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I love this time of year. Even though my children are grown, we still keep our traditions. Those traditions are the ties that have knit our hearts together as a family. They are the ties that have built our home. They are the ties that have brought security and protection throughout the storms of life. They are the ties that still bring our children back home.
What are some of your Easter traditions? How do you do it?
Love ya!
Cindy
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Well, for beginners…we don’t called it “Easter.” We call it “Resurrection.” Among other reasons for this, it keeps the mind centered on WHAT and WHY we are celebrating and away from the bunnies and eggs and such.
We purchased the Resurrection Eggs at a Christian book store a few years ago. I threw the eggs away, but kept the trinkets inside… I store them in a ziploc bag, and each year, about two weeks before Resurrection, I get them out… It also came with a booklet that has the Bible reference for each trinket, and what it represents. We get one out each day and talk about what it means, read the Bible reference, and leave a place at the dining room table for them to be “displayed” to help us keep focused. The children love telling Daddy when he comes in from work what they learned about that day and show him the trinket. Leaving them out, we review them each day.
Last year, we purchased a Jesus movie that goes into the details of his life, death, and resurrection. That will start becoming part of our tradition this year as well.
We also usually have a large meal with family and friends after church service on Resurrection…
We always have a Easter egg hunt. We (Mom & Dad ) used to hide the eggs. Now our 2 older kids, and sometime Dad too, will go hide the eggs for the younger kids. We can not do food dyes so we sometimes will try to color the eggs with homemade dyes or we will use plastic eggs with stickers in them.
We also use the Resurrection eggs to tell what Easter is all about. We don’t do Easter Bunny or baskets, but I have to hang on too the egg hunt. 🙂
We always go to church of course and I try to have something yummy waiting at home for dinner.
Love,
Alisha Hauser>
Here are a few of our traditions-
One thing we used to do was get new dresses but as my girls have gotten older, they aren’t really into that. But it was nice when they were young to pick out a new dress and cute white shoes. We also like to make resurrection rolls (you can find the instructions online). We also like to have a big Easter meal with lots of family. We do an egg hunt and separate the kids into an older group and younger group, that way the older kids can still get out there and have fun. We also make those much more difficult for them to find. We color a few eggs, more for tradition than anything. We give the kids baskets but they have things like homemade candies and a book that they want or activity books with bubbles or homemade playdough, or earrings and bracelets for the older girls.
As a family, our church has a Good Friday service which we attend. This has helped us to take time to reflect on the significance of the celebration. While I do not like the commercialism that accompanies the day, I have been trying to make an Easter basket of family-friendly gifts that we can all enjoy together: usually a book to read aloud, a family-friendly DVD, a game and/or an activity we can do together, like a puzzle. For dinner, we usually have a special meal. Last year, we asked a new family that we don’t know over for dinner to join us. That was a special way to celebrate, and I hope the Lord will show us who we can ask over this year.
I’m not big on traditions, but I’m looking forward to hearing what others do!
Cindy,
Our favorite since having children for Easter traditions is to study the Resurrection Eggs. We have the box of eggs and alternate who is opening each one, one per day. We read this in conjunction with the book called “Benjamins Box” The story makes it easier for the younger ones to listen and understand what each egg is about. We attend an Easter Egg hunt in a local park close to our home and enjoy the somewhat more American way of doing things too but emphasize God’s amazing sacrifice of His Son.
Julie Knight
Easter traditions… Like many families, we decorate eggs and they get hidden in the night. However, we don’t want to miss the reason we celebrate Easter in the first place, so we also do Resurrection Eggs. We have 12 plastic eggs that are numbered on the outside. In each egg is a small strip of paper with a scripture verse on it, relating to Jesus’ death and resurrection. Also inside is a small prop/visual to go with the scripture. After the children find all the decorated eggs, we all sit down and read through the 12 Resurrection Eggs. It’s the one thing they ask for every year.
They also receive some homemade chocolate creation and a small gift, like flowers or a VeggieTales DVD.
Then we all go to church together and have a family get-together for dinner.
Congratulations to Harold on his acceptance to law school!
Cindy Rushton Reply:
March 22nd, 2011 at 6:27 am
Hey Heather! Love your whole post here–thought I would comment quickly on your congrats. Thanks so much! Harold and I are very excited. I just LOVE to see people reach for their dreams. I know that so often it seems like there are dreams that if you miss going for it at a certain age, then you just missed it. I love that our story will include an encouragement to others that you are never too old to go for any dream and that when you lay down your life for those you love during one season, God can bring about your dreams in a crazy way in another season! 🙂 Thanks for your congrats!
TGMama Reply:
March 22nd, 2011 at 7:21 am
Thanks, Cindy! My hubby was in a similar situation except that he just didn’t know what he wanted to be when he ‘grew up,’ He started a new career when he was 40. He finished up the fire academy when he was 41 or so and is now, at 44, finishing up paramedic school. He may even decide to move on to Physician’s Assistant after that. Though he’s still torn between that and Hazmat. You are totally right – it’s never too late!
Cindy Rushton Reply:
March 22nd, 2011 at 11:33 am
How awesome!! I just read this to Harold. He is cheering on your sweet heart too! 🙂 Nope! It is never, ever too late! I love it!
