Easters 2012

No, that's not a typo in the title.  Easter morning, Giovanni kept saying, "Thanks, mom, for the Easters." Which I thought was funny because it reminded me of Nacho.  (If you don't know what I'm talking about, don't worry about it.)

Anyway....   Easter.  I loved seeing the pictures on facebook of all my USA friends all decked out in their Easter best.  I love the tradition of new dresses and Easter egg hunts.

But, I don't live in the US.  Easter in Brazil is different, but still good.  First of all, obviously, it is in the fall instead of the spring.  So symbols like little chicks and spring flowers don't have anything to do with Easter at all.

Eggs, however, are big here.  Specifically chocolate eggs.  About a month before Easter, the stores fill up with displays of chocolate Easter eggs.  They are usually hung from the ceiling and come in every flavor and kind of chocolate imaginable.  Here is what it looks like in the grocery store:

Inside these packages is a giant chocolate egg, in whatever flavor of chocolate, with other candy inside.  If it is a kids' egg, instead of candy, it will have a toy inside.

For a couple of years, my kids didn't get a big egg from the Easter Bunny.  He brought other stuff.  Sometimes even American candy.  This kind of caused problems for the kids because when they went back to school after Easter, everyone told what kind of egg they got.  Brazilian kids usually get more than one big egg - one from parents, one or two from grandparents, one from god parents, etc.  So there is a lot of "egg bragging" going on and lots of toys from eggs to show off.  After we picked up on this, our kids started getting an egg from the Easter Bunny.  Even though they don't get tons of eggs, at least they can "fit in" when the egg talk starts.

So, here are some pictures from our Easter this year.

We woke up early to check out the chocolate eggs that the Easter Bunny had brought.

Checking out what the Easter Bunny had to say.... 

He got a spider man egg....

Sleepy big brother helped out with the egg hunt....

 

Lining up his eggs.  He's one of those kids who lines everything up...

 After our egg hunt at home, we read the crucifixion story with the kids.  Then we met some of our church family (the ones who weren't out of town) at a nice park where we read the scriptures about the resurrection and had some prayer and reflection time.  It was really special.

 The park had a goose pond, so the kids had fun feeding the geese.

This goose looked like he would eat your fingers off.  Giovanni wasn't scared at all.  Luckily, he didn't get eaten!

Some people wanted to go home and watch soccer or play soccer with friends.

 This day was GORGEOUS!    My pictures don't do it justice.  This park had these beautiful blue fluorescent butterflies that we tried to catch or get a picture of, but no luck.  They were everywhere and so pretty.

After our time at the park, several of us went to take some Easter treats to another family from our church whose son had eye surgery this week and was in the hospital until that day.  Just a perfect ending to our worship time together.

So, our Easter was different from what I grew up with, but still good.  We enjoyed God's creation and blessed and were blessed by each other.  Very thankful for my family, my church family and the beautiful place God has given us to live.