Family Search 52 Stories Week 10

Tomorrow is Easter Sunday, and I will be hosting 13 or 14 of my extended family members for dinner. It seem apropos, then, to use a writing prompt that deals with holiday traditions.

Which of your holiday traditions have you carried on into adulthood? What new traditions have you started?

When I was a child, Easter was a big deal. It was almost as if Santa was visiting for a second time, coming dressed in a white, fluffy suit with big ears and a pom pom tail. My mom and dad had a good time with Easter, carefully filling our baskets with all our favorite candies and green, plastic grass. Then they would hide the baskets, and my brother and I would feverishly dash through the house trying to determine where that wily rabbit had hidden our goodies.

Easter ~1958

The bunny always left a brown, wooden bowl filled with dyed eggs and candy on the kitchen table for the "adults" in the house. There was quite an age difference between my older brother and sister and us younger two siblings, so perhaps that was the bunny's way of making sure the older two didn't feel left out. Or maybe mom and dad just wanted to make sure they got some candy, too.

After breakfast we would don our Sunday best and head off to Mass. The photo above is of our family before Easter Mass in Chicago, circa 1958. I'm in the front with my brother Joe on my right. In the back row is my sister Kathy, my mom, and my brother Ken. Dad was usually the one taking the pictures, so he isn't in this shot. I'm the only one who looks happy. Maybe my Easter basket was the biggest that year!

When my husband and I started our family we continued on with the Easter basket tradition, hiding the baskets from the kids just as my parents had done. And there was a bowl of candy on the table for the adults. But we added a new tradition by hiding dyed eggs outside. One of us would slyly sneak out with the eggs while the other got the children ready for Mass. When we got home from church, we would send them out to look in the yard. They loved it! But one year there were hardly any eggs left in the yard. We could not figure out where they had all gone. But just as we were scratching our heads over it, a big black crow swooped down from the sky, grabbed a colored egg, and took off. Those devils!

The next year I purchased a couple bags of colored plastic eggs, and we filled those with candy and hid them outside. Problem solved, and I think the kids enjoyed the candy-filled eggs way more than they ever did the hard-boiled, dyed eggs.

The picture below is Easter 1993. The kids found their baskets, we dressed up for Mass, and then they went on their egg hunt when we got home. And once again the dad was taking the picture, so he isn't in it. Though the days of Easter egg hunts are long gone, it's so nice to be reminded of the fun times we had when the kids were young.

Easter 1993

Family Search 52 Stories Week 9

This week the challenge question involves leaving home for the first time.

When you first left your parents’ home, was it to attend college, pursue a job, or embark on military or humanitarian service? What was it like to be out on your own for the first time?

My first time leaving home was to attend college. I had never been away from my family before other than a few overnight stays with friends, a couple of weekend girl scout camps and a class trip in high school to Washington, DC. On any other longer trips I was always with at least one of my family members. As the baby of the family, I was very close to my parents and siblings, but college held a world of new opportunities in my eyes. Though I did not get to attend the college of my choice (my dad's decision, and the topic of a future post), I was happy that a number of my fellow Hoover Husky high school classmates would also be going to Iowa State.

A good friend and I applied to be roommates, but the lottery used back then did not allow that to happen. She was at one end of the campus, and I at another. She and I packed up my car with our belonging the summer before freshman year and headed to campus together. Neither one of us knew our respective roommates. The picture below shows me with some of my fellow dormies. I am in the center of the front row, and my freshman roommate is right behind me.

Iowa State 1974 

It was difficult for me at first, and I made many weekend trips home that first quarter to see my parents. I missed them terribly, despite the fact that my older brother was currently a junior at the same university. Eventually I began to make new friends, and saw some of my old high school acquaintances around campus. One of them invited me to attend a rush party for Little Sisters that was taking place at his fraternity. Being selected to be part of this Little Sisters group at Alpha Sigma Phi was a turning point for me at Iowa State. I found a whole new set of friends, both male and female, and an entirely different way to become involved with the university.

The first three years of college I lived in a dormitory, but senior year I moved off campus into a mobile home with one of the other Little Sisters. That was a great experience in preparing me for independent living, with rent and utility bills to pay as well as groceries to purchase and cook. No more meal plan in the dorm!

Renting the mobile home and sharing a small space with another adult also prepared me to become a wife, I believe. And as one of the fraternity brothers married this Little Sister thirty-eight years ago, I'd say being out on my own for the first time worked out pretty well!