Easter weekend

Our Easter weekend was tiring, but it was nice to be with family.  A whirlwind of emotions and travel.  Before I get to the weekend, however, I thought I would show off my Easter tree.  Growing up, my mom had an Easter tree just as normal as everyone has a Christmas tree.  She would trim off a branch from the apple tree, put it in sand, and with water it would bloom.  This year, for the first time, I had my own Easter tree.  I do not, however, have a nice apple tree in the yard so I got my stick from the thicket in the ditch.  It's ugly, but it works.

When Mom was here a few weeks ago, we made these embroidery floss eggs that I found on Pinterest.  Essentially, you run embroidery floss through fabric stiffener and wrap them around a water balloon, let them dry overnight, and pop the balloons.  It was a little more complicated than it sounds, but they turned out pretty good.  One tip, though, don't simply put the glue on the balloon and drape the floss over--they will not hold their shape.  We learned the hard way.

My Easter tree

Easter weekend started on Friday.  An extended family member passed away last weekend so Friday night was the visitation.  My cousin's grandmother was 93 years old and when I was a kid, my cousin and I tagged along with Grandma Lillian and Little Grandma (her mother, who was under 5 feet tall) everywhere.  Eerily, she passed away exactly 24 years after our shared grandmother.  Although the circumstances were not ideal, my cousin flew in from New York City and it was great to see him and his significant other--we don't see them nearly enough.

Saturday morning was the funeral.  After spending some time with the family, my sister and father and I headed to Des Moines to run a few errands (pictures of my new porch swing soon) before going to Here Come the Mummies.  My dad is a big fan, and though they were a bit unconventional, the instrumentalists were incredible.  They were very high energy and fun, but dirty.  I kept thinking that any of them could be guys from the Swensen house in college--slightly odd, perverted, great musicians that really knew a good time.  I lived in Swensen after its heyday, but my freshman and sophomore years it was a breeding ground for Mummy-type musicians.  Anyway, the concert was great, we had a lot of fun, and even got to meet some of the Mummies after the show.  They don't talk, just grunt and moan.  Did I mention they were all dressed as mummies?

Bread bunny

After getting home a little after midnight on Saturday night, we went to the sunrise service at 6:30 AM.  Breakfast at the church and then preparing for the family!  My parents hosted 17 for Easter lunch, and it was great to see everyone.  There was so much food!

Mom's Easter tree

After we got done eating, we decided to work some of the food off.  There were several rousing games of washers in the front yard and though it was a bit cool and breezy, everyone lined up to cheer and watch as we refreshed our tailgating skills.

Rick and my cousin's 4-year-old decided to take advantage of the breeze and went kite flying.  Darby loved running around from group to group.  Take a look at that alfalfa the first week of April--so crazy!

It was a great weekend with the family, but it was also nice to get home and sleep--two 2.5 hour round trips in three days seemed like a lot of road time.  Then back to the grindstone--we're almost over the filling and shipping hump, but it's just the lull before the business of summer!