Easter in Rapid City

The cousins: Matthew, Andrew, Carolyn, Carson, Cameron

The Rezin Family: Mom, Me, Bryan, Chris, Dad

Well that was a fun few days. I'm glad to be back home and back to the usual routine. We left Friday morning for Rapid City. The plan was to leave sometime that morning and try to get to Mom and Dad's house by early afternoon. The drive of course was long and not much fun. We do have a DVD player in the van but it hasn't been working recently so we loaded up the ipods and packed books for the kids. Except for those times when all three kids wanted the same book it wasn't too bad. We did stop and kill some time (run off pent up energy)at Wall Drug. It would have been nice if the backyard area was open but due to all the snow it was closed. For those who haven't been to Wall Drug...there is extra shopping and entertainment behind the building in an area called the back yard. They even have a giant animatronic dinosaur that roars and blows smoke every half hour. The folks were very glad to see us and the kids. Special thanks to Mom and Dad who remembered that it was Good Friday and made us mac and cheese and fish instead of the pot roast they had planned. Because there are five of us and Mom and Dad have one small guest bedroom we stay at a nearby hotel. Later that evening Matthew and Carolyn and I went for a quick swim while Jim and Andrew napped. Saturday was our do nothing day. There was still quite a bit of snow on the ground so we took along the snow clothes. The kids had a blast playing in the backyard with Jim. The weather was nice and sunny so the snow was trying to melt. Dad had gotten out an old saucer sled so there was much pulling going on. Poor hubby, he was wiped out. Later that afternoon my sister Chris stopped by with her husband and their two kids. Matthew is 6 months older than Carson and Andrew is four months older than Cameron so there was lots of playing going on. Later that evening we had planned on going to church services. The Catholic church is only a half mile from my parents house and a few blocks from the hotel. There was an Easter Vigil at 8:30 that night. We had first thought of asking the grandparents to watch the kids while we went to church but the 8:30 time was a problem. Rapid City is in a different time zone so they are an hour behind. The 8:30 time was more like 9:30 to the kids so they would be tired and want to go to bed. Dad had been up really early that morning since he works Saturday's at the Rushmore Mall doing maintenance work so he was pretty much wiped out for the day. We decided to do the split the church service thing -hubby would do church that evening and I would do the 8 am Mass the next morning. Plan in place I dropped the loving husband off at the church and headed back to the hotel. All three children were fast asleep within a half hour. Hubby came back much much later. I learned from him the next morning that the Mass was three hours long. Yes, three hours. They had nine different readings before they got to the Homily. One of the reasons was that new members to the Church were baptized and or confirmed into the faith. No you can not be re-baptized so if you were baptized in a different church you would just be confirmed as a member of the Catholic Church. This is done during the Easter season and the bishop presides over the service and all who have taken the RICA classes are invited to participate. Had we stayed in Michigan I would have participated in this service in Grand Rapids. So hubby got to hear the bishop speak, light candles (part of the service was candlelight) and be blessed. At one point, Jim was convinced the purpose of this Mass was to worship until Easter officially began at midnight. At least for us with the time zones change, hubby accomplished this. Let's just say that hubby was more than willing to let me get up and go to Mass without him the next morning. As he put it "I'm good for the rest of the year". After I got back from church we headed out to Deadwood for Easter Buffet. We met my parents, brother, and sister and family and had some very good food. Forgive me Weight Watchers for I have committed megga food sins. For many years Mom has liked going out to the buffet at the First Gold Hotel and Casino. They have very good prime rib amongst other tasty things. I decided to give myself a vacation from point counting this weekend so I have no idea how "bad" I was. Dinner finished we headed back to Rapid City and over to the parents house where the kids spent more time playing and I got to get a few family photos. Later that evening we went back to the hotel for a quick swim while Mom and Dad picked up pizza for supper. Yesterday morning we had one last breakfast/coffee with the grandparents and off we went back home. I really enjoy visiting Rapid City but I totally hate the drive out there. The kids had tons of fun and we did too.