Today is Good Friday and for us it has been a good Friday indeed. Nothing too monumental and some days that means it was good. My little girl is such a sweetie and we have had fun playing together today.
In the hustle and bustle of life and a week of potty training, I have almost forgotten that this weekend is Easter and that today is Good Friday, the day Jesus was crucified for our sins. Easter did come early this year and it kind of snuck up on me. In fact, this year is the earliest Easter any of us will ever see the rest of our lives! And only the most elderly of our population have ever seen it this early (95 years old or above!). And none of us have ever, or will ever, see it a day earlier! Here are the facts: The next time Easter will be this early (March 23) will be the year 2228 (220 years from now). The last time it was this early was 1913 (so if you're 95 or older, you are the only ones that were around for that!). I doubt my blog (or any blog really) has readers older than 95. 
I was ahead of the game by buying Katherine's Easter dress last May. Luckily it actually fits a year later. I, however do not have anything to wear to church on Sunday. I am still in that awkward phase where my normal clothes are too tight and my maternity clothes are too big. Maybe I need to go shopping. I do not yet have much of an Easter basket ready for Katherine and we have not had an Easter egg hunt yet.
I was ahead of the game by buying Katherine's Easter dress last May. Luckily it actually fits a year later. I, however do not have anything to wear to church on Sunday. I am still in that awkward phase where my normal clothes are too tight and my maternity clothes are too big. Maybe I need to go shopping. I do not yet have much of an Easter basket ready for Katherine and we have not had an Easter egg hunt yet. I struggle with how to to present Easter Katherine. I don't want her to think it is all about bunnies, eggs and candy yet Easter has become so commercial like every other holiday and it is hard to find books that are not about bunnies, eggs and candy. On the other had, how ready is a two year old to hear about the death and resurrection of Jesus. I obviously want her to know the true meaning of Easter but that is so hard to explain on her level. We do have 2-3 books that are about the true meaning of Easter so she is being exposed and we are going to downplay the rest. 
This weekend we plan to go to a neighborhood egg hunt on Saturday and church on Sunday followed by lunch with Nana and Pops.
This weekend we plan to go to a neighborhood egg hunt on Saturday and church on Sunday followed by lunch with Nana and Pops.So I am curious, how does your family celebrate Easter and how do you explain it to your toddlers?
4 comments:
Happy Easter to you and your family, Christy.
We've been reading books about Easter all week. It's the first time that Nick has really associated Baby Jesus (Christmas) with Jesus-Jesus (Easter). This week he started telling all of us that "Jesus loves (enter name)." It's been nice. You know. Mixed in with potty training drama!
Happy Easter! Beautiful pics!
I happened on your blog by accident, but thought to share an Easter activity that I started with my girls when they were 2 and 4, in order to combat the "egss, chocolate and bunnies" of Easter.
We buy a bunch of brownie mix and bake brownies, build a brownie "tomb" (using icing as mortar) and dress up all their dollies as the key players in the Easter story. When they were really little, we totally skipped any of the gore - just playing that the "naughty men" killed Jesus and his disciples were sad and put him in the tomb. Then with much fanfare (including help from my husband with a flashlight in a dark room) he rises from the dead. Afterwards, we eat the tomb in celebration.
Each year I get more complex in explaining the story and its meaning. As my daughters have gotten older (now 9 and 11), they have learned the whole story and understand it. Now they enjoy actually staging the whole thing, including making hand sewn costumes for their dollies (we use fisher price) that coincide with the main characters in the story. They read the story straight from the Bible while having their dolls act it out, then we eat the tomb! Because they like this activity so much, they really don't care or even show interest in the bunnies, eggs, etc...
Okay, I didn't mean for this post to be so long. Have a great day.
Our first child was pretty sensitive when she was young so we talked mostly about how Easter was a time to celebrate how very much God loved us. Love was something she did know about, unlike death and resurrection. We could still keep the focus on God without going into all the details and without giving her a watered-down version of the story.
This year she was 7 and we finally read and explained the whole story to her. We spent 2 weeks reading and talking about it. She had great questions and we had great discussions. I think for her it worked out best this way.
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