Stone rolled

Lots of time in the yard today.
I wasn't sure we had room for the hill of 3 crosses, but Reece insisted. He found a spot, mounded some dirt and set them in.We made our tomb (and note for next year, make it earlier.)Dirt, rocks, guards, sticks. Perfect place to play, thinks Reece.

Crown

This isn't the kind of crown we expected after the grand palm tree entrance they gave him. Yet, there he was, now being mocked and beaten.We made our crown using rose bush branches from Kristen's yard. It made quite an impact. Just putting it together made me bleed. I cannot imagine wearing it with it being dug in. Oh how this history is hard to read again and again.

Father and Son

Jesus says the Son of God so today's symbol is a triangle representing the Trinity.I have NO CLUE what he's doing here, but I had to keep it. Thankful there's not a Virgina Slims in his hand.

Arrested

Thank you, Dollar Tree, for the handcuffs. They made quite an impression. Another story of how Jesus gave up his life willingly, calling off the disciples from fighting.

He prayed

Not just once, but 3 times Jesus prayed that night before his arrest.I love how Reece expresses himself with each day. It seems like he really understands the mood and tone of each reading. Precious boy.

Bread and a cup

Reenacted the passover feast today.
This might have been my favorite day yet.The splurge at the gstore for grape juice was so worth it. It stains relentlessly, and thus secured the message even more about the blood poured out for us.

Looks like he's licking it, but really he's describing the severity of that stain.He wanted to drink some grape juice out of the itty bitty cup from the Resurrection Eggs...We prayed together a prayer of thanksgiving for God sending His son for us, and for this very special time to learn about the last supper the disciples had with Jesus.

Very best

While Jesus was in Bethany in the home of Simon the Leper, a woman came to him with an alabaster jar of very expensive perfume, which she poured on his head as he was reclining at the table. When the disciples saw this, they were indignant. “Why this waste?” they asked. “This perfume could have been sold at a high price and the money given to the poor.” Aware of this, Jesus said to them, “Why are you bothering this woman? She has done a beautiful thing to me. Matthew 26:6-10

She gave Jesus her very best. We talked about how we could give Him our best.
Reece mentioned loving God and others, and he mentioned toys. He wanted to give Jesus something. I might think this was silly, if I didn't know that's a big hearted gesture for him. Love his sweet heart.

On a cloud

He's coming back, coming on the clouds of heaven. And he will send his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other.“But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father."

Love

I loved today's walk on Easter road.
Jesus tells us what he's all about...Love.
And He tells us what we're to be about...Love.

Yep, it IS pretty much that simple.

Before we came outside, we set at the computer learning the sign language for Matthew 22:37-40. Love sign language. We'll need to keep practicing, but loved the time together hiding some of the most important scripture in our hearts. Speaking of hearts...It's my favorite paperweight.I asked Reece what he was doing above and he said the sign for love. : ) Hard to do while holding something, but a heart melter nevertheless.Here he's saying it.
LOVE!

It is the answer for lots of things. : )

On a donkey

Smoothies, eggs, & bacon, and talking history about a town throwing down their cloaks for a humble king riding in on a donkey. About to go clip some ferns in the front yard as palm branches. Sunshine leaking through the windows. Ahh, that's a good start to this Wednesday.

That was my fb status from this morning.

This king came riding in on a donkey. He wasn't stately, but humble. When he arrived, he was honored. They put palm branches and their own cloaks down on the dirty path so that He didn't touch them. 'Hosanna in the highest!', they exclaimed, and today we sang.
Oh but for them, it wouldn't last long.

Found a small grey horse (we call it a donkey!) at the dollar store since we didn't have any horses in the house. I found it yesterday, so perfect His timing.
Reece played with it in the house for a while. Zach may have gotten a turn. ; )Later we went outside to add the donkey and branches to our Easter road. He's clipping the 'palm' (aka fern) branches...Drawing a donkey...
Added the fern...I mean, um, palm branch!Sorry to post two of these, but they were both so darling!

Blind see

Jesus was on the way to Jerusalem.
He had a job to do there, like it or not.

But, when these blind men called out to him, He didn't keep on going.
He stopped.

And we too stopped on that word for a bit.
He was on a major mission of love (and death) and yet stopped to heal.
Because he could (He's got power like God), because he loves, and because they believed.

Glasses were our symbol for today. And um, we just used what we had. Love that dude.BTW, Zach isn't intentionally left out of these lessons. The first few days at least, it has been a good time to do it when Zach is napping. It has helped get our momentum too.
I look so forward to the coming years when we do it all together.

Wanted to remember my fb status from today:
Just enough time to take our next step on Easter road before soccer practice. Jesus stopped where he was going to heal 2 blind guys. He's got power and can make anything happen, yet He let the most terrible thing happen to Him for us. Here's to slowing things down tomorrow and seeing those around us we can help, and show them some of the love we've been so lavishly give.

Easter Road

Dear Lindsey put together a Jesse Tree of sorts for Easter. We'd both desired to begin celebrating this season more intentionally. In many ways, it should be the biggest holiday of the year.

We hope to make it more of one this year.

A day behind, we started today reading Matthew 20:17-19.
I hacked together a telescope to represent how Jesus could see into the future, knew how horrifically he was going to die, and loved us so much he laid down his life anyway. Thank you, Lord, for loving us like that.In addition to playing with a symbol of the reading for the day, I wanted to incorporate a garden of sorts, since that was so cool last year.

I decided to use the front yard, drawing the symbol for each day in chalk on the garden pavers, winding our Easter road to the cross and part of the bed where I hope to make a tomb and roll a stone in front. I know Reece will love it, and I hope we'll get to share it with others too.Got back inside and Reece propped his telescope up to the Jesus statue. Pretty cute.I'm looking forward to this year's Easter road, and hoping to make a new tradition. I hope we can keep it up every day.

Reece time

Went to get Zach out of bed this morning and found him in puke. Poor guy just couldn't keep anything down today. This was all pretty new to him, who has only had one or two throw ups in his life thus far. One adorable thing is that after he was up and moving, I sneezed and he said, 'bless you.' I've never heard him say that before. Precious.

The other good thing is that he took a 4 hour nap.

So, Reece and I went hunting for monarch eggs on milkweed.
He is a great helper and was careful in handling and in not stepping on possible milkweed in the big field. I think this picture from my phone is just precious of my sweet little (but oh so big, too big!) boy...After that, I realized that we should just make a date of it and went for yogurt. He scored some cookies and cream, and it was a much needed relief after being in the scorching sun.Man, summer is going to be killer!

We decided it was hot enough for water activities in the backyard.
Thanks to that sandbox and slide a moving neighbor provided, we've found more reason to hang out back there. I'm loving that. Plus, we wanted to lay low for Zach, assuming he'd be up any time.

Reece didn't slide much, but we threw wet squeezable balls at each other. He taunted and he giggled.These last two I took while holding my camera straight down and not even looking. They might be my favs, b/c of that smile. I can't get that kind of smile from him looking in my lens much anymore. He likes some face to face interaction. Don't we all!Loved my special time with Reece today. And praying sweet Zach gets better soon (and without infecting us all!)