Easter Week 2021

 This week we did all of our Holy Week traditions.

Sunday we played the Palm Sunday triumphal entry game, where Mike is a donkey and the kids have to race to strew blankets in his path. Then we read about the triumphal entry.

On Monday we played up Clean Up Your Own Backyard and talked about Jesus cleansing the temple.

Tuesday we watched The Prince of Egypt and discussed the source of the Passover traditions.

Wednesday we had our modified Passover meal. This year we made it a bit longer because Rea wanted to include the afikomen and waiting for Elijah. It went pretty smoothly.

Thursday Easter walk in the canyon with fire and marshmallows. This is a new tradition to commemorate the Garden of Gethsemane, and it seems we finally have a winner! Alison has tried a lot of things that haven't worked, but everyone loved going up the canyon, and we built a fire and talked about Jesus' suffering and sang "The Miracle" before roasting marshmallows. The kids didn't want to leave and asked when we could come back.

Friday we colored Easter Eggs. We keep adapting the process and making it better. This year we made bowls of whipped topping with food coloring and gave all the kids paintbrushes to paint their eggs. That worked well, although eventually they ditched the brushes and mostly used their hands, so the brushes might be unnecessary. It's a lot more interactive and fun than dropping eggs in pots of dye. Once the eggs were gone, the kids painted themselves with the leftovers. It was a good excuse to get them all bathed before the weekend.

Friday we also made our garden tomb scenes and Rea did a family Easter Egg hunt, since we weren't sure we'd have time on Saturday when we usually do it. Mom and Rea hid the eggs in hard to find places, so it was lots of fun. The weather was perfect, so we made the tomb scenes outside, and the kids did a nice job with them. 

Saturday and Sunday we were at Grandma's house for General Conference. We brought our own asparagus and white sauce to add to their ham to make our traditional Easter Feast, as well as funeral potatoes and angel food cake. Grandma and Grandpa hosted an Easter Egg hunt on Sunday, which was a big hit.

We enjoyed Conference. The kids listened pretty well for the first session or two in order to earn treats (a Starburst jellybean for each name/title of a member of the Godhead they noticed, and a lollipop for knowing the topic of the talk). Amy and Dave were impressed by how well the system worked. But after a while they wandered off to play, and in the interests of not disturbing everyone, we didn't force them to come back. Rea voluntarily listened to almost the entire thing and took notes; she's so grown up! We'll see if in the future we insist the kids listen more, but it worked this year.