Happy Easter!

Today is April first. I’m happy to bid farewell to March. Now we should see spring really begin to settle in. Last week we had a few days of weather warm enough (just barely) to melt almost all of the snow. The only bits left are under the pine trees and up on the hills where the drifts were especially deep. With the snow gone, the garden is bursting with new life. The yellow crocuses are in full bloom and the other colors will soon be. There are tulip, hyacinth, and daffodil shoots coming up rapidly. The forsythia bushes are budding out. Last week I also started my second tray of seeds – tomatoes, peppers, petunias, and pinks. It makes me happy to think of the garden soon to come.

Crocuses in my garden this morning.

I love the days approaching Easter. They are days I spend listening to some of the music I love most. I listened to Handel’s Messiah during the week. I listened to Bach’s Saint Matthew Passion on Thursday and his Saint John Passion, and Easter Oratorio on Friday. This morning I listened to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir’s album This Is the Christ. I love my Easter music as much as I love Christmas carols.

During the week there were reports of red-throated loons in the area. Stacey, Miriam, and I drove around on Wednesday evening trying to spot them, but didn’t find any. We did see a porcupine, but no loons. Then on Thursday after school, Miriam and I tried again but had no success. Early on Saturday morning, Stacey, Miriam, and I set out again to find the elusive birds. We drove down to the lake at Galeton, parked the car, and surveyed the lake. There were some Canada Geese, a few mergansers, a pied-billed grebe. We were disappointed and about to leave, and then – a loon came swimming down Pine Creek and into the lake. We were too close to it and it took off flying right away. I tried to snap some photos as quickly as I could. Only one photo wasn’t a total blur, but it still isn’t a good shot. Later that day there was another report that the loon was back at the lake in Galeton, so we jumped in the car and drove down there (it’s a 15 minute drive). But, alas, there was no loon. We really wanted to get a good look at one. Red-throated loons are rarely sighted here. Until yesterday, none of us had seen one and we didn’t get a very good look at the one we saw. Still, it was nice to add it to our life lists.

The porcupine we saw.

The elusive loon.

I spent some time yesterday looking through photos that I copied from old slides a few years ago. I wanted to find photos of Easter Sundays from when I was little. I found a few from the years we lived in New Cumberland. Back then, my mother and the girls always had new dresses and sometimes new hats. My dad and us boys dressed up. My parents made Easter baskets and hid them downstairs in my father’s office. After church, we had to go on a hunt to find our basket. I look at those pictures and it seems like it was so long ago – wait, it was so long ago! When our children were small, Stacey sometimes made new dresses for the girls for Easter. We used to do baskets and candy. This year Miriam is the only child at home and she isn’t a child anymore so there’s no baskets or candy. But that’s okay. Next weekend the Thayns are coming to visit and we will have a second Easter celebration with baskets and an Easter egg hunt for Hazel and June. That will be fun.

Easter 1960.

Easter 1963.

Easter 1964.

Our Easter baskets, 1964.

This is General Conference weekend. The sessions start late for us here on the East Coast – noon and four o’clock. We are watching conference on the nice, big television our children got us for Christmas, not on our little computer screen, which is nice. We watched all the sessions yesterday. The first session yesterday was a Solemn Assembly where we sustained our new First Presidency and two new members of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles. The second session was the business session. I always pay attention to the statistical report – over 16,000,000 members now and 159 temples in operation around the world! The speakers at all the sessions have been wonderful. And the music provided by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and other choirs has been especially magnificent. Last night during the General Priesthood session, a change to the organization of the Melchizedek Priesthood quorums was announced. The change was made in order to, as Pres. Nelson said, “improve the way we care for our people. To do that well, we need to strengthen our priesthood quorums to give greater direction to the ministering of love and support the Lord intends for His Saints.” When you belong to the Lord’s Church, directed by a prophet and apostles who receive continuing revelation, you can expect such changes as the church grows and the world changes. Today so far, we’ve watched the first session. The first session today was great. I’m sure the final session will be wonderful too. In between the sessions we ate our Easter feast.

Our Easter feast was pretty modest this year. We altered the menu a bit because Miriam is vegan and won’t eat certain things and I can’t eat certain things. We had our traditional ham (which Stacey and I enjoyed), pickled eggs and beets (Stacey only eats the eggs. I love them both), zesty carrots (I’m the only one who eats them), fresh pineapple (instead of the traditional fruit salad, which is too sweet for me), a cauliflower casserole (instead of funeral potatoes, which are too starchy for me and too dairy for Miriam), sourdough dinner rolls, and an angel food cake with fresh raspberries (instead of the traditional pound cake, which is too sweet for me). It wasn’t quite traditional, but close enough and traditions must change when necessity requires it. It was all so delicious.

Our Easter feast.

The final session of conference will start in an hour. Before it does, I have to go down and do the chores. The chickens will have their own Easter feast as they eat food scraps from our meal. They’ll be so happy to see me. They always are.

Happy Easter!

Dan

But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the first fruits of them that slept. For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.
Behold, I shew you a mystery; we shall not all asleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.
For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory.
O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?
The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the law.
But thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.