Monday, April 9, 2012

Holy Week and Easter, 2012

I hope everyone had a spiritually productive Lent and a joyful Easter. Here's some of what we were up to during Holy Week.

One of our family customs is to have a Catholic seder meal, this year on the Wednesday of Holy Week.

Roasted eggs, bitter herbs, unleavened bread, and salt water for tears.

I'm horribly un-crafty, but I was inspired by Catholic Icing to make homemade Paschal candles with the kids.

Purple plastic tablecloths work great as impromptu religious image covers.

On Easter morn at break of day...



I tried my hand at "masking" designs on eggs. It sort of worked.

The kids made short work of finding the hidden eggs.

Happy Easter! Christ is Risen!

April Foolery

I promised I would go into more detail about my "hilarious" birthday present, and now I am at liberty to do so.

Here is a picture of what my brother gave to me on my birthday:


"OK...", I expect you're thinking. But there's more: he made it himself! Bought the mold and the ingredients and everything.

"That's nice." Oh, we haven't even gotten to the good part yet! He made it himself because he just couldn't find one in the stores or online.

Because this bunny is made of CAROB!

Oh the humanity...

Carob -- indistinguishable from chocolate in appearance and texture, until you bite into it and that burnt-raisin taste slowly spreads itself over your tongue. And this was no random April Fool's prank either, because carob and I have History, and Daniel well knew it. As youngsters, a friend's mother once gave us carob bunnies at Easter. She was known for her occasional "health kicks", and apparently she was on one at Easter that year. My mother presented us with the bunnies but didn't tell us what they were. Delighted, as any child presented with a chocolate bunny would be, we dug in. But... something was wrong... my bites came slower ...and slower... and after a while I looked up at my Mom in sadness and confusion and confessed that I just couldn't eat it, it tasted bad. Then, mercifully, the truth was revealed to me, and we all learned a valuable lesson: some things, like carob and spaghetti squash, are acceptable as themselves, but are an abomination if you try to pass them off as substitutes for the real thing.

So yeah. Daniel bought a mold, hunted high and low for carob chips, and crafted his own dang carob bunnies, just to pull the same trick on me as had been pulled oh-so-many years ago. Such perseverance, in pursuit of such an ignoble goal! Thanks, bro. :-)

Tuesday, April 3, 2012

My turn

My birthday has its idiosyncrasies. To begin with, it's April Fool's Day; I'm sure you can imagine the trouble that leads to. Additionally, it nearly always falls in Lent, and frequently on Good Friday. Over the years I have become accustomed to celebrating my birthday on the most convenient non-Lenten day, but this year I was in luck: my birthday fell on Palm Sunday! Let the partaaaaay commence.

Potted hyacinths make lovely centerpieces (and they smell good too).

Birthday breakfast of champions: croissants, jam, and coffee.

The coffee cup bears the chemical formula for caffeine.

God came through with a good gift: a birthday rainbow!

I received some lovely, and hilarious, gifts from my family, but that is a topic for a later post. Mwahahahaha.