Święconka

Smithers and I hosted our middle son and his family, plus The Traveller and his girlfriend, for Easter lunch. To pass the time while I was busy cooking, our two youngest granddaughters enjoyed hunting for decorated paper easter eggs which I’d hung around the garden earlier. There were 35 for the girls to find and place in their little wicker baskets, and these were later exchanged by Granny for a proper chocolate egg each.

Our daughter-in-law took our two youngest granddaughters to Poland for a week before Easter, returning on Good Friday. Today she presented me with these lovely gifts and explained that the blessing of the Easter baskets is a tradition in Poland. The colourful ‘palm’ was carefully made by all the family for Palm Sunday and taken to church to be blessed. The basket, with its lace cloth crocheted by our daughter-in-law’s mother, contains a sampling of Easter foods (meat, decorated eggs, iced biscuits, babka cake) which were then also taken to church to be blessed before being brought to us. What a lovely gift.