Easter is coming!!!!

Becoming · Post by **Becoming** » Thu Mar 31, 2011 12:27 am

How are you going to 'do' Easter?

This is my first holiday on No-S. I want to start planning so I can get into the right head space, because there is potential disaster ahead (loooove chocolate!)

Also, in Australia, we have a 5 day weekend over Easter. Do Good Friday and Easter Monday count as NWS-Days, thereby allowing me to indulge? The Tuesday after Easter Monday is Anzac Day, which is an important day of rememberance for us, but not really an 'eating' holiday. However, there is a tradition of baking Anzac biscuits (yum!), and I would really like to do this with my daughter. Which days are legitimate NWS-Days?

NoelFigart · Post by **NoelFigart** » Thu Mar 31, 2011 12:32 am

Now I'm not a Christian, but IIRC Good Friday is still during Lent and while a holiday, isn't it a fast day?

If Easter Monday is traditional for your culture, then yeah, celebrate it. (And definitely make the biscuits if it's the traditional way to celebrate the holiday).

Sienna · Post by **Sienna** » Thu Mar 31, 2011 12:43 am

My general rule for NWS days is to celebrate the day as I normally would. That means if I wouldn't normally celebrate with food in any way, then its an N day. If I would celebrate it with food, but am celebrating it on a weekend instead? N day. If I would normally celebrate it with a single food event (say cake for a good friends birthday), I'll allow the single food event as an S event, but keep the day otherwise an N day. And I try to minimize the rule breaks (so like cake with lunch so its only breaking the Sweet rule and not also the Snack rule).

Bigger holidays that I would normally celebrate with many food events (Christmas, Thanksgiving, New Years) I take as full S days. I've been doing this for less than a year, but I don't necessarily think I'll keep things exactly the same each year. But I do plan to always decide in advance of the holiday - so that I don't decide to declare at S day just because it happens to be a random holiday and I'm stressed/bored/whatever and want to eat half a chocolate cake.

librarylady · Post by **librarylady** » Thu Mar 31, 2011 5:05 pm

Easter is easy! Since it always comes on a Sunday it is by default an "S" day. We'll have ham and scalloped potatoes and asparagus, with probably a nice homemade cake (courtesy of my daughter). I would love lamb, but some of my relatives hate it, so we must wait until a week after Easter for that!

Good Friday IS a fast day, so that's easy too. Being in America I need not worry about ANZAC day - though I honor those brave men. But I would think that if you usually bake biscuits with your daughter then you should continue to do so - it falls under national holiday. Doesn't mean you have to eat all day long of course!

The only NWS day I am taking in April is oddly enough Passover! I go to a seder held by one of our Jewish friends - and you can't one plate a seder!

Chocolates and Easter candy I leave to the kids. I really don't need jelly beans or chocolate bunnies. I might have one or two pieces of candy on Sunday of course, but I long ago stopped stuffing myself on Easter - around the time I figured out that the Easter bunny wasn't real

(should I put in spoilers for that?)

Thalia · Post by **Thalia** » Thu Mar 31, 2011 5:10 pm

Yum, Easter! We'll have brunch with hardboiled eggs (of course!), sausage, and coffee-cake. Probably leg of lamb and asparagus and some kind of starch, and jellybeans and chocolates sprinkled through the day.

SpiritSong · Post by **SpiritSong** » Thu Mar 31, 2011 5:27 pm

I assume my husband will get me my orange chocolate miniatures. I may have to have him hide them from me on N-Days.

ellgee · Post by **ellgee** » Thu Mar 31, 2011 5:31 pm

We don't usually do a big meal or anything. Kids are grown so no Easter egg hunts. Luckily it is an S day so I am sure to see a Reese's Peanut Butter Egg in my future.

DaveMc · Post by **DaveMc** » Thu Mar 31, 2011 6:28 pm

librarylady wrote:Chocolates and Easter candy I leave to the kids. I really don't need jelly beans or chocolate bunnies.

