Saturday, April 11, 2009

Easter gives me a stomach ache


Of all the holidays, Easter is at the bottom of the food chain for me. Even when I was a regular church goer, I disliked it. For starters. I don't like candy. Make me eat a jelly bean and I'll be sick for hours. Maybe it's all those pastels that creep me out. Maybe it was trying each year to wear something fluffy and spring-like when there was still snow on the ground. Maybe it was Easter dinner - again with the pastels and a serious lack of anything cheesy, garlicky, or fried. I'm a real trooper for the kids, but meh, I could live without it.

This year only the 9-year-old tinky-winky has her head in the game. So I'm trying something new. I'm sending her on a hunt through the house, complete with decorated clues, to find their Easter baskets. Which in reality are brown paper lunch bags with curly ribbon stapled to them. And rather nontraditional Easter gifts inside: mascara for the teens, cheap DVD's, lip smackers for the Tinkster, and the required amount of chocolate and gum.

I've replaced Easter dinner with brunch, including a made-ahead pan of creme brulee french toast. If it's a hit I'll post the recipe.

Where is Jesus in all this? He isn't frankly. I think he'd be appalled to see us getting all dressed up and cutting into the coca-cola marinated ham while the kids slipped into diabetic comas. I think he's got better taste, and certainly a bit more decorum.

11 comments:

Coaster Punchman said...

Did you ALWAYS hate jelly beans or is this just a Holden Caulfieldesque downslide into adulthood?

Dr. Monkey said...

I always hated easter as well. But I lurved the chocolate.

Joe said...

Funny, you get lip gloss, my wife has always had the tradition of giving our girls some brightly colored nail polish. So, in lieu of dyeing eggs, we dye our children?

Happy non-diabetic shock Easter!

Unknown said...

We traveled home today, breakfast at the hotel, Chili's for lunch and they are all on their own for dinner, no cooking.
Easter food isn't that special to me, I do like the meaning behind it all, but I can get sugar rush too.....my kids got a few candy things, very little.

Sheleta said...

Girl the jelly beans are something I could never get with. I mean, they are nasty and they leave your teeth with all sorts of colors in 'em. Nevermind the fact that my teeth are crooked and spaced apart, I'd eat half the jelly beans and the other half would be left in my mouf until the following Easter!

Shannon said...

Mmmmm, need the recipe for the french toast. Second, how can a person hate candy? HOW, MARGARET?! I thought you were my soul sister.

I do have to agree with the part about trying to dress up in short-sleeved (or worse!) spring-colored dresses and sandals when it's pretty much winter outside (last year, up here where I'm visiting it SNOWSTORMED on Easter weekend).

Also, I give my girls mainly small gifts in their baskets instead of candy, too. There's a few pieces of something small, but mostly it's sidewalk chalk, bubbles, etc. I can see mascara down the road, for sure.

lisahgolden said...

We put this holiday out to pasture a few years ago with our standard "sorry, you're a Jew, you don't get an Easter basket" response. Thankfully, Garbo has never really protested like she might if we pulled that routine at Christmas/Hannukah.

Churlita said...

I don't like ham or jelly beans. I made the girls breakfast for dinner and they loved that.

MommyLisa said...

I don't like coca cola soaked ham - it isn't cheesey, garlicky, or fried.

;)

MommyLisa said...

Oh - and the MIL tried to pawn off all the damn easter candy she bought on me. I would have NONE of it.

the step daughter came to get the BBLL's easter paper sack and I would not give it to her. ;)

I hate sugar candy.

I will indulge in the occaisional chocolate, but Nerds and Jellybeans. blech~!

Missy said...

I struggle with this holiday a lot. I want to be honest with myself and see it as any other Sunday, but the tradition is important to greater family. This year we went to Green Bay, where the Easters of my childhood were spent with Easter bonnets, a new bunny stuffed animal, basket hunts and big family Easter dinner out at a golf course or something.

15-some years since the last Easter hoorah, we went to Green Bay this year and on Saturday we had a huge in home family pit luck. Even grandpa wore his jeans. We went to "midnight" high Mass and the church was sparse. Sunday we had a smaller group for brunch and none of us dressed up anymore than we would have for any other day. The Family time was wonderful, but it could have happened on any weekend.

I sat on the ride home thinking about how I missed seeing my aunts new dresses and my uncles in suits. I tried to think about if I would be the Easter bunny or not for my future kids. Do I settle for the commercial tradition of a religious holiday I do not celebrate?

I did not get answers, but this cartoon cracked me up: http://www.americanelf.com/comics/americanelf.php?view=single&ID=42095