Easter Sunday

Easter blessings to family and friends!

After our best attempts to make all the Triduum liturgies, a few stumbling blocks involving vomiting family members impeded our plans for Holy Thursday and the Easter Vigil. A highlight of Holy Week (if one can use such an uplifting term to describe Good Friday) was attending Bishop Morlino's Good Friday liturgy at St. Patrick's. Seeing the processing diocesan seminarians and the large number of altar boys serving with the Bishop was awe-inspiring and, as always, I became all teary-eyed during the veneration of Christ on the crucifix. Our three oldest were, at one point, in the front row of the Bishop's Mass on their own, while Joe and I attended to the needs of the two youngest. Thankfully, six-year-old William did not use that opportunity to vomit. (He saved that for traditional Lentil Soup dinner at the Daniel home later that evening. Thank goodness the Daniels are like family and are amazingly understanding.) I can't even think too hard about what could have been, had that happened a couple hours earlier at St. Patrick's.

A few photos from the Leone family Easter 2007...

Okay, so we didn't keep snapping until everyone was smiling. But here you get to see the five Leone kids in all their unedited glory.

Anna Marie snapped this slightly blurry photo of her dear ol' mom and dad on Easter morn.

The Leone kids explore Easter baskets. The theme this year was "nature hikes." The Easter Bunny provided special nature walk fanny packs with magnifying glasses and scat-identification bandanas. Bring on the warm weather!

Lil' Therese enjoys her first non-infant Easter and wreaks a little Easter havoc along the way.

Joe, despite feeling under the weather, made his traditional lamb roast and rosemary potatoes. What's there not to love about this man? He cooks for his wife and kids even when he's sick.

Ta-da! Here we are at Easter dinner (sans napping Therese and photo-snapping Joe). This is the first I recall not breaking out the china and eating in the dining room for a major holiday. However, with Joe not feeling well and Grammy not being able to make it at the last minute, we decided to keep things really simple. Simple must have been just what the doctor ordered, because it was one of our most memorable dinners. Simple-but-delicious was the menu theme: Joe Leone's Famous Lamb Roast & Potatoes, asparagus with hollandaise sauce, deviled Easter eggs, strawberry and spinach salad with poppy seed dressing, rolls, and a lamb cake. Oh, I almost forgot to mention the Grandma Kate-style relish tray. Mmmmm....

If I may direct you to a funny little point about the above photo... It was not until after we snapped this shot, after we had started eating, and after Andrew stood on his chair to make a point (Emily Post is shuddering), that we learned Andrew was wearing no pants. (Ms. Post is shuddering again.) Needless to say, the table erupted into laughter at the expense of poor potty-training Andrew who forgot to replace his pants.