Entertaining Angels

If there is a Pinterest standard for Easter, I failed completely this year.

I didn't dye eggs with the kids. I didn't get new clothes for anyone. I didn't buy any candy besides a couple of boxes of Trader Joe's jelly beans which are still sitting in a drawer in the kitchen. (OK, confession: And a couple of boxes of Peeps, which are now unwrapped and getting stale and chewy for me, which is the only way to eat a Peep, and don't try to tell me otherwise.)

I didn't even do Easter baskets. I didn't have enough candy to make them look respectable, and I had no stomach to go shopping just to fill the baskets. So I left them tucked in the storage area with my mommy guilt.

I'd like to spiritualize my laziness by saying, "We just focused on Jesus this year." But it seems wrong to add deceit to sloth.

But you know what? It was still a great holiday. Both because the truth of the resurrection doesn't need bunnies to make it better. And because we were invited to Easter dinner by a family in our church.

Never underestimate the value of hospitality.

Because this family hails from Canada, they have no extended family within driving distance. So they open their home on holidays to other "orphans" so no one has to celebrate alone. When Dana asked if we would want to join them for Easter this year, I said yes right away.

Corey and I did the same thing when we were newlyweds living in San Diego. Having neither the money nor the vacation time to fly home very holiday, we simply opened our house up to anyone else who might not have family nearby. (And to be clear, that's almost everyone. Very few people living in Southern California are from Southern California.) Thanksgiving was our favorite. We would host a potluck for somewhere between four and sixteen people. We would play Nertz and watch football and eat way too much food and it never mattered if the dishes matched (they didn't) or the centerpiece was crafty (it wasn't) or if no one could ever beat Corey at Nertz (we didn't). It was a shared holy day, a day to be together and be thankful for the moments when friends become family.

To be clear, Dana's Easter table was not only beautiful, but it would have passed any Pinterest test.

She is a gracious hostess (I hope her laptop recovers from the many times we found Kieran banging on it) and the food was amazing and the kids reveled in an outdoor egg hunt with friends.

But it wasn't the trappings of Sunday that left me with a glow. It was the spirit. By entertaining us, Dana and her family fed our souls with heaping portions of love and acceptance and community.

You can't Pinterest that.