As y’all know, I LOVE holidays, and Easter is my favorite – I think it’s the colors and all the cuteness. This year was a real milestone for us, as we have now started attending a church that we really like. We decided to make this shift from non practicing to practicing Christian behavior because our Critter was getting upset that we were not practicing the Jewish holidays. YOU try explaining why there’s no Hanukkah at your house without actually going to church. I remember taking the child to his first Sunday school class and when I dropped him I explained “We are trying to give him a cultural identity. So far all he knows is that Jesus is the boss of Christmas”. I think they probably pegged me for being a prime candidate for attending what we now call “cool church” as opposed to the traditional Episcopal service that we attended until cool church was called to my attention.

Since November, we have come to really enjoy Barry Taylor’s perspective widening sermons that relate real contemporary life to Biblical times. Barry is very interesting – legend has it that he used to be a roadie for ACDC, and sometimes my fave crooner Chris Mann sits in on the mostly music service. On Palm Sunday I grew to love cool church even more when Barry explained that he originally found religion in Stevie Wonder, which really validates my playing my Innervisions cd in my car over and over so the Critter is learning all the words. I really want my kid to have soul.

As time marched up to that day of Jesus’ (aka the boss) resurrection, I began to prepare for what has become an annual event at our home, where I go insane for two weeks choosing everything Easter and figuring out a menu I can serve to the usual twenty or thirty folks of all faiths who come to my place for good Southern food and fun. They all cram into our condo and I always worry that it’s like Holly Golightly’s apartment. This year carried on the tradition, and I had a ball putting it together.

The Easter service was really wonderful – Chris sat in, as you can see from the quick clip above. Our guests stayed at our home up until about eight o’clock, and then Spring Break officially began. You can see from the photos that we found lots of fun things to do to keep ourselves entertained, including Kathryn Ireland’s new fabric launch at Scalamandre, Taekwando, an awesome evening at H.O.M.E. Beverly Hills (SERIOUSLY – check out this video), playing with some cool new toys – in general having enough fun that we really didn’t take the break! The Critter returned to school yesterday. I think I’m going to take a cue from Louis XIV below and take a nap before I head over to Natalee Thai to hang with my mommyblogger peeps!