Reason to Celebrate

JESUS IS ALIVE! Happy Easter dear ones! It's wonderful to have a day and weekend of activities that celebrate His victory over death and our life in Him, but it's even more wonderful to live every day with this great hope.

We believe that the greatest joy of parenting has to be watching your child fall in love with Jesus to the point of surrender and the choice of His Lordship. We talk about Jesus, pray to Him, worship Him, and retell the Bible stories daily, but when your child starts connecting their life with His, that's just the best ever!

Elle asked if she could go to Heaven with Jesus and if she could talk to Him. We've explained these things a hundred times over, but for her to formulate the thought and ask the questions...it made the answers come to life for her in a whole new way -- this made for a very special weekend!

We started our Saturday at a church egg hunt. I think they were expecting a much larger crowd, so Elle got about four prizes at every booth and there were plenty of eggs to scoop up in the field. Zane even filled his basket. After, we met some friends for lunch and because of Elle's GREAT loot, she was able to pass along a great car racing set to her friend, a boy who could appreciate it.

A pause in the hunt to give Mama a dandelion.



Score, Elle!








Counting his eggs.

We attend Saturday night services and things are quite casual, but we dressed a bit up for Easter celebration. We are so blessed by the music and strong, biblical teaching at our church. Elle always has a great time of learning too. Her class memorized the Lord's Prayer during the last few weeks and got to look in the empty tomb (a decorated dome tent) to see that He was not there. What a glorious celebration with our church family!

Today was a relaxing family day with food, food, more food and playing outside. I really enjoy cooking. I have a passion for whole foods, fresh and organic produce. I like experimenting with spices, flavors and simplicity (thanks Mom, I learned it all from you!). The kiddos eat everything I make and really enjoy it. I was thinking today that getting a child to really enjoy all different kinds of foods definitely comes from modeling and introducing those foods early on while being creative with the preparation and spices. But I believe it also has a whole lot to do with knife skills. I'm sure this isn't an original thought, but I haven't ever heard anyone else talk about this.... Both our kiddos have eaten raw, veggie packed salads since they were one year old -- it's all in the knife skills. If you look at an adult's salad with its big leaves and chunks of vegetables, that requires eating practice and familiarity to consume. But take that salad and run through it with a chef's knife, well then you have a manageable, workable product for the inexperienced eater. You've broken down the overwhelming textures, chewy skins and different flavors and brought it to a level where they can just appreciate the flavors that meld together into a great taste. From there, they grow in to being great salad eaters and enjoying all kinds of other foods -- like the quinoa, tomato, spinach, basil, almond salad with a garlic, walnut oil and lemon dressing that they ate today.

We also enjoyed deviled eggs, squash, asparagus, roasted chicken with orange sauce and a yummy strawberry almond-shortcake with homemade whipped cream laced with orange essence. Mmmmmmmmm... enjoyed a second helping of that with a cup of amaretto coffee, later after the kiddos were in bed. Okay, enough about food....He gives for our pleasure - thank you God!

Elle decorated eggs today and when Zane found them later, I caught him with his hands in the 'cookie jar'! I allowed a few eggs to be sacrificed to get a few pics and video to capture that face -- boy, he knew he had sister's eggs! :)

Later at the park, Zane scaled the climbing wall and ladder like he had done it a hundred times before. Eric has said that he's pretty coordinated, and he sure looked like a true natural, knowing just where to put his foot next and how to pull up - WOW! He isn't even walking -- we should be scared! ;)

Elle and I went down the slide a few hundred times, then we hiked a lakeside trail where Eric snatched up Elle just in time before she stepped on a water moccasin sunning between two giant rocks. We went home tired and after a lighter dinner of leftovers (so we could enjoy that second helping of strawberry shortcake), we did baths and BTBT. (That acronym is for the Wolfe family, but for the rest of you, it means bedtime.)

It was a great Easter weekend! The best part, tomorrow we wake up with the same reason to celebrate, He lives 365 days a year!