunday, it was nice to have no talk of the bunny or baskets. That was all done. We all came to the 12th egg and opened it to find that it was empty and read the scripture, "He is not here, for He is risen." And then watched the lds.org Bible video called "He Is Risen". It is beautifully done and was the perfect way to remember why that day was so incredibly important to celebrate.

Off to 9am church. (I didn't do Easter clothes. The girls wore their skirts from last year and Kate got a new yellow dress. Worked out.)

Right after church, which included an exceptional Sacrament Meeting put on by our choir, we were invited to our friend's three year old birthday party/Easter egg hunt. Thank you to James and Megan for putting on Easter for us. So very nice of you. James actually filled and hid 300 plastic eggs providing us with the best hunt we've ever been to.

Mr. Z and the birthday girl, Emily.

They got A LOT of candy. Check out those baskets.

Kate didn't get to join in the hunt.

But was well taken care of by Scott.

Finally . . . . we were home and the kids were let loose on their Easter candy. This kid went right after it. (Side note: It is now two weeks since Easter. Zach's basket has been completely cleaned out and empty for two weeks. The girls baskets still have every last bit of candy in them. They haven't touched them. I finally just combined it with their Valentine's, Christmas and Halloween candy I have in a bag. Evan knows where to find it.)

Remember how I said Easter was low key. This is when that started. We didn't have anyone over for a big Easter dinner. We just spent a quiet afternoon with just us. It was lovely. This picture is of one of my favorite moments of Easter. It was all quiet except for the sound of Scott teaching Brielle her new songs on the piano. So nice.