Let the Easter Festivities Begin!

Tonight after dinner I put together a little family church to start our Easter weekend celebration. It is hard for me to find the balance of Easter. What I mean is, it's hard to describe what the true Easter story is all about and not freak out our kids... the kids who don't watch t.v (except for Disney channel in the mornings), and live a pretty sheltered life from "scary stuff". I feel good about our decisions to "shelter them" but Easter gets a bit tricky....

So, instead of celebrating Good Friday by carrying a cross and going to different churches and hearing about how people are helping those who suffer ( my plan A for the evening)... I got to thinking that maybe that was not the picture of Easter that the kids need to see at this stage of life. I started to think about what they should experience and decided to do a little family church instead.

We started with the story of the last supper and how Jesus washed his disciples feet. Since Scott has just returned from that area of the world he helped describe what feet are like and why washing them was such a big deal. The new vocabulary word of the night was manure! The girls were shocked that someone may have mud and manure on their feet! It gave an entirely new perspective to foot washing!

We moved on to the full Easter story told through a bunch of eggs... resurrection eggs if you are looking for an idea. Each egg has a little something inside it to remind you of a part of the story like a nail, a cross, a piece of cracker, etc. etc. This was a good way to tell the story for our kiddos.

The next move was to the kitchen table where we ate a few symbolic things. We had some crackers and grape juice- for communion, some parsley dipped into salt water to remind us of our tears over death but the green color of the parsley reminds us of life and how Jesus didn't stay dead, etc. etc. We also had a few sweet treats to symbolize hope.

Then we moved the party to the bathroom and took turns washing each other's feet. This was so funny! Hannah and Scott are so ticklish that it wasn't long before some major flailing was happening. I wonder if Jesus had to deal with that?! Anyway, we ended the night in our bed putting lotion on our own feet and talking about what we learned, our favorite part etc. etc. I know, I know, once a teacher, always a teacher.... haha. All in all it was a really fun family night!

The fun actually started right after that when I was tucking the kids into bed. The conversations that those girlies have are so, so funny! One in particular stands out but I don't want to blog.. because I know I couldn't do it justice! Let's just say that tonight was quite educational for everyone... mom included.

Hope that you had a meaningful Good Friday and an Exciting Easter weekend!