I'm 40, and while I really don't need jelly beans, I really *do* need a chocolate bunny around Easter!

The size of the bunny has declined over the years: when I was a teenager, I would routinely devour an entire solid bunny weighing in at a pound or more. Now the thought makes me faintly ill, but I'll still enjoy demolishing a smaller hollow bunny, come Easter. (Not a holiday I celebrate religiously, in either sense of the word, but I enjoy the candy and egg hunts.)

Becoming · Post by **Becoming** » Thu Mar 31, 2011 7:16 pm

DaveMc wrote:Not a holiday I celebrate religiously, in either sense of the word, but I enjoy the candy and egg hunts.

This is my issue. There will be so much food around over the whole Easter long weekend that it will be hard to resist. It's kind of a party weekend for those of us who aren't religious, because of all the public holidays. I'm thinking that the best thing to do would be to stick to N-Days on Good Friday and Easter Monday and just enjoy them as days off work (no fasting for us). Take the usual S-Day weekend and enjoy Easter treats then. Make the Anzac biscuits with my daughter on the Tuesday as a way to commenmorate the day with her.

Really, I just have to be sensible and not let a 5 day weekend give me an excuse for gluttony!

sarah.grace · Post by **sarah.grace** » Thu Mar 31, 2011 7:22 pm

I will definitely be consuming a Cadbury egg, but that's probably it for Easter candy. Not a big jelly bean fan.

Probably no Easter dinner either, which is our typical method of celebration. I am taking some vacation days to travel for the holiday, but I won't be home for the annual dinner.

Oh well. Being able to spend a couple days with family I haven't seen since Christmas is enough!

milliem · Post by **milliem** » Thu Mar 31, 2011 7:51 pm

I'll be spending Easter Sunday with family so as an S day, I'll be indulging. We usually have a big meal (3 courses) and lots of chocs around.... my family are all foodies and we're used to any reason for something tasty!!

I probably will keep the Friday, Saturday and Monday of Easter weekend as normal N or S days accordingly though... I'm not religious so have no REAL excuse to give myself extra S days!

Too solid flesh · Post by **Too solid flesh** » Thu Mar 31, 2011 8:41 pm

In the UK, we have hot cross buns on Good Friday.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hot_cross_bun

http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/hotcrossbuns_397

And Easter eggs on Easter Sunday.

milliem · Post by **milliem** » Thu Mar 31, 2011 9:41 pm

Too solid flesh wrote:In the UK, we have hot cross buns on Good Friday.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hot_cross_bun

http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/hotcrossbuns_397

And Easter eggs on Easter Sunday.

Oh god I forgot about hot cross buns..... yum. I'll try and save them for Saturday's S day!! Now you've reminded me how much I love them I may have to grab one for an S day treat this weekend

Let's hope I stick to one...

amake616 · Post by **amake616** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 12:40 am

Those hot cruss buns look wonderful, I might have to find a recipe for those. I don't plan on taking any additional NWS days although I'm sure I'll eat more than my fair amount of food that weekend. Luckily Orthodox Easter falls on the same day as everybody else's Easter so I can get all of my devouring done and over with.

I love Easter...spanakopita and galaktobureko (custard between layers of buttered phyllo soaked in lemon sugar syrup) and tsoureki (which is an anise bread - dunno if other people eat that during Easter) I must be valiant in the face of malted milk balls when they go on clearance though. I really don't NEED ten bags.

snapdragon · Post by **snapdragon** » Sat Apr 02, 2011 12:53 pm

We go out for Easter brunch. Which saves me from all the fattening leftovers. But since I have four kids there will be plenty of candy around.
this year I am bringing back an old tradition....confetti eggs. I have been saving the eggshells from my breakfast ( you cut off the top of the egg with a sharp knife) wash, dry, dye them fill them with paper confetti seal them with tissue paper then hide them and break them over peoples heads for good luck. This was a lot of un when I was a kid. Trying to find non-food ways to celebrate with the family.