Giving Meaning to Easter (aka a post with very few pictures)

If you are a Christian, Easter is the most important holiday on our calendar. This is the week which your savior bore a heavy painful weight for you. This is the week He knew His life was coming to an end, and yet said nothing so that He could die for us. It is humbling. And overwhelming. And painful and beautiful.

So much of our society revolves around being secular; a travesty in a country that boasts freedom of religion. The message of Easter is lost in pastel eggs and Easter bunnies delivering chocolate. I hope that our Easters never feel secular; that at this time of the year we can truly feel Jesus' example of love for us all through His sacrifice. Do you truly love your neighbor as yourself? Would you lay your life down for a friend? Or someone you didn't even know?

So for the last few years we have been trying to do activities with the girls that will convey the story of Easter. We do an activity every day that reinforces the story of Jesus' last week on earth. And we talk a lot about what it means to truly love others.

This is our schedule for this week.

Easter week is usually pretty busy for us so I keep to activities that are simple

and require little preparation.

Palm Sunday

Tell the story of Jesus entering Jerusalem while kids do coloring sheets.

Make a Fan Palm here.

Monday

Talk about the miracles of Jesus including feeding the 5000, healing the sick, and calming the storm. With each of these miracles we will ask them if it is possible ("If there's a storm outside, can you stop it?") and then discuss what Jesus did. Each of the links above have crafts that go along with the stories.

Tuesday

Teaching the Meaning of Easter egg hunt.

Wednesday

Christian Seder and The Passover (normally done on Maundy Thursday)

Dana (thank you thank you thank you) puts together our Seder. She does an (almost) full Seder and we eat a meal with scripture readings. As an adult, this is my favorite part of Easter-I feel tied to everyone who has ever celebrated Passover. This is my children's least favorite part of Easter but I feel that through this experience they are beginning to understand the importance of this day and feel the weight of history behind it.

There is a great website on Christian Seders here where you can put together a full Seder or just a small, symbolic one.

Thursday

Repeat Teaching the Meaning of Easter egg hunt. This time see if the kids can remember what each item in the egg means. Jelly beans for correct answers!

Friday

Good Friday. When the children are (much) older, we will discuss what happened to Jesus on this day in depth. For now we tell them that this is a very sad day because it is the day Jesus died.

We will do a beading craft with the kids, if they'll go along with it we'll use the colors and poem found here (meant for jelly beans).

Saturday

Neighborhood Easter egg hunt.

Before our egg hunt will talk about loving our neighbors as ourselves.

Easter Sunday

We'll be teaching Children's Church. There are many wonderful Easter crafts on this site, easy to do with large groups of kids.

At home we'll talk about Jesus' resurrection. We'll discuss what that means for them and how Jesus can preform miracles in our lives today through prayer because He lives.

Have a wonderful Easter celebration!

Anything but Easter

Well I managed to stop thinking about the Lil Blue Boo pattern.

(For today at least)

But still no Easter urgency.

So this morning

(in a desperate attempt to avoid necessary Easter projects)

I started looking through my patterns and

found one my Mother-I-L had passed on to me.

Simplicity 7557 from 1976

I decided that Chloe had to have

a little jumper.

Today.

(Much more pressing than Easter!)

It was FAST and EASY

and I will definitely be making her a couple more of these.

What else can I do to

keep me from the things I should be doing....

Sneaky Easter

Easter is two weeks away.

2 weeks!

I am trying to feel urgency but can't seem to muster any up.

(part of my problem is I just got myself this pattern from Lil Blue Boo

and I am so excited about the endless possibilities I can't focus on anything else)

I have nothing for the girls to wear on easter.

(I can hear my husband

"what are you talking about?

They have closets full of clothes!"

But you know what I mean...)

I have nothing to fill eggs.

Nothing for Bailey's class.

Nothing for our little friends at church.

(Which reminds me we teach that Sunday and I have no teaching plan, either...)

No handmade goodness for my girls.

No activities for the week.

Still no urgency.

Oh my.

So here is some inspiration I will be meditating on

in hopes of getting my mind off recycling Tshirts into

the most adorable little dresses ever.

