'Win Blog: Easter: Beyond the Bunny

I really looked forward to the Easter season this year, perhaps more than most other years, because Gabriel is finally at an age where he can begin to grasp the meaning of this holiday. Easter is such a strange but wonderful juxtaposition of solemn remembrance and joyful celebration. To try to unpack the complexity of Easter to a nearly 5 year old is no easy task. I never really understood the importance or gravity of Easter myself until well into my adulthood, so I certainly can't expect Gabriel (and one day Judah) to fully "get it". Easter for me as a child was about dressing nicer than usual for church and getting an easter basket, and about the perfunctory family photo in the front yard. None of these things are inherently bad of course, but my understanding of the gospel was lacking considerably. Andy's experiences were pretty similar to mine, so as we discussed how we would approach the Lenten season for our family we tried our best to be purposeful in reflecting God's character through the Easter story without trying to shoehorn Jesus into the boys' brains inorganically. I'm sure we made mistakes and I'm sure our traditions will encounter changes or adaptations from year to year. But overall, we were really pleased with how well the boys seemed to understand why we celebrate Easter. Oh, and beyond the bunny is a phrase I snagged from pinterest, but I think it succinctly describes what our "theme" was for Easter :)

Here are the highlights:

We celebrated Palm Sunday with palm leaves given out at church and read the bible story about Jesus entering Jerusalem. At home, we took the palm leaves and shaped them into crosses for the boys:

We dyed easter eggs using naturally-derived colors, using cabbage (blue), paprika (orange), tumeric (yellow), red onion (purple) and tumeric+cabbage (green), something I started doing a few years back and have really loved as an alternative to the dye kits. Interestingly, while we were dying eggs, we heard a commotion down on the street outside our apartment building and it was a local church performing a reenactment of Jesus being tried and sent to the cross. So the boys watched and we explained what was happening. When the soldiers whipped Jesus as he drug a cross down the street, Gabriel asked if that was really what happened. We explained that even though it's hard to watch and understand that indeed that is what happened. As a parent it's easy to want to shield the ugliness from their young eyes, but understanding the depth of God's love for them through this horrible sacrifice is accomplished (hopefully) by revealing the whole truth, not sugar-coating the story.

The set-up: ready to go!

The finished product!

We took the boys to their first Good Friday service and related bible verses about why we observe Good Friday. We relied on an Easter board book to make it age appropriate. I also made hot cross buns, which were delicious! We talked about how there is a cross drawn on top of the bun ... a nice snack before we headed to church!

Saturday morning we had an Easter brunch with close friends where the boys could play with friends and enjoy fellowship, just as we do as adults when we celebrate this holiday with other believers. The idea behind the brunch was to establish traditions around Easter to underscore its importance, just as we do for Christmas. It was also fun because they got to have an Easter egg hunt in Riverside Park!

On Sunday morning, Andy hid plastic eggs for the boys, a tradition he loved as a child. Gabriel and I made resurrection rolls together as a way to keep the dialogue going. Resurrection rolls are crescent rolls with a marsh-mellow wrapped inside such that when you bake them, the marsh-mellow disappears (melts!) leaving a hollow center, just like Jesus' tomb was empty. Gabriel wrapped each marsh-mellow up to make the "tomb", then when I served them for breakfast, he was like "it's empty, just like Jesus' tomb! Jesus rose from the dead today!". Judah and Gabriel also enjoyed their modest Easter baskets, of course!

Making the resurrection roles...

I don't remember what was going on when I took this pic, but it appears Judah is not willing to share his resurrection role :)

We headed to church for the Easter service, which was lovely, and especially liked hearing from G and J all they learned in their Sunday school class. We stopped by Whole Foods to pick up a few brunch items and headed home to have Easter brunch with Aunt Steph!