#48- Sharing my favorite Easter traditions with you. What does Easter mean? Why are rabbits associated with Easter? Why do we eat chocolate on Easter?

WARNING!! Do NOT listen to this with your young children around!!
 (I talk about the Easter Bunny...Y.O.U)

What are your favorite Easter traditions? In this fun episode I share some of my favorite Easter traditions with you and share some FUN facts about Easter.

Why do we call it Easter? Why are bunnies associated with Easter? Why do we eat chocolate eggs on Easter?
I learned some pretty neat facts that date pretty far back when it comes to some Easter traditions.

Do you have a favorite tradition you celebrate with your family? Where was the craziest place you found your basket as a kid?
Mine was in a separate garage that was very far from my house. And it is NOT that warm in Buffalo on Easter Sundays. I wasn't too happy with the bunny that year!! HAHA : )

Transcript

 Hello. Hello my friends. I am Jenny Lynn and this is my show. I am a wife and mom of two crazy kiddos. I have struggled many years with chronic illness and pain. I have a passion to find out as much as I can while navigating through life, not always feeling 100%. I have realized that having a positive mindset is a must in today's crazy.

You deserve to live this life showing up as your best self, and I can help you get there. If you've been feeling lost after becoming a mom, you're not alone. I know that incredible woman is still in there just begging to be found. I am here to create a safe, non-judgmental space for like-minded women.

Let's empower each other. I am so happy you're here. Now let's jump into the 1 23 Mom Squad podcast with. Jenny Lynn.





Hello, my friends and happy. Wellness Thursday. I normally do a wellness Wednesday, but obviously you're listening to this on a Thursday. And if you're listening to this, when it's coming out, that means that Easter Sunday is this Sunday. So today I wanted to talk a little bit about what is Easter who celebrates it? What are my Easter traditions? 

What, and why is a bunny associated with Easter? Why do we color eggs? And kind of all the things revolving around Easter. And, um, for those that do celebrate, I am curious as to what kind of traditions you celebrate on Easter, or do you kind of do the, you know, coloring of the eggs and hide the eggs for the kids and do they find their Easter basket? 

Does the bunny leave clues or do the kids just run a muck all over the house, trying to find the Easter basket? What are the preparations before. Before the big day. And what does Easter mean to you and your family? So I wanted to talk a little bit about what Easter means to me and my family on my email this week. If you're part of my weekly email newsletter, I went through my feet, my favorite Easter memories, and kind of my favorite Easter traditions that I've done ever since I've been a kid. So I hope you are a part of my newsletter. 

If not, all you gotta do is go to my website. 1, 2, 3 moms squad.com. And you'll get a prompt that just says, join my newsletter. And all you gotta do is put in your email and your name and boom. You're done. And you'll find other information on the website as well. I'm trying to keep it updated as POS most. 

As best as possible. But, um, doing that is time consuming and not my forte. So I kind of do it when I have a little bit of extra time. So here we go. Let's see, I do celebrate Easter. I am Christian. I unfortunately do not practice as much as I would love to. Um, I did more as a child. We, you know, we did more going to church and religion. 

I've been, I had my communion and we've been baptized. My kids have been baptized. They made their holy communion. And, um, I got married in a Christian Church. I definitely believe there is a God. Um, I do pray every night and whether or not you do believe in God or universe, I hope you believe that there is some sort of higher power. 

That you can kind of rely upon when. Something you that you have no control over. And even though. You know, Obviously, there are things that are beyond our control. You always like to think that there's some sort of higher power kind of holding your hand and backing you. And that they're there for you or you have an angel. 

A guardian angel that is watching over you and your family. So whatever you believe, um, totally the choice is yours. You know, I'm just letting you know how, um, how I spend my Easter and then I am Christian and I am also part Polish. So if you are a part Polish welcome, and I am so happy for you all to be here. And Easter is, is a pretty long Delon holiday for the Polish folk. So. 

