palm sunday and memories

how in the world is it Palm Sunday already? this year the lenten season has flown by. and i feel like i've been so preoccupied by the house that i haven't really given as much time to acknowledging the fact that it is lent. 

today specifically is Palm Sunday. growing up whenever the weather permitted (growing up in southeast virginia you never knew what march and april were going to bring. i have memories of Easter sunday in the snow and wearing sandals and fanning myself with the bulletin. weather there is alll over the place!) we had Palm Sunday service outside. it was the Sunday that we brought the Easter cross out that would later be decorated with fresh flowers on Easter Sunday. and of course there were the palm fronds. how many people still have a collection of crosses made from dried palm fronds? what no one else keeps every cross they made from kindergarten to high school? mine are in a trunk with other special things from my childhood. 

speaking of after we (send up a prayer, cross my fingers and hope real hard) move i really need to do something with everything in my trunk. it's sad that it's just sitting there!

....back to Palm Sunday! i have such vivid memories of it being a special day. i loved hearing the story of Jesus coming in on a donkey. our Pastor growing up had the best voice and such a talent with telling stories, especially the Gospel. i can hear his calm even tone now. 

another random side note but does anyone else have specific smells that they conjure up with remembering things? whenever i think of Palm Sunday and Easter i imagine the smell of church lady perfume and honeysuckle. i can't picture our Easter Cross or picking up my palm frond without those smells coming back to me. 

we always had big family dinners on both Palm Sunday and Easter Sunday. after church we'd take off our 'dress up' clothes and head to my grandmother's. we always always always had deviled eggs and boiled eggs and eventually egg salad :) when I talk about Easter eggs i imagine the smell of vinegar. i actually enjoy the smell of warm vinegar because of that. (i'm weird i know!). Palm Sunday we would have chicken and Easter Sunday we'd have a ham. OH! and collard greens from my grandfather's friend down the road. and those little brown and serve rolls. 

i'm so thankful that my childhood was so full of tradition like that. i love our traditions and that when people ask what does your family do for ____  i always have something to fill in the blank. now though that matt and i are in south carolina we're having to create traditions of our own. i'm looking forward to dying some eggs this week and making some homemade potato salad with boiled eggs, my grandmother's recipe of course :) i'll still miss my family though and the smell of honeysuckle and warm vinegar (i've found that 'church lady' smell is pretty much the same wherever you go, haha) and sitting around my grandmother's table chatting. luckily we have cell phones which will almost make me feel like i'm right back there!