What are your Easter traditions?

I thought it would be nice to share our Easter traditions :)

My family is nominally Russian Orthodox, so often "our" Easter would be a week or up to a month after everyone else's. This was GREAT when I was a kid because it meant heaps of discounted Easter eggs for Orthodox Easter (back before the days that shops cottoned on to the fact that there is a huge Orthodox market out there!)

We would paint boiled eggs on Good Friday and my aunt would make Pashka (a type of cheese cake) and Kulich (a yeast bread) and at midight on Easter Saturday we would go to Church. Russian Orthodox churches are very ornate and full of incense, head-scarved women, candles and people - all very impressionable for a little kid! The choir would sing mournful songs in Russian (none of which I would understand) and as part of the ceremony we would walk around the outside of the Church 3 times holding candles while the choir sings (a long walk if your church is on a big block - LOL!!)

After the service we would stand outside and have our basket of eggs, Pashka and Kulich blessed by the priest who would throw holy water on it. Then we'd go home and have a huge feast - lots of meat, vodka and dessert.

I am not religious in any way as an adult and neither is my DH (who is from an Aussie/Pom background) and we want our kids to make up their own mind about religion, but I sure do hope my mum and stepdad can take Flynn and his siblings to Church one day, just so they can experience the wonderful spectacle that is Easter in the Orthodox Church.

Our easter goes like this: All the family come over to our house first thing. Ashlea wakes up about 7.00 and calls my sis and my mum and everyone comes around. Easter bunny hides all the family eggs here at my place, we have a treasure hunt and then all have a big breakfast here
We have fresh home made break, pancakes and waffles, coffee/milo and we madelittle merangue easter treats too.
Then we all feel sick for a while!!!
Then we go to my Aunty's house for the morning and swap easter eggs there
In the afternoon we visit the other side of the family and have another treasure hunt with Ashlea's cousins
Then we all go home feeling disgustingly fat and unhealthy but have had a great day!

We all go to Mass on Good Friday.

On Easter Sunday, the Easter bunny writes each child's name (me and my siblings included as well as my DSs now) on a piece of paper and leaves them on the kitchen table. Above your name is the presents from the bunny. It's usually chocolate eggs.

However, this year is the first Easter without my XH and I wanted to avoid the kids being "over-sugared". So I bought them a toy oven as well as two small chocolate eggs with egg cups. Something to keep IYKWIM.

The kids got up at 6:10am... (yikes) and Mum & Dad got up at about 8:30am, the rest of my siblings came over about 12noon, we exchanged eggs and then ate roast chicken for lunch. Yummy!

I then went to the XILs for dinner (yep wierd I know, but XH has gone away for the weekend and doesn't spend much time with his family anyway, I believe that family is important and so took the kids to see their grandparents and half-sister). Their tradition involves an Easter egg hunt in the backyard (as long as it's not raining) and dinner.

We usually go to Mass on Easter Sunday morning (10:30am) but I didn't this year because Ned was asleep and Mum and Dad went last night, and I didn't want to leave them to look after Ned whilst I took Alex to Mass, because they were getting ready for lunch. Cop-out I know.

TOO MUCH FOOD!

Argh!

But fun though.

We dont have proper Easter traditions.
the only thing we do the same every year is me and my mum compete to see who can get the most eggs foil wrappers off in once piece, with no tears in the foil, and then smooth them all out with our fingernails.

I can't believe I told you that.

LOL RayRay - we used to do the same thing!! was a big challenge when i was living at home!!

we don't have traditions really, though i think we might have started something this year - we usually catch up with family for good friday lunch as i have an aunt with an intellectual disability and it's what her parents used to do - apart from that not much

this year though, my bro/sil, dh and i also spent time together having a ****tail party on good friday night - maybe it's a new tradition in the making (though i don't know if it's going to be just good friday or whether it's going to be every friday the way they were talking!!)