passion week 2019

I finally managed to get my advent stuff down today (Christmas was almost 4 months ago....) in time to put up our stuff for Easter. After thinking about what to do for this year's passion week, I've finally narrowed it down to a couple of things to keep this week intentional in teaching Asher about the reason for this season. 

I love thematic things and parties and holidays and I am all for gimmicks (I'm kinda lame that way, lol!) so I am down for all the bunny pictures and egg hunts and egg painting fun! but I hope to also use this special week as an opportunity to teach Asher about this magnificent, glorious, amazingly loving way that God demonstrated His love for us in sending His Son to die on our behalf. Amidst the fun and fluff (haaaaa....), I want him to really understand what Easter is truly celebrating! 

A couple things our family will be doing this week:

1. "Story Alive" by The Littles and Me. I absolutely love everything that Ashley does and especially how this little resource brings bible stories to life and makes it easy to talk through it with little ones. I think Asher is still a little on the young range for thi, but it's been helpful in guiding me as to what kind of passages to read, what kind of questions to ask and what fun activities and crafts to incorporate to really bring these bible stories to life! Story alive is a growing curriculum, which means that Ashley is continuing to add to it. There are a handful of bible stories that are in this curriculum so far (including the Palm Sunday, Good Friday and Resurrection that I will be using..) but she is continuing to add to the curriculum so I'm so excited to see what other stories I'm going to be able to walk Asher through using this resource! 

2. Resurrection Eggs- You may or may not remember from last year, but I put together these no-cost, super-ghetto resurrection eggs to go through with Asher. It was so last minute so I didn't even have a normal egg carton to use! Asher was also younger so I wasn't sure if he would be able to sit through all 12 eggs. I modified it for his age and tweaked and personalized it to what I wanted to go through with him. We absolutely loved doing it with him last year. By the end of the week, he was able to recite what each of the eggs had inside and recount the entire passion week including Christ's death on the cross and His resurrection! He has been asking me all year long if we could do "Easter eggs" again and I'm so excited to go through it with him this year. 

Last year, a seasoned mom who now have grown kids passed down her personal (and legit) set of resurrection eggs to me after I showed her a pic of mine (LOL, I think she saw how ghetto it was). It was such a gracious gift and I am so so thankful to be using this one in lieu of my ghetto one. PSA: Ghetto one is equally effective IMHO!

the list and resurrection eggs signage is from the "Story Alive" resource. The cards I found on google somewhere (can't seem to find it..) and the resurrection eggs you can make for cheap/free or you can purchase one online like this one here.

3. Resurrection rolls - We are prob gonna be doing this a few times this weekend (mainly because we need to use up our crescent rolls!), but if you haven't heard of resurrection rolls yet - you must try it (....with us...this year...because... I have personally not tried it but it sounds cool! lol!) It's a fun treat and cool activity in one. Essentially, its a way to demonstrate that Jesus (marshmallow) went into the tomb (crescent dough), but that after 3 days (baked in the oven) He resurrected and the tomb was empty (crescent roll with no marshmallow inside/melted!)! I know my kids will LOVE doing this activity (because hello-opportunity-to-help-in-kitchen-and-sugar-and-cinnamon-and-CARBS) so I'll try to post pics when we get around to doing it! But for now, enjoy this beautiful and glorious photo of baked resurrection rolls from A Pinch of Joy as an example. I mean, C'MON! I can smell the cinnamon.

(TBH my crescent rolls expired a few days ago, but its okay. I'll just bake it for a few mins longer. If you don't hear from us we prob all got food poisoning, in that case  - please mail us a box of pedialyte pops.) 

4. The last and most significant and precious (to me) thing that we are gonna be doing this year is having Asher draw out each day of the passion week. During passion week (or as some call "Holy Week") we remember what Christ did in his earthly life in the final days leading up to His crucifixion (death on the cross). There are passages you can read everyday (see image below) to follow along what happened on each day. As I read and recount to Asher what Jesus did, I'm having him draw a picture (or any # of things that he wants to draw) that we can post inside our home to look at throughout the week. 

 

(thanks BMC for these helpful resources!)

Sunday- https://vimeo.com/89013208
Monday- https://vimeo.com/89117797
Tuesday- https://vimeo.com/89651201
Wednesday- https://vimeo.com/89420035
Thursday- https://vimeo.com/89420081
Friday- https://vimeo.com/89429101
Saturday- https://vimeo.com/89436644
Sunday- https://vimeo.com/89509380

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This was our first post for Palm Sunday. 

Asher drew Jesus (for some reason with a very large clown nose), the palm branches, the donkey that he sat on, and the purple cloaks on the floor. When I asked him what he drew, he said "Jesus is riding a donkey like a king!"

As young as these kiddos may be, I'm learning that any and every effort that we put into teaching them these things is never wasted. I'm praying that as we try to spend this week (and every week for that matter) being intentional and purposeful in teaching our kids about Who God is and the amazing love He showed us in Christ - I'm praying with faith that these seemingly mundane, silly and simple efforts will somehow, in some way, some day be used by God to plant seeds of faith in their hearts so that they too would come to the saving knowledge of Christ. 

sometimes I dismiss how much these little kiddies understand and absorb at this age. but just yesterday, after a more-than-usual difficult day of tantrums and meltdowns and time outs for hitting/pushing/snatching toys away and screaming... Asher asked me to pray for him that he would have self control.  Even though it was nothing profound, the fact that he was able to recognize his need for help reminded me that all of these little efforts are valuable; valuable and instrumental in teaching him that there is no good that we can do on our own. that we are sinners who are dead in our sins, in need of a Savior because we cannot save ourselves. and that God in His great love and mercy, made a way for us to be reconciled to Him and to have a new life - free from the power and penalty of sin.  praying that every simple, silly, mundane and seemingly meaningless moment and effort would be redeemed for His glory! 

cheers to a blessed week remembering and celebrating.