Easter Duds

As it is for many folks out there, there is a tradition in my family of getting pretty, shiny, lovely new duds for the Easter holiday. It's one my mom had growing up, and one she happily carried on with my sisters, brother and I, often making our dresses for us (though not every time). It's a tradition I hold with fondness in my heart, and have had the joy of carrying on with my own little family over the years.

Like my mom, sometimes I take to the sewing machine for parts of the Easter clothing for the year, many times I let the stores do the work for me. One year I even enlisted my own mama to make a dress for Lucy because of my memories of her lovingly doing it for us as little girls. 

For fun, I have compiled as many Easter Duds photos as I could find on my hard drives, to put here in one post, an homage to this sweet tradition passed to me from my own mother. I wish I had more of my own childhood photos at my fingertips--but for now, this compilation will be more than enough to share. 

1. My mama (left), two neighbor girls (center), and my Aunt Juli (right), Easter morning sometime in the early 1960's. They are holding new kittens as they show off their new dresses. (Look at those Mary Janes. I die.)

  

2. Easter 1981, myself at age almost-4 (left) and my three sisters. This year was DEFINITELY a store-bought year, since you can tell my baby sister Beckie is still a total newborn. How fun to have four girls first, right mom? so fun to dress up! My brother came a year later, and two more sisters after that. I know my mom has Easter photos from all the other years, but this is all I have in my digital archives for now. 

 

 3. I don't remember getting Noah dressed up for his first Easter, in 2008... But I VIVIDLY remember when he was almost 18 months old. I had this "simple" vision of taking some formal Easter portraits of Noah with my sister's ancient pet bunny, while we were at my parents' house for the holiday. Let's just say that 18-month old + bunny + photos was NOT a walk in the park. I blogged it, way back when, here. 

 

4. I think I might have a 2010 Easter photo, but 2010 is my "lost year", all my personal photos locked into RAW format and not edited yet, and because they're RAW, there's no thumbnails to even see what I took that year... So maybe someday I'll find out if we did Easter clothes that year. Ha ha!  But here is 2011. Lucy was literally BRAND-NEW, less than two weeks old this year, so no fancy dress for her. But Noah gt some cute new clothes! And Lucy had a bow to match, and even smirked in her sleep for this one photo. 

5. 2012: This was the year I enlisted my mom's sewing help. She made Lucy the amazing dress, pinafore, and bloomers. I made Noah a tie to match (though I used too stiff of interfacing, so it was kind of a dumb tie and he only wore it this once) and I made Lucy a headband. No formal portraits... just a front porch photo on my parents' porch.

 

6. 2013: Just one year later and along came Quinn. Easter and Quinn's baby blessing coincided, so Quinn wore Noah's blessing outfit. Noah had a brand-new suit from his grandparents, complete with tie, so I just had to get Lucy something this year. I opted for a little ivory GAP dress with golden bunnies on it, part of their Peter Rabbit collection, which I swooned and mooned over for weeks before finally giving myself permission to just get the darn thing. And its matching golden cardigan. Never looked back, no regrets. And look! Mom and Dad in the photo! Hooray! 

 

7. Last year: I made Lucy's dress, made the boys some REALLY bad last-minute bowties that didn't work without safety pins, and dragged them to the gardens in Columbia, MO in the middle of the day on Easter to get some photos. There was no good shade spots except huddled in the side-yard of the old schoolhouse there in the gardens. And clearly Quinn was super into this whole thing. But can you even stand Noah's genuine, half-grown-toothy smile?? My heart.

 

 

8. And this year! I only had to make the boys' bowties this year, and I learned from my mistake last year and made them without trying shortcuts. And hey-- Easter Sunday ended up being Conference Sunday, so while I packed all their duds and brought them to my parents' house for that day, I never ended up dressing them up because we never went anywhere-- just sat in their home and watched the conference talks on their computer. And getting them all dressed up on such a weirdly-paced day ended up feeling ridiculous. So instead, we got them all dressed up the following Sunday and made them go take photos, and honestly, it all just worked so much better. Plus it was Lucy's birthday, so she was in a "party dress" for her birthday. So cute.  New shoes and shirts for the boys, new dress and sweater for Lulu, and a trip to the covered bridge in Manchester for the photos. So sweet. ♥

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How about you? Do you have this tradition? Is it losing steam in today's world? Do you have any favorite Easter clothing memories? Maybe a pair of lace gloves or a little matching purse to go with your dress when you were little? I think I vaguely remember a little purse. I maybe need to go find one for Lucy next year. :)

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