It is a festive Christian holiday and in Poland that commemorates the resurrection of Jesus Christ. So. Easter was huge. When I was small, my grandmother, my maternal grandmother actually came to the United States from Poland when she was only 18 years old. And she learned how to speak English all by herself and established her life here in America pretty quickly. 

Uh, she, she got married, had five amazing children. My mom was the only female among four brothers and smack dab in the middle. They grew up in a small ranch with three bedrooms and one bathroom, if you can believe that. So I can't even imagine what the teen years looked like in that house. God bless my grandmother and my mom. 

Um, my grandmother, unfortunately is no longer here with us. She passed away what will be five years ago now? Now next month. And there's not a day that goes by that. I don't think about her and miss her every second of the day. She was a part of my life. In every. Just an every day. She was there all the time. I really kind of thought of her as a second mother. She just was there all the time and kind of was my best friend growing up and would just kind of pop into my house. I gave her a key to my first house. You know, we just, we spent every. 

Holiday. She came with us on every vacation. She was just always there. And, um, I do miss her. I do miss her a lot. But, um, she, when they first, when she first moved to America, there is a. There was, I guess, a big Polish community. In south Buffalo. Where I, I live in a suburb of Buffalo. Um, but. 

Where she grew up and where my, where she raised her family at first. There was a really large community of Polish immigrants there. And there was a market it's called the Broadway market and it had, you know, Polish sausage and all sorts of deli meats, and little like chotchkies and everything that like, you know, reminded you of Easter, the butter lambs and the wooden eggs that. 

The Polish community would make very tediously. So we used to go the Friday before Easter. And me, my mom and my sister and my grandmother would go and we, you know, walk around, we'd see the Easter bunny, get our faces painted and there was this horse radish stand there. That makes fresh horseradish. Now, if you're familiar with the actual, extremely potent older. 

Of fresh horse radish. You can't even get close to that without your eyes watering. Um, So we would make my grandma go get, go get the fresh horse radish. Um, of course, like none of us really ate it. It was just had to be something that was in your basket that you took. To the church to have it blessed to have the food bless before you ate it on Easter Sunday. So she'd go and she'd talk Polish to all her friends and. 

There was a woman there named Wanda. And my grandma's name was Wanda. And I had this picture of the two of them together. One year that, um, sits very, um, uh, I don't know what the word like, it just, it just sits in my mind, you know, very vividly of the two of them. And they would just talk back and forth and. 

I miss hearing her speak in Polish and I wish I would have understood it more. Or even. You know, tried to learn how to speak it. And it's unfortunate that the Polish community in Buffalo. Is really dying off. And I don't know if their families are trying to carry these traditions, but unfortunately all the Polish veterans there. 

They're well into their nineties if not had passed. So there's not many left. And it's really sad when these generations die off and these kind of traditions and, you know, Known ways of life just kind of go away. It's really, really sad. To see that happen. But so we're at the Broadway market and we'd get our sausage and she'd push her way. This she's like was four, 10, and was always in pantyhose and dressed to the nines and her high heels. She never went anywhere in like sneakers or flats, but she'd push her way right through. She'd have money in her hand and she'd be talking Polish. 

So she knew what, you know, what was going on. And me and my mom would just kind of laugh and look at each other, like, yeah, she knows what she's doing. And people would. You know, she was just like, I don't know. She was just, just the cutest little thing. So. We'd get all of our stuff. We'd um, there used to be a little restaurant in there that we'd we'd eat, we'd eat at. And unfortunately it closed down at quite a while ago now. 

Um, And now my mom and I used to take, well, we still do. We take my kids. My son doesn't really love crowds because the Broadway market is still extremely, extremely packed. During Easter, Easter week and Easter weekend. So it's just my mom, me and my daughter. We go over there and it's really to kind of keep the tradition alive. A lot of families still do it. 

Here in Buffalo and I'm, I'm glad to see that there, there still is a good amount of people that do visit the Broadway market, but it it's turned more into almost like a flea market. There's a lot of. Knickknack vendors. More than the food type vendors that are there. So, um, it had has changed, but we still go, like I said, to just kind of keep the Easter tradition alive. 

