February 29, 2008
Easter memories
Do you have special family traditions for Easter? I’m not talking about the religious traditions - those tend to be shared among many people. What I’m asking about is the secular traditions that come with most religious holidays and tend to become an engrained part of our family history. While I no longer have distinct memories for each Easter that I celebrated with my family as a child, I have clear recall of the things that we “always” did.
My mother made a lot of our clothing when we were kids. At Easter she made matching dresses for my sister and I. They were always very girly creations in soft pastels with flounces and ruffles and lace. I’ve been searching for a picture of Sis and I in our matching Easter finery. I’ve seen it in the not too distant past, but I can’t find it now so I’ll try my best to describe it. The photo is black and white, but I remember the dresses well. They were pale pink with white lace trim. They had dainty little cap sleeves set into the bodices which fitted to the waist. Like all of our dresses they had full, gathered skirts. The dresses in the picture were special, though. The skirts had either two or three layers, with a short one on top and a knee-length one as the bottom layer, each layer trimmed in white lace, of course. Beneath them we wore several nylon net petticoats which Mom had starched so stiffly that they stood up on their own. We wore cotton slips under the petticoats, but that didn’t help at all with the itchiness. Tiny white straw hats, pink, lace-trimmed socks and white, patent leather shoes and purses completed our matching ensembles. We were adorable, of course. Other than the color and detailing, any Easter outfit during our girlhoods would fit the same description (including the adorableness.)
There are other traditions we enacted each year. The four of us each used the same Easter baskets each year throughout most of our childhood. I thought everyone did, but somewhere along the line I’ve discovered that many children play with their baskets after Easter until they fall apart, and that they get new ones each year. That seems a little strange to me, but I suppose that’s just because it wasn’t the way we did things. Our baskets contained what I realize now was entirely too much candy to entrust to children. There were jelly beans and malted eggs and those nasty marshmallow eggs with colored sugar coatings. We each got a molded sugar egg with a picture inside, and Elmer’s Gold Brick and Heavenly Hash Eggs, Southern treats that I really miss. A chocolate bunny stood front and center and sometimes the whole basket was wrapped in colored cellophane gathered up in a big bow. My parents always overindulged us for all of the holidays. It’s a fine family tradition that I carried on with my own son.
We always had our Easter egg hunt shortly after we got out of bed. The New Orleans area gets a lot of rain this time of year. Our first Easter after we moved there from Texas included an indoor egg hunt, as did many others that followed. One boiled egg didn’t get found that year. After a while - days? a week? - we located it by its smell. It had slipped down into the sofa bed that was rarely opened. None of us really liked the couch after that, with its faint hint of rotten egg odor that you only noticed if you sat on it for a while.
After the hunt was over we had our breakfast, donned our new clothes and went to church. The holiday dinner that followed varied in menu from year to year, but usually featured ham. The Easter breakfast menu never varied. Each year we had Eggs Goldenrod, one of the few traditions that I’ve maintained in the years since I became an empty-nester. The link includes the recipe, a tasty way to start using up the boiled eggs that get found in time to still be edible. I’ll make Eggs Goldenrod again this year, though the eggs may or may not be dyed the day beforehand. Some of my family’s traditions have remained a part of my life. Others I savor as memories but have no real desire to revive.
Technorati Tags: Easter, family traditions, holidays, memories, traditions
Posted by skeet @ 10:04 pm • Society & culture
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March 1st, 2008 at 2:53 am, Kate Says:
My biggest Easter memory isn’t necessarily my favorite one. Since I grew up in California, it was often warm on Easter Sunday. My folks decided one year that they’d get a little extra sleep by putting the Easter eggs in the yard the night before. We came back home from church that morning and all 4 of us raced out to find our eggs. Naturally, we also ate them.
I’m not sure whose memory of that Sunday is more traumatic: mine, because the eggs gave me food poisoning, or my mothers’ because she had to take care of four children all sick with it.
March 1st, 2008 at 1:39 pm, pussreboots Says:
Easter is a completely non-religious event in this family… dying eggs, egg hunt, and of course golden rod for dinner.
We also do the Passover feast but that holiday is a month later than Easter this year.
March 1st, 2008 at 7:23 pm, valmg Says:
Great post.
We were caught in the “floody” season in New Orleans one year. Hairy stuff!
You description of the Easter outfits is so vivid I thought I smelled starch.
We got giant Easter baskets too, complete with giant bunny in the middle.
My family reuses the Easter baskets now.
March 1st, 2008 at 7:35 pm, skeet Says:
Oh Kate! I hope you have some happy Easter memories to balance out the food poinsoning incident!
March 1st, 2008 at 7:36 pm, skeet Says:
Sarah, I grew up in a Christian tradition that does not celebrate holidays, so my Easter memories also relate to non-religious events.
March 1st, 2008 at 7:38 pm, skeet Says:
Oh, Val, I could tell some stories about the floods when we were growing up. New Orleans has a lot to recommend it … when it doesn’t rain too much!
March 2nd, 2008 at 9:12 am, Whim Says:
My Mom used to sew matching dresses (complete with pinafores and bonnets) for my Sister and I every Easter. I hated it!
March 2nd, 2008 at 6:59 pm, skeet’s stuff » Postie Carnival Says:
[…] ready for the Carnival had me thinking about Easters when I was a child, so I’ve shared some Easter Memories with you. I’ll be interested in seeing how your family tradtions differ from the ones […]