Celebrating Forgiveness! Happy Easter!

Today, I need to talk about God's story. He tells it to me everyday. I am overwhelmed at the the lengths He goes to tell me His story over and over, longing for my attention, mine! He tells me in the light of daybreak that His love is new every morning. He tells me in the song of the Robins as they search for their breakfast... look at the birds of the air! He tells me in the moments between my children needing fed and clothed and scooted and scurried. They are His, I am His, and He loves his children more than I could ever imagine! He tells me in the changing of the season from Winter to Spring as I watch the flowers break through the earth. New life comes from death. Beauty from emptiness, and the miracle of his beautiful story is wrapped around me like a never ending circle of love and hope.
With Easter coming, more people will be open to hearing His story. For that I am so grateful, but for me, His story is always with me! I can't help but see the significance of His design everywhere I go.

One of the things I love about our daily commute home from school, is all the sweet farms we pass.  And more than that, in this season, Spring, there are new baby animals being born everywhere! Cows, horses, and little lambs! I am always pointing them out to the kids... "Look, a pure white little lamb in the grass!" They squeal and point, I slow down a bit so they can get a good look. And all of this makes me think about the excitement of Easter and our Lamb!

There is such opportunity in moments like this to show my kids what the true meaning of Easter is all about. I'm not sure how the Easter bunny and bringing candy got all mixed in with the brilliant story of the resurrected Lamb, and our family has never really went along with this idea. We have our traditions of an Easter hunt, and eating a great feast, but my boys know that Papa hides the eggs. I'm not against the Easter bunny or anything, but this year, since my little ones are getting older I want to talk more about the real meaning behind why we take time out to Celebrate this special time of year.

I came up with some practical ways to talk about our Easter story, and some activities to make it fun and special.

The Resurrection Walk

When Jesus died, he took all of our sins with him, and when he rose, that meant new life for all of us!
                                       Luke 24
Take a walk and look for things that have new life.

Flowers.

Plants.

Animals.

Trees just beginning to bud.

Bugs.

All of these things are God's little reminders that he has given us the greatest gift of all: forgiveness and New Life!

Scavenger Hunt

Read Luke 24.
Go on a scavenger hunt looking for items that symbolize the main parts of the story.
You might find a stone to symbolize the tomb.
Look for some sticks and form a cross.
Find something white (maybe a flower) to symbolize forgiveness


Light three candles.

One represents God sending Jesus as a baby.
One represents Jesus dying for our sins.
One represents Jesus resurrection from the dead.

Talk about the importance of each as you watch the flames with your kids. Say a prayer, thanking God for each part of the story, and blow the candles out.


Ask  a local farmer who has lambs if you can bring your kids for a visit.
Let them pet the lamb.
Talk about how pure and innocent it is.
Talk about Jesus being our pure and perfect Lamb!

This is my sweet son Elijah. He actually memorized the poem, but was too shy to do it without the words. Enjoy!

Happy Easter everyone! I hope Easter will continue to remind you of God's story, His grace, and overwhelming love!  That is worth celebrating!

An Easter sort of day

Today was a good day. The weather co-operated for the big Easter egg hunt (...thank you God)! This was the first year that Owen actually participated in the egg hunting. Though he didn't seem to care that he only got one egg. There were hundreds of kids and I think he just loved being a part of the excitement in the air. For most of the time he looked around stunned, and the rest of the time he was trying to run of out of arms reach of mommy. Last year he wasn't walking yet, though he still enjoyed some treats, and the year before that he was only a couple months old. So, yay for Owen's first Egg hunt!

It finally felt like spring was going to "stick" this morning when we went outside. I let the boys run around the yard with their Easter baskets before we left for three reasons. First I wanted pictures of them before anyone grumped out, second they had plenty of energy, and thirdly, we had extra time to kill due to us all being so excited for this wonderful day.

They chased each other in the grass, and practiced their Caribou calls (I'm sure all of our neighbors loved that)! This came about from one of their favorite movies "The Polar Express." There's a part on the movie where thousands of Caribou are blocking the train tracks and the conductor pulls the engineer's beard making him screech and scare the Caribou. This is their favorite scene. They love imitating that screeching sound as loudly as they can!

After the hunt we went grocery shopping, then came home and had a picnic in our front yard. We all soaked up the sunshine hoping and wishing that it will stay forever!!! OF course, the boys didn't stay on the blanket long. After a few minutes, socks were thrown and bare feet were running through the prickly green grass and the air was full of high-pitched laughter. Martin stared falling asleep (since he'd been up all night working the night shift). I just looked at my family smiling. I wish every day could be like this. Carefree and sunny, how blessed I am.

I hope all of you have a wonderful Easter holiday. Count your blessings and remember the true reason we celebrate this weekend and everyday of our lives- Our risen Savior!!!