Which is fun. And then afterwards, we'd go get some, some really nice Easter plans and make, you know, a nice little. Um, bundle of fresh flowers and lilies and hydrangeas. So the house would smell nice and get little Easter egg picks and little bunny picks to stick in there. And. We decorate. We'd get our baskets ready because on Saturday, 

We would go to our church and we would have the priest bless our baskets with our holy water. And our buttered lamb and our cute little Chicky, salt and pepper shakers. So it was, it's a lot of, you know, it's a lot of fun and Easter to me really represents, especially in Buffalo, the coming of warmer weather. So right now, today it's actually really warm outside. It's 56 degrees, but we. 

It just got done, having a thunderstorm. It is decent outsize or outsides outside. Um, but in the past that we have had snow and unfortunately there are days or there has been Easter Sundays where we have gone to church in. Our boots and winter jackets. So. We still go. And we, my daughter likes to still pick out her annual Polish, wooden egg. 

And we get some, some sweets and our polar sausage. And then when we get back, I hard boil some eggs and the kids love to color the eggs. That's always the fun part. You know, it takes longer to set all the dye and dry the eggs, and then the kids just dump them in and, and, you know, Let them soak. And my, my son has done in seconds and my daughter likes to take her time and she takes the wax cran and writes everybody's name. 

In the family, that's going to be at Easter brunch on Sunday. She puts a wax crayon and puts their name on it and then dips it in the dye. So then this way, everybody has their own hard-boiled egg, Easter Sunday. And then we get to, we get to take those eggs and put, we bless those eggs at church on Easter. 

Um, on that Saturday. So that's pretty much my traditions that I love. And now I decorate my, my decorate, my house, and I leave little clues as my mom did for us or the Easter bunny did for us little clues around the house. And leave clues to where the kids would find their Easter baskets. They'd be cut out in little Easter egg shape. 

And usually they would rhyme right now. I am kind of rhymed out. So I just leave cute little clues. As my mom would always leave my basket outside somewhere or where I have, would have to like get dressed and go outside and walk for my Easter basket. I am now. Doing that to my son, which is kind of funny. 

Um, To see him. He just, when he see, when he knows like where it's at. The look that he gives me. It's that. Oh, my gosh, are you kidding me? I have to like, you know, go across to a garage or, you know, walk down. Well down the driveway and it's behind a flag pole or whatever the case. It is really hilarious. 

Um, but through the years, you know, the hiding place has kind of become a little bit trickier. As you just run out of places. So, you know, how many times can you hide a basket and like the dryer or behind a recliner? Um, so we've resorted to like the cars are like outside and just different places. 

I would love to know where you hide your kids, Easter baskets, and you know, maybe it's someplace that I have not thought of yet. So with let's see. So we've talked about my Easter to debt, Easter traditions. I am okay. Speaking a little bit quickly, but yeah. So now I want to talk about, well, what is Easter and where do we kind of get these cultures from and where does it stem from? And all of that. 

So this Easter is this coming Sunday, April 9th, 2023. So apparently, well, we all know it's a Christian festival. It is a cultural holiday, commemorating the resurrection of Jesus Christ. So question, why do we associate rabbits with Easter? So apparently. There's no exact origin of the Easter bunny. 

They it's kind of like the mystery, but there is a theory that the symbol of the rabbit stems from pagan tradition, specifically the festival of, and I'm going to not say this right. Oh, Stra it is, she's a goddess. It is spelled E O S T R E. And it's a goddess of fertility whose animal symbol was a bunny. 

And so rabbits are known for their energetic breeding and how traditionally symbolize fertility just in case, you know, you'd want it to know that little, let little tidbit there. So, and why do we, why do we call it Easter? Well, this is because the naming of the celebration is Easter. It seems to go back to the name of pre-Christian. This is that goddess in England. 

Uh, Astra. Who was celebrated at the beginning of spring. And the only reference to this goddess comes from the writings of a British monk who lived in the late seventies and early eighth century. So because Easter is celebrated in spring and this goddess. 

