Views From a Crow's Nest: Easter Weekend and Angela's Visit

Last weekend we started the Easter weekend celebration with a tradition in which I hadn't taken part since I was about five years old--blowing and painting Easter eggs!

Of course, Dad went overboard as always and had to get the "top of the line" Easter egg dying kits. My Dad has a habit of overdoing...well...almost every function in our lives. My dorm room looks like a mansion and my school projects always outshined those of my classmates. I remember in fifth grade I had to make a shoe box replica of a hospital room for a project on Louisa May Alcott. Dad wouldn't accept a project in a shoe box, so he constructed, from wood, a to-scale replica of not just one hospital room, but an entire hospital. Imagine how I looked walking into school, with everyone else holding a small shoe box and me holding a two-story wooden hospital.

Not only did he go overboard on the dying kits, (Mom sent him to the store for a box of the colored pellets that you put in water; he came back with a No-Spill, Smiley Face Egg Dying Kit and a box of Glitter Dye) but he also found a way to go overboard on blowing the eggs. Instead of using pins like a normal family would, my Dad pulled out his drill and, using a tiny drill bit, made holes in the top and bottom of each egg.

After blowing 36 eggs (Dad scrambled the insides for our dog to feast on all day), we dyed and painted them all. Christopher's interest lasted for about two eggs, then he went outside to help Dad wash cars (what a boy!) Angela, Mom, and I finished painting the rest, coming up with creative designs and scenes like zebra print, the Old Well in Chapel Hill, a penguin, monogrammed eggs, summer scenes, camouflage, and Disney characters. I have to admit, it was a pretty impressive basket of eggs by the time we were done.

That night, we celebrated Easter with another tradition--watching the Passion of the Christ. It is an incredible movie and was such a powerful reminder of the reason we celebrate Easter. The next morning we dressed in our Sunday best for church, where Christopher found a baby turtle in the parking lot that we had to return to the pond before leaving for Elizabeth City to spend time with our family there. Then more family came to our house for a traditional ham dinner.

The next morning, Angela and I got up early and left for Chapel Hill, where she would be spending the first part of her Spring break! I was SO excited to show her around campus and around town. While she was here, we went shopping, she went to my staff meeting, she helped me babysit in the afternoons, came to class, went out to eat on Franklin Street, and even went to see a movie at Varsity Theater. While babysitting, we took Aadit to the Orange County Animal Shelter where we saw kittens and puppies up for adoption (and fell in love with a few!) We celebrated the last day of class (a BIG deal here in Chapel Hill) together by going out on Franklin Street, and then Angela left to spend the rest of the break at home. It's hard for me to imagine her being old enough to be a college student next year, but she fit into the college scene perfectly!