Easter holidays

         

       Happy Easter, readers!

This year Christian Easter is April 5, Orthodox church celebrates Easter according to the Orthodox calendar, and it occurs in April 12. 

Like many Christian countries Russians celebrate Easter with decorated eggs and special foods and customs. The egg tradition dates back to per-Christian times when people saw eggs as a remedy of protection. When Orthodoxy was adopted, eggs took on Christian symbolism. 

 Easter eggs by  Peter Carl Fabergé

The traditional Easter breakfast includes kulich (Easter bread), paska (a dish made from cottage cheese, fruit, sugar, butter and usually formed into the shape of a pyramid), decorated eggs. Sometimes the food is blessed by the church before being eaten. Other tradition is one egg may be cut into pieces - one piece for each family member at the Easter table.I'm not a religious person but love to decorate eggs and do this every year.

 Easter kulich

cottage cheese paska

Here Easter service is held Saturday evening and may be attended even by those families that do not regularly attend church. Midnight is the high point of the service, when bells are rung and the priest says, "Christ is risen!" and in reply, "He is truly risen!" Traditionally, after these words people have kissed on the cheek three times.

Since childhood I remember as we, kids were waiting for the Easter morning to taste a piece of kulich and to spread a paska layer on it. After Easter breakfast we rolled eggs and tried to knock down another egg. 

19th century postcards

Do you celebrate Easter or other spring holiday? Do you have any Easter/spring traditions?

'Spring Time Light'

      Last weekend I went for a walk to the Udelny park. I had my camera with me and I wanted to take pictures of how sun warms the nature. After all we're in March!

I was glad to see that the snow has almost melted on the hills of the park and it only remains on a flat lawn. A month ago children had been tobogganing here and now spots of soil and grass are already visible.

 In some places streams have run, and they are deep up to the grass. Trees also wake up: the ends of the branches have begun to turn yellow and green.

The sky is blue-gray in those days, trunks and branches of oaks and birches are clearly visible against the sky.

Here is the poem 'Spring Time Light' by Robert Patinson. I think it goes well with my photos of a vernal day:

Spring Time Light

At last the mornings welcome light
has drawn the darkness from the night,
and growing days give time and heat
for nature's bounty to repeat.

The trees sing out in chorus lines
words which blossoms redefine,
these garlands in the trees reveal
the land can now revive and heal.

All creatures feel the warming hand
of sun beams scattered on the land
as battered grass begins to grow,
released once more the rivers flow.

Do you like the first signs of nature awakening? Do you believe in people's omens that early spring predicts hot summer?

GBBD in March

March has arrived and I see in your blogs, my friends, that crocuses are blooming, primrose revive, the first shoots emerge from the soil. Each month waiting for Garden Blog Bloom Day I think what I can show in my Northern garden. So last weekend I arrived there and was pleasantly surprised that the snow is almost melted.

Even crocuses, buds and green leaves have appeared. The evergreens are reaching for the sun too. Perhaps they too, as people feel the warmth, the beginning of spring.

In general, the beginning of spring in the North of our Planet is always an exciting spectacle, especially when an ice drift begins on the rivers. This time thick ice melts in my garden pond too. Needles of thuja turn green, buds of rhododendrons grow, because in a month and a half their flowering begins.
Here is rhododendron 'Helsinki University', Lysimachia nummularia (golden creeping Jenny) and Lamium maculatum (devil's clover). 

 
Some plants stored their leaves under the snow and now are green and fresh: 

  They are Primula and Dianthus barbatus (Sweet Williams).
I also have cuttings of Dianthus chinensis (China pink) and Dahlia tubers that I stored all winter and now they started to grow on my windowsill: 








I sowed seeds in paper and plastic modules.
Every day I watch how fast they're growing. Here are tomato seedlings "Gardener's delight' variety and Nasturtium.

When tomato seedlings grow enough I'll need to separate them and to plant in bigger pots. What is your experience in separating of seedlings?
It's all I can show you in March. Hope in April I'll be able to take more photos of growing plants in my garden.