I love Easter! No, not for the chocolate bunnies, easter egg hunts, or pretty spring dresses-I love it because it is the time of year we remember and celebrate the death and resurrection of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ! What could be more wonderful than that? It can be hard, with any holiday, not to be distracted by all the other "stuff" that the rest of the world tells us is important. If you're not sure what I mean, just visit any store's Easter section and see how many items being sold show the resurrection of Jesus, versus how many are related to bunnies, chickens, or eggs. Now, I am not saying there is anything inherently wrong with eggs or bunnies (or Peeps!) , just that this is not the focus I want my children to have when it comes to Easter. I want them to know and understand the truth. With that goal in mind, but still wanting to make the teaching fun, we use the Resurrection Eggs from Family Life for the couple of weeks leading up to Easter, to visually tell the story of Jesus' crucifixion. If you don't know what these are, it is a dozen plastic eggs, each filled with a different trinket that helps tell the story. For instance, one day there might be a small piece of leather to represent the whip the soldiers used on Jesus. Another contained 3 fake coins to represent the pieces of silver that Judas' betrayed Jesus for. You open one each day and read the accompanying story until the final day, when the egg is empty (the day Jesus rose from the dead!) The little kids especially love it because of the little treasures hidden in each egg. What fun it is to have a new surprise each morning!
We also made the Resurrection cookies the night before Easter and told the story of Easter while making them. These are essentially a meringue cookie-each ingredient has a special meaning-vinegar represents what was given to Jesus to drink as He was on the cross, beating the pecans into pieces is representative of the Roman soldiers beating Jesus, and so on. We then put them in the oven, turn it off, and seal the outside with tape. In the morning, we open the oven and take a bite of the cookies, which are hollow inside, just as the tomb of Jesus was!
Finally, this year we dyed Easter eggs, which we really don't normally do, but we found a cute kit at Walmart with cute religious symbols to use. Here they are..decorating away with Dad!
The only bad part was when our counters stained pink because we didn't put newspaper down. :-( Nothing a little magic erasering couldn't take care of! They had a great time and quite enjoyed eating the eggs today! After a very stormy morning, our weather here is clearing up and turning beautifully sunny! I hope everyone has a blessed Easter!
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