It is Spring!!! Yay. And in honor of spring. Hannah has been taken through the ritual known as Passover. Oh yes, it starts with the hunt for the pretty and perfect Passover dress. Which we found at TJ Maxx for 29.00. Same dress at Macy's 89.00 What a bargain!!! Joel saw it at Macy's and almost fainted. He thought 29.00 was a little much. Now he and I are on the same team about clothes at least. Anyway, dress is lovely and as you can see she and Mr. Bunny had a lovely picture taken at the mall immediately following the purchase. Changed in the ladies room. Oh yes, we did.
So, Thursday night we made our annual trek to our friends house to celebrate the Passover Seder. In the car, Hannah pull the center flower off the dress. It's okay. Super mom digs through the 400 reciepts, notes, random slips of paper, $50.00 worth of change mostly in pennies, fuzz covered Altoids, and business cards for people I don't even remember in her purse. Oh yes, I have a pink knock off Coach bag with a fancy smancy pink fuzzy pony tail holder replacing the missing zipper pull. There must be a safety pin, super glue, something in the bottom of this carryall I carry. Lo and behold, a safety pin. Salvation. Perfect, pretty dress is restored. Grand entrance is saved. We arrive without further deflowering 40 minutes later, a little rumpled from the car seat but fine.
In we go to greet our friends and their assorted 20 some relatives for the King of all Seders. It's 7:30 and we have worked all day and been up since 4:00 a.m. thanks to Hannah's week long fight with a "non-descriminant" fever (Doctor's words not mine). It finally broke Thursday morning. Still, despite the drive, the long day, and the knowledge that this crowd does not do the Reader's Digest condensed version of Seder we are happy to be included and happy to see our dear friends John and Candy. According to tradition, the candles must be lit 18 minutes before Sundown exactly. So, we start around 8:30. About ten minutes before we light the candles. Cloe their labrador yanks the same flower off the dress and I am relieved. Ok, the dog gets blamed for flower falling off. I fix again with same pin and Hannah spends the evening protecting her floral waistband from Cloe.
Now, for those who haven't been to Seder or are unfamiliar, it is a dinner that celebrates the miracles that God gave the Hebrews in their Exodus from Egypt. It recounts the 10 plagues. Hannah has finger puppets. We brought them and they were a huge hit with the couple sitting next to us. The wife was wiggling Mr. Lice Puppet in her hubby's hair giggling "oooh Honey you have lice." It was quite hysterical. At Jon and Candy's the service is mostly done in Hebrew by their family and the rest of us take turns reading the Haggadah (the book that outlines the service) in English. The entire first part requires drinking two glasses of wine, tasting the matzah, washing hands twice (can't be too clean), eat haroses (apples, wine, walnuts and honey mushed together), a little horseradish cause life can be bitter, some potatoes or parsley in salt water, all is symbolic of different parts of the tale of Exodus, and then Jon hides the Afikomen. A piece of Matzah in a bag, which Hannah spied and found right away.
Dinner was monsterous and delicious and by the time we began with our choices of 3 soups and 6 appetizers it was 10 o'clock and Hannah wasn't interested in food at all. After dessert, there are two more glasses of wine and then Hannah must sell the Afikomen back to the host so we can all have a taste which ends the food portion of the Seder. Nothing can be eaten after the Afikomen, which since it was after 11 p.m. wasn't likely anyway. Hannah tells Jon "I'll sell it for a C Note." She was coached by the adult children at the table. Jon yelped "A C-note? How about a brand new five dollar bill?" Hannah accepted, she had no idea what a C-note was but five dollars she knows. After the two glasses of wine, a few dozen Psalms in Hebrew and English and three or four songs it was over. And even though it was late and we were exhausted and still had a long ride back home, I couldn't help but appreciate the Seder this year more than before.
So many people skip the end part, but Candy never does. This year I followed along closely and understood why. The end part is a bunch of the Psalms that Thank God for all the good He does in our lives. It is just a lot of praise and thanks for everything that is good in our lives. I think no more fitting an end should be after a delicious dinner with loving friends and what better lesson teach our children than God did all these great things for us and saved us even when we acted badly or didn't have faith. How can you go through a whole evening recounting the wonder of this and not take time to say, Thank you just a few more times?
Today, we died Easter eggs with my Mom. She and my stepdad came over and we died eggs and stuffed plastic eggs, (120 of them) for the Easter Egg hunt at my mom's tomorrow afternoon. My nephews are going to be there too. It should be a blast. And we will be staying for dinner, while my brother and his kids are going to have dinner with family at home. All in all it's beautiful outside, spiritual inside and the wonder of miracles surrounds us all. I love this time of year.
Hope all of you have a wonderful Passover/Easter too.
