I love holidays. They are times to come together with family and friends, usually share good food, create memories and relish being together.

My two favorite holidays are by far Christmas and Thanksgiving. There are the quintessential family holidays and many of my favorite memories growing-up came on those two days.

Not far behind though is Easter. Taking place this weekend, it is a great holiday for so many reasons. It of course has the religious aspect, which as I have grown older has become more and more important to me and the commercial side has become less important. But growing up, there are few things as fun as an Eater egg hunt and waking up to dig through your basket of candy.

A day or so before Easter, my family would dye eggs for Easter. Sitting on a tarp, usually in the garage, we would mix the dye kits and then work to make creative eggs.

Some single colored, some with one color on the top and another on the bottom and then when one egg was left I would pass it through each of the colors until it was a ghoulish greenish-black.

When we lived in Brunswick, Georgia for the first time (grades first through third) family friends hosted an egg hunt each year at their house.

The dad of the family was in charge of hiding the eggs, mostly filled with candy, but some with a little money. This was no ordinary hunt though. He would hide them so difficultly that he kept an itemized list of where the eggs were and each time you found one you had to go check it off the list. They were behind the panel for the air filter in the laundry room and tucked into various nooks and crannies.

At home, my parents would hide the eggs and there was always this one spotted egg that had coins in it instead of candy so my sister and me always competed to see who could find it.

I loved those hunts as a kid.

Easter has taken many different forms for me as I have grown up and moved away from home. One year, I had the week off while teaching in Spain and attended Mass in Frankfurt, Germany after walking across the city to attend an English Easter Vigil mass I had found online. Then on Easter, I went to a biergarten in Munich will two guys I met at my hostel where we ate dinner surrounded by people in lederhosen.

It may not have been an Easter egg hunt or chocolate bunnies, but it sure was an Easter I will never forget.

I think my favorite thing about holidays is that as you grow-up, they grow-up with you. Easter, Thanksgiving and Christmas have all changed as my family has spread out and new members have been added and although they have changed, they have become even more special because they are a time to come together.

  Brandon O’Connor is a staff writer for The Vicksburg Post. You may reach him at brandon.oconnor@vicksburgpost.com.