Awake thou wintery earth....

Have a wonderful Easter weekend!

I blush to admit, but with such an early Easter this year, I am running behind.  So far behind, in fact, that I still have my Christmas Dickens Village displayed in my family room!  With such a snowy winter, it didn't seem too out of place to have the village still up, since the large windows behind the village showed a backyard filled with snow.  But really, there are limits and this afternoon it needs to be dismantled and packed away.  I hung my spring wreath up this week, and hopefully I will also have time to finish up the Easter napkins I wanted to make before Sunday.  If I'm successful, I'll share them with you next week.  If not, I guess it will go into my project box until next year!  Considering I haven't planned, shopped or prepared anything for Easter dinner yet, I think the napkins may be 'iffy' at best.  Thankfully, dessert is covered as my daughter is planning on making her special cupcakes, and I can't wait to taste them!  She is a true cupcake queen.

Today, to help me get in a spring-ier frame of mind, I'm sharing with you a few of my favorite vintage Easter cards:

 

Easter Sunday calls for ham and lots of springtime salads and desserts.  Before dinner, though, it will be time to put on my Easter bonnet and sing the hymn below in church.  This hymn by Charles Wesley, more than anything else, defines this holiday for me.  While it brings loved ones to mind, and inevitably tears to my eyes, it is the promise that those we miss so much live on, and we will all be united again. I wish all of you, my friends and family, a blessed weekend.

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 Christ the Lord is risen today, Alleluia! 
 Earth and heaven in chorus say, Alleluia! 
 Raise your joys and triumphs high, Alleluia! 
 Sing, ye heavens, and earth reply, Alleluia! 

 Love's redeeming work is done, Alleluia! 
 Fought the fight, the battle won, Alleluia! 
 Death in vain forbids him rise, Alleluia! 
 Christ has opened paradise, Alleluia! 

 Lives again our glorious King, Alleluia! 
 Where, O death, is now thy sting? Alleluia! 
 Once he died our souls to save, Alleluia! 
 Where's thy victory, boasting grave? Alleluia! 

 Soar we now where Christ has led, Alleluia! 
 Following our exalted Head, Alleluia! 
 Made like him, like him we rise, Alleluia! 
 Ours the cross, the grave, the skies, Alleluia!