Easter Traditions

I always remember Easter Saturday night. My sister and I were given a fresh hens egg each to decorate usually with paint. Since our Dad was pretty bald we usually drew him. The eggs were boiled for breakfast on Easter morning. We carried on the tradition with our own children

We always have fish on Friday and on Good Friday my Italian DH won't eat meat at all. I was surprised that here it is treated as a normal working day !
My mum always dyed boiled eggs for breakfast on Easter Sunday and I did the same for my children and only Easter eggs on Sunday, no alternative gifts( it's not Christmas)!!

Stations of the cross in church, hot cross buns fresh from the bakery, church service on Easter Sunday ( Easter egg when we went home.)The Easter egg we had was always from Thorntons and was chocolate with iced flowers on it wrapped in cellophane.We only had one Easter egg, but it was a good one.
Boiled eggs which had painted faces on them.

Boiled eggs coloured with food colouring on Easter morning. I did that for my daughter too. My mother and grandmother would not put washing out any Sunday, let alone Easter Sunday. Apparently, it was OK if there was a baby in the house (terry nappies in those days!) or if one of the people in the house was ill and needed constant bed linen changes.

Forgot to add it is not a simple look and find Easter Egg hunt but they follow clues which as they get older need to be more sophisticated and complicated. Well I suppose that is also good for keeping my brain working....

No, shops and businesses were open in Scotland on Good Friday which was not a public holiday.

My father remembered being expected to attend lectures at St. Andrew's on Good Friday in the 1940s.

Not a religious upbringing but we always maintained traditions like it had to be fish on Good Friday and Mum still does not question these but blindly follows them. Roast dinner on Easter Sunday but can be chicken, lamb or beef. Easter eggs were always sat on the dining table when we woke on Easter Sunday. Years ago DH decided in his wisdom he would create an Easter Egg hunt instead for GC's at our house which the GC still wish to maintain but all the expense and hard work are left to me now....only a few more years but I can't complain really it is nice for them to still have a bit of magic instead of all the electronics they fill most of their time with.

We had new clothes for Whit Sunday too (new summer dress each) not for Easter.

We only had Hot Cross buns on Good Friday. My mother disliked them and disliked Good Friday, as she never could understand that Christ had to die to save us, although she was quite devout.

We weren't allowed to play outside on Good Friday or on Sundays for fear of offending the neighbours.

Easter decorations were put on the dining room table and sideboard on Easter Saturday, as my mother felt it would be disrespectful to have them up on Good Friday.

I realise how odd this sounds, but she never reconciled herself with having seen people killed during the war.

We were never allowed to eat Easter eggs before Easter Sunday.

Rolling eggs on easter monday. Still do this with my grandchildren whatever the weather.

Are Easter egg hunts a new idea ?I don't remember them from my childhood.

Definitely lamb on Easter Sunday (just as we always had veal on Mothering Sunday) and never any Easter eggs until Easter Day itself...

I remember Easter as many of the posts here. IE Good Friday a very sombre day, Easter Sunday the day for rejoicing and treats. Feel sorry how far we have come from this while still a nominally Christian country.

Paddyann.
We were brought up Methodists, and our new outfits were always bought for Whitsuntide. New shoes, new dress, etc.

Memories of Good Friday as a child in the fifties were of a very sombre day. The only shop open was the bakery for Hot Cross buns, which we only had on that day. There was a long Church service, in a bare church with no flowers, which lasted for several hours, but you could go for parts or all of it. When I was very small it seemed interminable.
Then on Easter Sunday, eggs, though nothing like the huge variety filling the shops now,and new clothes when they could be afforded.

3pm kissing the cross service in church,even when I started work our boss would yell its time all you "tims" headed to church .For Easter Sunday it was a new outfit for us all,bags hats and gloves included .Non Catholics didn't do that tradition they got new outfits for the first Sunday in May ...I have no idea why .Maybe someone here would know ?
Mum always bought an easter cake as she wasn't the worlds best baker ,sometimes it didn't make it to Easter Sunday ,she was very much a lets enjoy it now person so often we had it on the Saturday after dinner ,luckily one of the Aunts would bring a spare for Easter dinner .

We were not allowed to sew on any Sunday.

Salmon with new potatoes and peas on Good Friday and roast lamb on Sunday.
Always had a new outfit to wear on Easter Sunday.

I'm not religious but saw a sobering picture posted on Facebook today by a lovely friend, a picture of the pavement trodden by Jesus to his crucifixion.

We had a brand new dress for Xmas but I don't think we had one for easter

In my really young childhood ( late 40s/early 50s) the only shops that actually opened on Good Friday were the bakers for bread and hot cross buns, and fishmongers and fish and chip shops . These would then close just after lunchtime for the rest of the day. Good Friday was a day off for most people with the odd exception and hospitals. Most people where we lived in Yorkshire tended to eat fish on Good Friday regardless of their religion but more of a tradition which carried on within families. The hot cross buns would be had later on at teatime. Some of the adults would give up certain foods ...fasting for Lent they would say, usually this was eggs or maybe meat, not everyone did but it was not unusual at all. Easter Sunday was the day of celebration when the children got their Easter eggs. Many people were still regular church goers then and Easter was much quieter time.We were expected to play quietly and then go to Sunday School and would be given a small religious token to acknowledge the occasion.

When we were kids we only had a brand new dress once a year - for Easter Sunday. The rest of the year it was hand me downs. Mum said you had to have new at Easter, otherwise the birds would sh*t on you. Her words, not mine!

Only ever fish on Good Friday. Strange I know but I am really upset to see people hanging out washing in the complex where I live, the lines are full. Growing up Good Friday was the holiest day of the year to be spent quietly at home. Here in Australia football rules the roost today.

I was brought up as a Catholic, and on Good Friday we always went to the 3o’clock mass, which was very sombre. All the statues and pictures in the church were covered with purple cloth, apart from the stations of the cross. We fasted, but we were allowed a hot cross bun each. Easter Sunday was almost as exciting as Christmas. We always had new summer dresses and sandals, which we wore even if it was cold, and we had an Easter egg each, which we were given in the morning but not allowed to eat until later. Church was always crowded, with a high mass with singing, and incense, and it took ages because everyone went to communion. Dinner was roast lamb or, if we were very flush, a chicken.

When DD was a little girl our local Bakery opened on Good Friday morning (unlike all the other shops) to sell delicious Hot Cross Buns I still refuse to buy them until Maundy Thursday

Never allowed Easter Eggs until Easter Sunday.

In Yorkshire Good Friday was a normal day but everything closed Easter Monday & Tuesday, very unusual in the days before shops were open 7 days a week. The rest of the UK I believe shops closed Good Friday & Easter Monday.