I am in love with these eggs.

Thinking of making some to decorate our house.

The tutorial is over at Retro Mama

We played this last year and I would like to do it again this year.

It's an Easter egg hunt that teaches the meaning of Easter.

I saw it over at Make and Takes.

This year Secrets of a Super Mommy used a similar idea

as a countdown to Easter.

I love her Easter tree, too!

Maybe I'll make the girls some hair clips.

There's a cute little bunny template over at Allsorts.

Or I could just buy some.

The Pickled Pumpkin always has cute clips.

(No it's not a bunny. But it's cute!)

This is pretty cute, too.

I want to make these.

And eat them.

But I should give them away.

Easter Bunny S'mores found over at Creative Gift and Party Ideas

(thanks Tip Junkie for the link!)

These would be great for the girls Easter baskets.

They would love to have their own little hankerchiefs!

See how over at Domestic Goddess.

For my birthday my Mother gave me a

beautiful vintage egg holder.

I would love to make these to set inside it.

I even picked up some mini fake flowers to use.

From Martha Stewart (of course).

Maybe I could whip up some skirts for the girls.

The pattern over at the Polkadot Chair has become my favorite.

Quick, easy and cute.

She also has a tutorial for a matching doll skirt.

Oh, and I am SO in LOVE with these doll patterns.

I would have bought one by now but I can't decide which one.

She even has a Bailey Bunny!

Dana is putting together a Passover meal for us

to celebrate the last supper.

I love this part of Easter and I am so grateful she

goes through the hard work of putting the traditional meal together

(along with all the scriptures and meanings!)

Happy Easter planning!

Feed Your Soul

Have you heard of the Feed Your Soul art project?

(am I the last to know?)

Oh it's lovely.

Free artwork every month from different artists.

Aren't they adorable?

Now to just decide which ones go where...

Reunited

Well, all is right with my world again.

Helen

(my sewing machine)

is home.

You may remember the ugly incident with the

"sewable" sticky back velcro.

If you don't remember just trust me.

It's Not Sewable!

I rescued Helen from the mean mean man

who was holding her ransom

{and speaking very rudely}

and gave her over to Patricia's Dad

over at Sew Special.

(they had been moving earlier in the month

and weren't doing repairs then)

Anywho,

he fixed her in a day.

And I offered him a place to live should he ever become homeless.

The trade off?

My Camera broke.

Sent it off to Cannon and they should be

sending it back to my be the end of the decade.

So what have I learned?

1. Do not buy sticky back velcro

2. I like my camera a lot a lot a lot

3. But I LOVE my sewing machine.

So this is FINALLY done.

I love it.

Chloe loves it.

She wants me to make 7 more-

one for each of her babies.

I told my little Octo-Mom

it may take a while.

Heart Attack

Happy Valentine's Day!

We gave our neighbors a heart-attack today.

The girls had so much fun I am sure we'll be doing it every year!

(Heart-shaped brownie treats)

Done (well, almost)

Well I have to admit I'm a little behind but at least I'm ahead of the due date.

(what did she just say?)

I was planning to have my Valentine's projects wrapped up a few days ago so that I could move on to the things I wanted to do for Chloe's birthday party next weekend. I'm still confident I'll get everything done, just not when I thought I would.

(my continued sanity is not guaranteed as evidenced by my decreasing clarity)

These projects were really easy so you could probably pick one and still get it done in time.

Well first off, I changed my mind.

(shocking, I know)

I decided to do a little handmade gift for Bailey's teacher and came up with this:

I attached it to a magnet/clip thing so her teacher could put it on her file cabinet at school.

It took one afternoon of embroidering while watching the girls play house and completely neglecting the laundry.

I completed Brad's gift.

By far the most involved of the projects I did this week.

But he's worth it.

And I love all the cute little notes we can "write" to each other now.

no, I won't tell you what they say(;

And crayon rolls. Done.

I love how they came out.

I decided I would much rather do a garland project with the girls

than the fabric one I originally found.

So we've been gluing and glittering and crafting like crazy

and hopefully tomorrow I can show you a finished product.

Happy weekend!