Tradition

When The Mister and I were newlyweds, I asked him about his family traditions. I was stunned to hear him say, "Well, we really don't have any traditions." Convinced that this was an inaccurate perception of a young man, I went to his mom for the truth. As you might suspect, any family that has lived in one place for as many years as this one has, and enjoyed as many holidays together as this one has, will have several traditions. I have embraced many of these, and watched new traditions form in the greater family, and have of course seen new traditions become embedded in my immediate family. Our family's world view is grounded in faith, and therefore the Easter holiday is especially meaningful to us as we celebrate the very underpinning of our belief, the resurrection of Christ. Here are a few traditions, new and old, that the Morrison Family at large revived this past weekend.


A darling girl in a pretty dress hunting eggs is common to many households, including ours:



For years our children have hunted eggs on Easter Saturday at The Mister's homestead. Bias For Action's kids are all still at home, our children are near enough to make the event, and the older brother's kids are willing to travel long distances as well. As the kids have grown, it seems a bit silly to continue hunting the eggs, so Grandmama decided to try something different this year. She organized the making of several baskets for East Valley Child Crisis Center. It was a great idea:


But not so fast; the egg hunt happened just as it has in years past, except that eggs on the ground were fair game for the older kids since there really aren't any very small kids anymore; and the event is now a veritable competition. We also engaged in egg boxing, and at my son's insistence, the raw egg toss.

A relatively new tradition, exclusive to my neighborhood, is getting egged every year. No gasps necessary; this is being egged in the nicest way:



All the front lawns except one on our street looked like this early Sunday morning; so my suspicions as to the mystery eggers are confirmed!

Most traditions become that way by accident. Our Easter weekends end with a meal that I didn't even know was a tradition until my offspring pointed it out to me. I generally fix an Easter Feast to be eaten midday; by the time Sunday evening rolls around, everyone is exhausted and full from the earlier feast. So one year when the kids were small, I whipped the colored eggs into deviled eggs, made some popcorn, and sat us all in front of the TV for a movie. Voila! Instant tradition! And so last night was a typical ending of the weekend for us, with deviled eggs, popcorn, and The Lion, Witch and the Wardrobe in the DVD player.