Well it is Easter Monday night here and I have had my first chocolate free Easter! I can’t really believe I have achieved it myself yet I have and I’m very happy. There wasn’t any real longing for chocolate treats despite themselves nibbling away around me which was the best bit. Hopefully this means that my sugar addictive is starting to wane.
Our Easter began with Good Friday, which is the day for Hot cross buns, and traditionally I would make some using a sugar laden recipe that I was never very happy with, it has to be said. I decided that this year I would re-think things and amazingly I worked out a great recipe that contained no sugar (the crystalized stuff I mean) and only had dried currents added for sweetness. The results? YUMMY Hot Cross buns that tasted a lot like the shop ones 😉 So as you can imagine there was a bit of munching and crunching going on and a few batches made! I’ve put the recipe on my recipe page to check it our here for next year or even if you just want a good current bun.
The last batch of buns minus their crosses in a rush to feed everyone.
The aim was to make the Easter Sunday (the traditional day for gift giving) more about hunting for wee gifts than eating chocolate however the kids were given so much chocolate by others that it became a mixture of the two. I say so much though when I looked at their stash it was far less than previous years! We, as parents, didn’t buy any and it really is starting to amaze me just how much other people give children, outside of their family, chocolate and lollies (sweets). I had never paid that much attention to it in the past and in fact I was just as guilty of ‘treating’ others children rather than letting them ‘treat’ their children how they saw fit. I guess what goes around comes around and I have definitely been learning a few lessons in this adjusted way of eating. Apologies to all that I have annoyed, upset and given a little thoughtlessly to.
After much waiting and excitement Saturday night finally arrived and themselves carefully put all their ‘goodies’ into a bag for us to hide before having their final sleep before Easter Treats on Sunday. To this stash we added a few homemade gifts like crocheted bunnies, chicks and eggs along with a washi egg each hidden inside some plastic chicks. We then wrote out clues for each child so that they could have their ‘treat’ hunt in the morning. Then everything was hidden around the house, due to lots of rain here on the West Coast, along with $1 in a gumboot from the Easter Bunny (I have no idea how that tradition began!) waiting for the morning.
Easter treats
4.15 saw the first of our brood awake which meant a long wriggly wait till at least 6pm when they could go and search. They found and loved everything, getting into playing and munching straight away. I think chocolate will always be a part, a small part hopefully, of their Easter Sundays as it is very hard to get away from it however hopefully with a bit of balance it can be a special treat for Easter which is all the more special because it is not what they have regularly. An Easter Sunday walk has also become a bit of a tradition in our family too and luckily the rain did clear for us a little so we managed to have our walk which was great. It was good to have a mixture of food and family time over Easter, the kids loved having Himself around and I loved having everyone here enjoying Easter in a new way – well kind of 😉
Hope this finds you all having a great Easter with family and/or friends too.
Arohanui
Y
Becoming Healthy 
as always, entertaining and inspirational. I won’t even go into the sugar situation where we are… 🙂
🙂 Thanks lovely