9 April 2012

Easter Eggs are to hunt

Mine? Eat Egg?

Even Princesses get Easter Eggs.
After we escaped from the shop on Easter Sunday, the men of the household had an important mission.  We were to hide the Chocolate Easter Eggs.  More importantly, we had to remember where they were hidden so no-one missed out.
Everyone involved has 3 eggs on which their name was attached.  All eggs were hidden in the back yard or around the deck.  Only the children get to search, but they can only pick up their own or an adult's eggs.  This year the 3 eggs per person meant hiding 51 eggs.  The difficulty varied depending on the children's ages, but we have found over the years what we thought were easy places when we were placing the eggs sometimes ended up being the last places to be discovered.
Having 3 eggs each allows us to do an audit as the hunt progresses to make sure none are lost.  It also means we don't have a greedy rush and unequal eggs per person.
One year we found a missing egg months later that had been hidden in the roof trusses of our house that had been recently delivered.  When Lana's Dad and brother went to lift the tresses into place, an egg rolled to the ground as a bonus for their fine efforts.
See the costume Clare is wearing? My Mum made this and Clare just couldn't wait to wear it on such a fine day.
Zach has discovered Easter Eggs are pretty yummy and we have had to put them all out of reach as he tries to sneak away with eggs and eat them out of sight.

I love a good Good Friday

Carrying the cross
Every year on Good Friday the local monastery hosts a passion play.  Many actors are involved playing each of the parts from Jesus and the apostles, Pontius Pilate and Caiphas, down to all the Roman and Jewish guards, weeping women and members of the Sanhedrin.  As the weather was so marvellous there were thousands of people from Sydney, Canberra and all points in between.
James was one the apostles and Ariel and Clare were weeping women.  James likes being an apostle as all an apostle other than Peter has to do is eat (at the Last Supper), sleep (in the Garden of Gethsemene and run away (after Jesus is arrested).
Bulk Holy Water
Ariel and Clare started at Palm Sunday waving palms and praising the entry of Jesus, and then were part of the crowd in various scenes. They were also spoken to by Jesus during the Carrying of the Cross when they did their "wailing" thing and finally gathered around the cross during the Crucifixion. You can see from the first photo that Jesus was well costumed.  The "Blood" mixture was a combination of jam, wine and honey which provided just the right texture and consistency.  When a drip ran into Jesus's mouth he was heard to mumble, "That tastes all right."
Our traditional Good Friday involves closing the shop (Yay! A Day off!) and attending the Passion Play followed by the Veneration of the Cross service at 3:00pm.  When we return home, we have some home made Hot Cross buns to break our fast for the day.
Saturday is always an odd, in-between kind of day as we wait for the Easter Vigil Mass on Saturday evening.  This Mass goes for around 2.5 hours which sounds like a long time, but so much is happening in the Mass to leave reminders with all your senses that when Mass is over and you check your watch you are surprised.  Mass starts with a procession into the Church carrying candles that have been lit from the specially blessed Paschal candle, lighting a darkened Church with our many small candles.  We hear 7 readings from the old testament, 7 readings from the Psalms, a reading from the New testament and a Gospel reading.  There is even more, but this is the premier Mass for the year.  You should go and be part of it.

1 April 2012

Puddles are to jump in

Should I or shouldn't I?
Since the end of the ten year drought we have been blessed with rain.  A lot of rain!
The water tanks catch all the rain from our roof, but as the tanks have been full for so long, the water just goes straight through the tank and out of the overflow. Here is an example of what excess rain is like back from 2006.
But rain eventually stops so we all went for a walk to relieve the cabin fever. Before we travelled 100 metres Zach's boots were already full of water making that lovely squelching sound.
Squelch!  Squelch! Squelch!
"Zach, are you having fun?" I asked, to get a huge grin as he spied another puddle to traverse.
Some way further along we came to the puddle pictured. The photo is worth clicking to get a close up and see Zach's expression as he contemplates a puddle that is so huge.  Notice the toy car in his hand.  This never dropped even during all his running around and puddle playing.
When I printed out the photo for our photo wall I had a quick heart flutter as I thought the photo was all smeared.  Then I realised I had the photo upside down and the smeared part was only the reflection in the puddle!