Easter

Easter this year was different because of Corona. Church was again online so we spent it at home. We watched a Facebook live video of Colin at home singing Easter songs about Jesus' death and resurrection. 

On Good Friday the kids made their own Easter garden. It was a suggestion of Julia Watson in our church facebook page. I loved the concept of making the garden, building the cross, having the tomb, placing Jesus inside the tomb and the rock in front of it to remove on Sunday. The kids did a great job.

Daddy helping Daniel make the cross

Placing the seeds

Their Easter garden

 We do love hot cross buns and I would love to make them, but I looked at a recipe and they have so many random ingredients in them that I wasn't keen to go and buy them. Instead I found a recipe for Hot Cross Muffins. The kids did a great job helping make them and they were really tasty. They each had a job to do to help make them. Alexander sifted the ingredients, Eliza chopped the dried fruit and Daniel mixed the ingredients together. I think it will be the start of an Easter tradition.

Sift

Chop

Mix

During the Good Friday sermon the kids had the job of making their own Easter Hats to wear on Sunday during their Easter Egg hunt and Easter baskets to collect their eggs in. They had a great time making them.

Sunday morning the kids were excited to get up and pop on their Easter hats. We started the day focusing on the reason for the season - Jesus is alive! The kids did a scavenger hunt through the house learning parts of the Easter story. They loved it! They wanted the clues to be hidden again and repeated the hunt a few times.

Running to find their next clue

They were very excited with their Easter gifts - Peppa Pig activity books and paint eater cookies.

Daniel and Alexander were straight into the activity books.

James surprised me with a Rocky Road Easter egg. Yum!

Eliza wanted us both to be bunnies.

Next up, James and I set up the Easter egg hunt outside. The kids first headed out to see that the stone had been rolled away and that Jesus was alive outside the tomb! I love that this year we were able to focus a bit more on the real meaning of Easter and not just the chocolate eggs.

The kids were then keen to run around and find all of their Easter eggs. We hid them in 3s so the kids all got the same amount. They did pretty well to find most of them on their own.

Daddy explaining how the hunt is going to work

Excited by her chocolate

Their  collection (plus a Lindt bunny from Dennis and Carol)

The kids were keen to have some of their eggs.

We then joined in the Easter service online.

For kids church the kids coloured by number and coloured in bookmarks.

Then we did the kids' talk. It explained that today was about a celebration so we got to play some party games!

We started with party poppers

It was Alexander's first go at it

I love his face

Balloon tennis

Alexander was so into it! His 'yesssss' was the best.

Eliza and I spent some time reading together and then she read a bit on her own.

Then it was a family activity time with painting our Easter cookies. They were lots of fun to do and the kids loved it!

My eggs

The boys

The girls

It was a lovely activity for us all to do and the cookies were delicious to eat after! 

We finished the day off with a bike ride and walk.

Spotting ladybirds

It was a lovely day and I loved that the focus kept coming back to Jesus and the sacrifice he made for me, for all of us. Thank you Jesus for all that you have done for us so we can be friends with God.

This year with the kids eating the chocolate we decided that we'd let them just eat their chocolate eggs when they wanted to. We had no idea if this was a wise choice or not... I'm still not sure if it was a wise choice or not. Ha. Alexander and Eliza went through their chocolate quite quickly. They just loved it! Easter Monday I was outside hanging out the washing with Daniel and came back in to find 2 chocolate faces and many wrappers for Eliza and Alexander.

Daniel was much more controlled with his chocolate eating (he only finished his stash yesterday so almost 2 months after Easter!) He wanted to be the last one with his chocolate. Alexander got upset at times about Daniel being able to eat chocolate when he couldn't but understood that he had already eaten all his chocolate.

Cousin Mel also created some Gower Family activities. 2 years ago we met up all together at Uncle Milton and Auntie Barb's place and this year we were to get together. With Covid happening we couldn't do that so Mel and Kaysey decided we could do some activities over messenger. One task was colouring in. I finished mine.

Eliza finished hers a few weeks later (I will post a photo when I come across it).

Found it!

Another task was to come up with as many little words as you could find in Gower Family. I loved that our kids were getting involved in this one too! Alexander and Eliza were saying words like I, am, we (sight words) while Daniel was saying some larger ones (farm, worm). 

Looking at Gower Family to try and work out some words

I ended up being the last one to write a word when Mel's timer went off so that was a bit of fun too. So nice to be connected even though apart.