Easter 2011

I apologize ahead of time for the long post, but we had a lot of fun this Easter! :-)

The eggs the kids made out of marshmallows.

Blake's entry into the newspaper's coloring contest.

Morgan's entry into the newspaper's coloring contest.

Morgan couldn't wait to get me an Easter present, so she and my mom picked me up some beautiful flowers when we went shopping last week :-)

We dyed Easter eggs.

Morgan got this little toy from someone at school and I had to take a picture...I actually got all the balls in the holes! LOL!

The dessert I made for Easter day.

The cake I made from the leftover batter from making cupcakes....I'll tell you more about the cupcakes in a bit :-)

What the kids woke up to...the Easter bunny spoiled them with what is mostly winnings of stickers, books, a couple movies and stuffed animals. :-)

Hunting for Easter eggs.

Blake carrying his like when he carries real eggs in from the barn...can't let it break! ;-)

Ready to watch TV for the 1st time since lent!! (With one exception...they watched The Jesus Movie the 1st week of lent.)

Ready for church! :-)

After church, was dinner and a candy hunt at my parents' house....can you see the excitement!?

***********

In the time leading up to Easter, I tried to do several activities that I found in Focus on the Family's 'Thriving Family' magazine to teach the kids about Jesus. Here is what we did:

The kids made palm branches for Palm Sunday and learned about how people waved the branches and shouted 'Hosanna' to Jesus at he entered Jerusalem and discussed what 'Hosanna' meant.

We baked bread another day and discussed how Jesus is "The Bread of Life". 'Just as bread gives us nutrition and sustains us physically, Jesus offers us eternal life and sustains us spiritually.' (Quote taken from the magazine.)

During the week we also did our Resurrection Eggs and read our books about Jesus and Easter. Thursday, we took a higher value of money and asked if the kids would trade it for a few pennies, which they wouldn't. We talked about how Judas traded Jesus for 30 silver coins and how he made a bad choice and how that must have made Jesus feel.

Then, Good Friday, we put a carnation in water with red food coloring and watched what happened. We read 1 Peter 1:18-19. We talked about how Jesus was a "lamb without blemish or defect" (the white carnation). And when he died, he took our sins upon himself (the red petals.)

Easter morning we made Resurrection Rolls. Unfortunately, Jesus was still in the tomb when the rolls were done and Morgan made sure to point it out!! LOL! OOPS! It was worth a try and they were DELICIOUS!

At my parents, we went over the Resurrection Eggs again with my nieces, so they could hear the Easter story in a fun way.

And we read Matthew 27:62-66; 28:1-4. I had the kids try to push a large stone and talk about how one even larger couldn't keep Jesus in the tomb.

And finally, the cupcakes!!! I made cupcakes and my sister picked up trick candles. They each got one trick candle on a cupcake and blew it out. Of course the flame came back, to their surprise, so they tried again (and again and again...). We discussed how Jesus is "The Light of the World" and that even though everyone thought Jesus's light went out when he died...it hadn't...he was still alive! :-)