I love traditions. So do our children. For Easter, we eat a large lunch together with frends on Christmas dishes. The children do a craft together, color eggs, and hunt Easter eggs. We talk together about Jesus and how much He loves us. We try to make sure that the children understand Jesus’ resurrection!
Easter is one celebration that I’m still trying to establish with traditions. =) We don’t color eggs at our house – but the kids get Easter goodies from both sets of grandparents, and do an Easter egg hunt at my parent’s house, and have a big lunch at my in-laws with my husband’s family.
For the past couple of years, I have been able to find free printables online and have let my girls (and even their cousins) color faith-themed pictures that we post on our front glass storm door. Sometimes eggs with crosses, resurrection pictures, Bible verses, etc. We talk through the Easter story during the weekend, and we do celebrate with Easter baskets on Sunday morning. This year, I want to be more intentional about it, so I am researching (and have collected some materials for) Easter themed lapbook activities that my daughters & I can work on during the weekends leading up to Easter Sunday. each of them will work on coloring pages and activities that help us understand the story of Jesus’ death & resurrection, so we can focus on HIM and the girls can learn more about why we love Him…
Our Easter tradition is coloring and hiding eggs. We use crayons to write praises to the Lord on our eggs. We also put the names of people we are thankful for and praises to God for prayers He has answered. We then take them to church and after lunch we hide the eggs. I always try to remind my kids of Matthew 13:44. Our Risen Lord & Savior is the true treasure and worth giving up everything for.
We don’t do the same things anymore as we moved away from family a couple of years ago. We would go to church then hunt for eggs at Nanna’s house and have dinner.
Since the Lord called me to homeschool, a couple of years ago, I have been learning as much as the kids about our Savior and His love for us. This year I am planning on a unit study on Easter with the kids. After church service we will probably still hunt for eggs (even the older kids still love it and continue to hide them for more games!) and have a nice meal to celebrate.
In addition to the traditional Easter events like dying eggs and buying new dressy clothes to wear to church, our favorite tradition is our Easter dinner. After church, we invite anyone there who doesn’t have family in town to our house to join our family. I provide the ham and everyone else brings a dish to pass. We all enjoy the beautiful spring weather on our back porch and yard, chit chat all afternoon, and celebrate the Resurrection together. I love that our parents, siblings, and children get to spend this time with our church family. It makes for a very special celebration!
We have the resurrection eggs that we do like many others. I am going to try resurrection rolls this year with my girls. Every year my mom makes the girls new dresses. We do not really make it a big deal, other than spending more time talking about the sacrifice of the Lord for us.
We also go to a friends who has an easter egg hunt each year. It is an outreach to the community. Every year they do either a story, a play or something that gives the easter story. Then a hunt and some snacks.
Heather Wilson
Easter traditions have changed over the years in our family. Years ago when our children were small we made Easter baskets for them to have on Easter morning, they also colored eggs earlier in the week. I came from a non Christian home and saw nothing wrong in it, but today I do things different and have for some years now.
Now if I want to do bunnies, chicks, eggs or anything to do with spring, I make it a spring celebration time on a different day and not on Easter.
At one time we would buy our children new outfits for Easter, when we could afford it. Then we started getting them before and they were worn before Easter.
We always got together for a Sunday Easter dinner, at first at Dad and Mom’s, then sometimes at our place, later my brother married and we meet there. We always had ham and Mom’s fruit salad, they were a must.
Even today, the part of our family here in North Carolina still gets together for dinner at our daughters, she has the biggest house. Yes, we still have ham and Mom’s traditional fruit salad.
I believe we need to stick to the Bible view of Easter and teach it to our children as it is. I feel it is important not to miss lead our children into thinking Easter is something it is not.
The bunnies and all are fun, but I think we can have fun with all that and make it a spring time celebration, of new birth of all the baby animals at this time of year.
The best part of Easter is that Christ died for my sins and rose again. Now I have a home in Heaven waiting for me, because I asked Him to be my Lord and Savior.
Happy Easter to everyone!
Nancy Lewis
John and I watch the Jesus movie on Saturday evening while I make cinnamon rolls and set the table for Easter Brunch. Our children are all very little but when they’re older we’ll allow them to stay up and watch the movie with us. We also hide eggs for the children’s egg hunt. Usually Easter involves extended family get togethers and I cherish these!
In these weeks leading up to Easter we’re reading through the Gospels a bit each day and talking about why Jesus came and why He died and the hope that we have through His resurrection. To me this is the most important part and I hope my children have these times of reading as their most precious memories of our preparation.
Our Resurrection weekend starts on Saturday when we have a big family day at church with a meal and egg hunt for the little ones. Now my kids are older and they get to help hide the eggs. My youngest daughter will be participating in the production at church on Easter morning then we’ll come home and have a meal with friends from church. Thru the past several years during Advent we’ve read thru all of Arnold Ytreeide’s books (Jotham’s Journey, Bartholomew’s Passage and Tabitha’s Travels) Now we are reading Ammon’s Adventure. I still make Easter baskets for my kids but we always have had them hunt for them after church.