Holy Week

I have loved trying to make Holy Week much more of a celebration for the past few years. And it's been a bit of a work in progress, every year adding or adjusting things that I felt would be meaningful. This is how it ended up this year:

• I started Holy Week by fasting. I did this a few years ago, when it just happened that, because of general conference, we were fasting at the beginning of Holy Week, and I really loved that little spiritual boost before Easter. So I've been doing it since then, and I love it. 
• I do an Easter Week devotional every day, telling stories of the last week of Jesus' life, with the kids
• We listen to sacred music instead of worldly music. I listen to Rob Gardner's "Lamb of God" cantata, and it's such a great way to bring the Spirit to the week and make me think of Jesus. 
• We have our "Jerusalem Supper" on the Thursday of that week, when Jesus would have been having the Last Supper with His disciples. And we usually have discussions about Jesus, and I answer the kids questions, or sometimes I ask them little pop quiz questions about Holy Week. 
• We do our secular "fun" Easter traditions during the week, like dyeing and hunting eggs and Easter baskets. We dyed eggs on Friday this year, and the kids were so into it, especially Sawyer. He loved dyeing his eggs and was so thrilled with trying different things. Jack, too, was very into experimenting with different colors. It was fun. 
• The kids got their Easter baskets on Saturday morning. We always do fun cereal and Easter candy, and this year, I went to Deseret Book for some religious reading material and activity books for Sacrament Meeting. 
• Easter Sunday we go to church, have an Easter lesson at home, and this year we tried something new that may be a yearly thing. We did a testimony meeting after the lesson, just with our family, which was kind of nice. Brooke bore her testimony, which was so sweet. But none of the other kids did. 

Doing all of these things during Holy Week just invites the Spirit and makes it feel special. 

We invited Brian's and Scott's families to come participate with us in an egg hunt. They came for lunch, where we did panini and fruit and chips, and then when we were done eating, we went the kids downstairs while we hid the eggs. It was fun to do our egg hunt with more family! 

Emily came to church with us on Easter, and then came over afterwards to do a lesson and lunch and games with us. We loved having her. And we dropped her and Sammy off when we went to Michael and Michelle's house for dinner. It was a great Easter Week and Easter day.