Expect the unexpected

I love the entire Season of Christmas and all the lights and glitter and colors...but for a "religious" experience...give me Easter! The continual reminder of the Resurrection is such a blessing and there are Bible stories (the good old kind) on Network TV!

However, this Easter had more than its' share of the unexpected. Most of us experienced the freezing cold temperatures. Everything in my backyard (that had bloomed fully) lost all the blooms. We've had many chilly Easters but that was the coldest in 51 years (and almost the coldest on record). After weeks of above normal temperatures, it felt far worse.

I thought all the daffodils were dead but when I went out to check, well over half of them were still alive, just flat on their little blossom backs. I cut just about all of them on Friday. I'm happy to say, most were still thriving enough on Easter Sunday to make a spectacular bouquet. Under the best of circumstances, daffodils sometimes only last a couple of days once cut. They were beautiful and took some of the sting away of losing the other blossoms (including one of the azalea plants, the one I see out my kitchen window).

One of the other unexpected events happened early Easter morning, as I was pouring some more water into the large Pyrex baking dish that I've used for fifteen or twenty years as my roasting pan. Well, I don't know why (although my husband gave me some engineering reasons), it completely and literally exploded, sending glass shards everywhere. Fortunately, the ham was fine (although I washed it off completely and when I cut it, I went a little deeper than normal "just to be certain" there was no unseen glass).

It took about an hour for my husband to get the glass off the kitchen floor as well as cleaning out the drawer where we keep skillets, below the oven. I was trying to cook at the same time. He finished cleaning out the oven itself this morning. It wasn't until we saw all the glass and how sharp some pieces were that we both knew we had experienced an Easter miracle. Although I was standing there as it exploded, nothing hit me. I am very thankful to whichever guardian Angel stepped between me and the explosion because believe me...that is the only explanation I have of being safe!