A Blessed Easter Weekend

Monday, April 9th, 2007 at 8:20 pm

Our weekend started out with a wonderful Good Friday service at our church. A small bunch from church have made it a tradition for many many years now to carry a cross through town from the grocery store and up a long hill to our church building. It is very moving and those who participate in this yearly walk take turns carrying this cross the 2 to 3 miles this walk takes. We were unable to participate this year but we did get to the church before the group arrived.

The following service was small and short but very meaningful. We were given a chance to morn and rejoice over Jesus’s death and it was quite moving. The kids stayed in the sanctuary during the service and really behaved themselves. For having as many kids as adults in that room it was amazingly quiet and went off without a hitch. My kids came away with quite a few questions that I was more than happy to answer! I love it when they attend a service and understand it enough to ask questions about it.

Saturday found us spending the day out at Papa and Grandma’s farm riding the 4-wheelers and spending time with each other. We sat out in a grassy area and had a picnic and enjoyed our unusually warm weather. It was an awesome Saturday. We did have one accident – Joe.
Joseph misunderstood a direction given by his father. Our smallest 4-wheeler has weed-eater engine in it (this is lady talk for something more complicated) and needs to stay revved just a tad bit or it will stall. My dear son thought this meant to keep it wide open, his 4-wheeler is a bigger 110 so he is just learning the difference in riding the smaller one. He took a turn with it full-on and drove up a fence post, flipping over sideways. He was wearing a helmet, jeans, and closed toe shoes which helped keep him from getting hurt. As it is he walked away with just a few scratches. Lesson learned: Always wear your protective gear no matter what size the machine you are operating! He was shaken up but got right back on and tried again, this time with a better sense of what he was doing.

On Sunday we woke up to a cloudy, chilly morning. I was a little disappointed in the weather but by the time church was over it had warmed up quite a bit and became a perfectly warm day!
We readied ourselves for church and got there an hour and a half early to get prepared for band (my husband plays the drums) and preschool/kindergarten church class (which I teach with the help of my 12 year old daughter).

I was amazed by the amount of information my class at church was able to soak up. It isn’t a normal Sunday without a bunch of 4, 5, & 6 years olds running wild but yesterday was different. They were all attentive and curious and it felt so good to be able to relay a message that these little ones appeared to drink up. I try to view every Sunday with this class a blessing no matter what mischief they get into but yesterday really did remind me why my role there was required.

After that we came home, got a snack, and headed back out to Papa and Grandma’s farm for swimming (they have an indoor pool) and more 4-wheeling. The cousins, aunts and uncles came out which thrilled my kids. We had a great time and it was an absolutely beautiful day ~ and NOBODY got hurt which is very unusual when you have 9 kids under 13 roughing it up in the fields!