Easter!

We had a great weekend! I think I probably posted this time last year that Easter is my favorite holiday, and I will say it again : ) Spring is - in my mind - the most beautiful season. I miss my Texas bluebonnets, but have come to love Memphis azaleas and dogwoods! I enjoy hosting Easter lunch, since it's my only holiday to host a big meal, and I spend a long time planning and prepping for it. Of course most of all, this holiday is the pinnacle celebration of the Christian faith, since we remember the resurrection of Jesus Christ and with it our assured salvation, victory over evil in the world, and the hope of our eternal life! I have had "Christ the Lord is Risen Today" in my head all morning...probably because I sang it, oh, nine times yesterday in all of the church services!

To back up, the weekend started with a meaningful Good Friday service. I obviously enjoy worship through singing, and the Crucifixus that we sang was my thank offering to God for Jesus' sacrifice. Although it is a somber service, I cannot help but leave uplifted, knowing that with Jesus' death all of my sins (past, present, and future) are forgiven. What a weight lifted off of me, and what a challenge to dedicate my life to Christ. After the service, I went into prep mode doing a final cleaning of the apartment and making honey yeast rolls (thank you Nancy Simmons!). We watched Donnie Darko, because Jonathan wanted to see if a certain scene had a certain song that had been stuck in his head all week. (for Becky, it was the first school scene where we are introduced to all of those characters) If you care, it was not the same song...but it was the same band from the 80s. Only my husband would have a mind that works like that. You can never go straight to sleep after watching Donnie Darko, so we tried to wrap our minds around its meaning. It could be a possible good pick for Good Friday, since one way to interpret it is that Donnie voluntarily sacrifices himself. Every time I watch that movie, I try to pay attention to every little detail so that I can figure it out. Jonathan thinks we need to track down a director's cut version, and then the pieces will all come together. In my mind, DD is possibly Jake's best movie - the Smurf scene may be his best monologue as well!

Saturday morning started with our third annual running of the Bunny Run 5k around Audubon Park. Erin, Becky and I all did very well - I want to say we all PR'd. Bunny Run 2007 - 40 minutes. Bunny Run 2008 - 36 minutes. Bunny Run 2009 - 33 minutes. Erin ran hers significantly faster than that - those are my times! It was supposed to be a tempo run preparing us for the Youth Villages 5k next Saturday, but we were in a groove and ran faster than anticipated. Hopefully we can do just as well on the 18th! Jonathan's grandmother and great-aunt came into town from Chattanooga Saturday morning, so we headed out with them to brunch at Cafe Eclectic (where I got a very nice sunburn sitting out on the patio), and then went to the zoo...along with everyone else in the tri-state area. We love the zoo and are very spoiled living across the street from it! I prepped some more for our Easter meal, and then we had dinner at Ciao Bella. After dinner, I needed to purchase a baby shower gift, and we were already in East Memphis with a car, so we visited the new Target at Ridgeway. It is huge! And it has everything you could ever want! I am completely satisfied with our little Target on Colonial, but I can see what all the fuss is about with the new store. A friend's toddler was telling me about the 'new' Target and the 'old' Target last week - even he knows the difference!

Sunday of course was lots of fun (see first paragraph)! We were at church from 7:15 to 12:30, and we sang in three services. All of the choir members, our director and organist were wiped out afterward, but we had a great time worshiping. At home, we had a total of twelve for our meal, and I was able to get everything out on the table in a semi-reasonable amount of time. Meat always takes so much longer to cook than the directions say! We had pork tenderloin (thanks Becca for the recipe), sweet potatoes, asparagus, green salad, honey rolls, cornbread, and 10-cheese pasta (thanks Ashley for bringing it!). After lunch, a bunch of folks headed out, and those that remained played a rousing game of Harry Potter Scene It (in which I was a big dork and looked up a few answers in the books...because the game is over the movies, but most of my knowledge is from the books). Then we had our Bunny Melt - a Pollock tradition in which you melt a chocolate Easter bunny and eat it, fondue-style. Ashley was brave enough to try a chocolate covered peep, and her facial expression let the rest of us know that it was not a good idea! After all our guests had gone home, we had a very nice nap and didn't really do much of anything for the rest of the evening.

I don't have pictures because I am not a big picture taker : ( I felt the need to share our weekend with you anyway! We had a lot of fun, and all of the fun moments were spent with friends and family : )