Valentine Lesson

With Valentine's Day coming up, we have been working on lots of heart projects.

This one is very special because of the application (that I stole from a dear friend).

I cut out a heart as large as I could from construction paper (we used red, purple and pink).

Then inside that heart I cut out another heart. That left me with a frame of a heart.

We set the heart frame inside a laminating sheet and carefully placed tissue paper squares in the open

space. Then we laminated it to make a beautiful sun catcher.

NOTE: You could make any kind of heart and laminate it or put it in a sheet protector for the same devotional lesson.

Then we ooooed and awed at how beautiful it was when we held it up to the window. The "Son" shines through and makes it more beautiful! Then I asked, "Who loves us MOST of all?"  I got a resounding, "God and Jesus!"

Then I took a black dry erase marker and told the kids, "This is what dark, dirty, sin looks like." And I scribbled all over the pretty heart. The kids we upset that I ruined the heart. I then explained that sin does that to our heart. It makes is ugly and dirty. But if we ask God to forgive us he will. Then I took a white Kleenex (Puffs Ultra to be exact) and said, "This is what Jesus does when we ask for forgiveness, He washes us clean and we look beautiful again. We are most beautiful when we seen the 'Son' shining through us."

The kids then spent time scribbling all over their hearts and teaching that same lesson to each other. We washed them clean and taped them in the window. Now we can be reminded throughout the day of how God has washed us clean!

Memorial Day 2011

You can't go through a Memorial Day without a hot dog, watermelon and listening to this.

Just listen to her! She is 7 years old! She gave me chills!

Resurrection Sunday!

We all have our little quirks. I will flat out tell you that I believe Easter is not real (nor is the Easter Bunny nor is Santa). But, the resurrection of Jesus is REAL! I prefer to say "Happy Resurrection Day!" It really helps ME to remember the most important things that Jesus asks us to remember ~ his Death ~ his Burial ~ his Resurrection!

I am sure most of you have heard of the cute little resurrection eggs that most christian bookstores sell. They really are a neat idea. We have a set and my kids love to play with the little pieces. But I tell you, I have the darnedest time trying to keep the right trinket with the right number on the egg and that is if we can find all the eggs! So, this year I started something new.

THE TREASURE BOX

This has been gleaned from the children's book
Benjamin's Box: The Story of the Resurrection Eggs


This great little book is about Benjamin who lives in Jesus time and he has an empty treasure box. One by one he follows Jesus just before he is crucified and collects items that he will treasure as he remembers.

I read the book to my kids and with each page we added the same item that Benjamin adds to our own treasure box.

One by one they added these pieces (from the resurrection eggs) into the box.

What a fun time they had with it. What a wonderful keepsake to keep our treasure box on display on our bookshelf to interact with and to remember Him.