Thank Goodness.

I have been feeling super grumpy about Easter. Here in Mississippi, apparently it’s the thing to celebrate Easter- a lot. Having never before encountered requests (from all 3 teachers) for candy filled eggs (12 for each of my children, to be exact) along with notes home about multiple egg hunts and parties- I had no idea that I would react to all this hullabaloo about Easter by feeling pressured, irritated, and grumpy. It’s true I’ve been grumpy (Ernie will be happy to confirm that).

Just to set the record straight: I love Easter. It’s a sacred holiday and I love that it’s not hugely commercialized like Christmas. I love the Easter Bunny too, and my kids get baskets and candy and the whole works. I like Spring Time and flowers and baby chickens and pastel eggs and all the other cutesy things that you can buy at Target this time of year. It’s certainly not that I am against secular celebrations this time of year, either. It’s just that I was starting to feel like my kids were being sucked into thinking that Easter is just a springtime version of Halloween. That it’s only a “candy holiday”.

So I’ll just say: thank goodness for General Conference. It was a blessing and a privilege to listen to the prophet and the apostles share testimony after testimony about the true meaning of Easter. It was so wonderful to be hear again about the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. I felt like I was living the primary song “Tell Me the Stories of Jesus”. General Conference never disappoints and this weekend it took a grumpy mom and helped her to be a happy mom. For that, my whole family says thank you.