Easter. Am I doing this right?

Every year I have noble intentions of really making something special and spiritual out of Easter week.  I basically always fall short.  I was thinking about it this week as I saw friends posting about their meaningful devotionals while I read the world's most boring book about trucks for the 17th time today.  Pip is sick and it's been a bit of a weekend.  And I still barf more days than not it seems.  So we're just kind of slumping along.  As I thought about it though, I think our family is doing a good job of focusing on the message of selfless love, which is really what Easter is all about.  Here are some of the gifts of love from Palmerville.

• I spend time cooking meals for my family even though I end up vomiting them
• Pip let me go for a walk and happily ate crackers without a murmur yesterday.  It's a big deal for me to walk without a tantrum.  Thanks buddy.
• I took Pip for his bath on Friday even though he basically always poops the tub, which means I start vomiting, and I hate it.  But Chris always does it and I gave him a break. Because I love him.
• When Pip pooped the tub I scooped it out.  It takes love to pick up feces.  I got poop under a fingernail.
• So then I started violently gagging.  Chris immediately tore up the stairs hearing what was going on.  That's love.  He finished the job, sterilized the tub, diapered Pip and kept him busy so I could vomit in peace.
• Most of the time Chris gives Pip his bath, and cleans the poop without comment or complaint so I don't have to.  That's love.
• Last night I got up several times to rock a screaming child back to sleep even though I was, in fact, rather tired myself.  That's love.
• This morning Chris remarked that Pip seemed to go back to sleep quickly -- he heard the crying, heard it go quiet, and didn't realize that a certain someone spent an extra fifteen minutes rocking a gloppy child to make that happen.  So that's my love for Chris right there.
• I let Pip nap on me even though my belly is huge and it's not at all comfortable to have a thirty pound snot machine added to the child I already have to haul around to my lap, and nap time is precious me time which I did not get thanks to being a mattress.  But I love him and he needed rest and comfort.
• Chris brought me cookies home from work and has not touched them.  Just for me.  He made a trip to the store to buy sherbet for Pip (at my suggestion, so really for me) -- it has medicinal purposes.  Long day at work, still caring for his family's health.
• Chris let me be the one who went to church and interacted with adults leaving him with the child who said "Mama" at one minute intervals for two hours.
• I came home for the last hour so he could go be an adult.  I dealt with the child who sprawled in only his diaper on the laundry room floor crying piteously for Daddy while he was gone.  Love is always getting to feel like the unwanted parent because you're the one home at the moment.
• Pip begged to go for a walk even though he's clearly too sick to do anything physical.  So I got us all suited up.  Chris put Pip in his boots.  I got out the stroller for when Pip inevitably would lie down on the sidewalk and refuse to move.  All that production.  We made it as far as the mailbox when he declared the walk to be over.  But we do this kind of thing for those we love.
• I've spent a lot more time being consistent about praying to be patient and to be a loving and pleasant parent.  And I sort of think it's working.  Praying for other people is a good way to show selfless love.
• Chris took Pip upstairs so I could make a smoothie without someone whining at me because I felt too sick to eat a proper dinner and only wanted foods that are reasonably pleasant to vomit (yes, I think that way and yes smoothies are about your best bet).
• Chris and I have both spoon-fed our son who apparently feels that lifting food is beyond him in his current extremity.  I cooked Pip a special lunch that he refused to eat.  Chris made him a special dinner that he would only eat with a personal assistant.

So I'm kind of botching religious Easter in a lot of ways.  So far I haven't thought of a good devotional or craft.  I haven't played the right music or read the right scriptures or planned good activities.  I just can't.  I've bought a few jellybeans.  Easter isn't about bunnies.  But it also isn't about devotionals.  Devotionals and object lessons are a means to an end, but they are not the end in itself.  The point is to try to love other people, to draw closer to God, to seek forgiveness, to forgive others, and to try to become like Christ.  Our family's way of doing that seems to involve a lot of faulty sphincters and bodily functions, but we're drawing closer to Christ in our revolting way.

Maybe next year we can do it without all the pooping and vomiting.