Um, Was celebrated in the beginning of spring and that's. At Esther, so, okay. So Esther, maybe Easter, Esther. So maybe that is why it's called. It's kind of strange, right? So, how about this? Why do we eat chocolate at Easter? Well, at the time, it was customary to save eggs until the end of the fast and some eggs were, were also decorated. 

And the chocolate egg appeared in the 18th century when the idea of emptying eggs and filling them with chocolate. Was introduced as a way of marking the end of the fast. So, how about this? Why do we give eggs? Or I should say, why do we give chocolate eggs for Easter? So a little thing about the chocolate eggs. 

 It wasn't until the 19th century that eggs made entirely of chocolate appeared with the invention of molds and the improvement of techniques that allowed for better shaping of the cocoa, the Persians Egypt, and the Romans also used to give each other eggs as a symbol of life in spring. By extension chickens and chicks also had the same meaning. 

Here are  facts about Easter. Easter is the celebration of the resurrection of Jesus and the Christian religion. Eggs have been seen as an ancient symbol of fertility while springtime is considered to bring new life and rebirth. American spend 1.9 billion on Easter candy. That's the second biggest candy holiday after Halloween. 

Do you like milk, chocolate, dark chocolate or orange chocolate. I am an orange chocolate lover through and through. 70% of Easter candy purchased is chocolate. 76% of Americans think that here's have a chocolate. Bonnie should be the first to be eaten. How about you when you have a big chocolate bunny, what do you kind of eat first? I guess. 

Yeah, the ears would probably be the, you know, the most to be cracked open. Now do you like your chocolate bunnies to be hollow or to be solid? All right. Egg dyes were once made out of natural items, such as onion, peels, tree bark, flower, pedals, and juices. There are so many different ways to die in egg. Now you can use like shaving cream. 

And oh goodness, like tissue paper. If you go to Pinterest or, I mean, even Google and find just natural home. You know, ways to die in egg. There are so many different ways you can like do. Cool foil. It depends on how much time you got right. All right. There's much debate about the practice of dying chicks. Why would we want to do that many hatcheries, no longer participate, but others say that it isn't dangerous to the chick's health because the dye only lasts until the chicks shed their fluff and grow their feathers. 

I'm not sure how I feel about that one. The first story of a rabbit later named the Easter bunny hiding eggs in a garden was published in 1680. Wow. Easter takes place on Sunday after the 40 day period called lent lent is referred to as a time of fasting, but participants focus more on giving up one significant indulgence. Do you give up anything for lunch? 

Holy week is celebrated during the week leading up to Easter. It begins on Palm Sunday, which continues onto the Monday, Thursday. Good Friday. And then finally Easter Sunday. And finally the white house, Easter egg roll event has been celebrated by the president of the United States and their families since 1878. 

Wow. Those are some fun Easter facts. Bet. You didn't know that? Huh? So that's a quick little podcast for you all about Easter. I really hope that even if you guys don't celebrate Easter, maybe you can just somehow come up with a fun family tradition to do. And you never, you know, you never can have too many family traditions make up something silly, you know, like, 

Watching a sports game or a Scooby-Doo in like your silliest hat that you have around the house. Go for a walk in different shoes or like your mom's shoes or. Uh, totally like weird boot or something. I don't know. There's so many different traditions go find something fun to do. I'm sure you can Pinterest that as well. Right? Just. 

Have, you know, enjoy, enjoy your time together with your loved ones. And I am curious to know if anybody has any other fun. Traditions. If they do say, if you do celebrate Easter, what they are. And where you hide your kids, Easter baskets, um, or where the bunny hides the kids, Easter baskets. To, um, I don't know, maybe give me an idea of new hiding places. 

And once again, I hope you guys have an amazing week ahead and until next week, stay safe. Love you all and happy Easter. 

 Thank you all for being here. I am so glad we found each other. See you next time. Have an incredible day. My beautiful friends.