Toy Thursday: Learn your letters with Easter Eggs!

Last year my neighbor gave us this clever Easter egg game matching letters together. As soon as we got it back out this year, Judah was more interested in it than before. The game certainly puts a seasonal flair on learning by matching upper case letters to lower case letters using plastic Easter eggs.

Items
package of colorful plastic Easter eggs
permanent marker

Instructions
On one side of the egg, write a capital letter of the alphabet. On the corresponding side, write three or four lower case letters of which one is the match to the upper case letter. Rotate these letters around the egg. The child then puts the egg together and turns the sides to match the upper case letter with the lower case letter. Do this with several eggs using various letters of the alphabet.

Make Monday: Crayon Eggs!

If you have a lot of broken crayons lying around, keep the pieces for melting into crayon shapes. Introduced to us by a friend as their annual Valentine's, Judah and I expanded the idea and used our broken crayons to make Easter eggs for a fun and easy Easter activity.

1. Sort and separate all your broken crayons. Remove any remaining paper from crayons.

2. Place broken crayon pieces into the baking silicone rubber pan of your choice. Choose colors based on designs for a fun melting experience.

3. Bake at 400 degrees for approximately 20 minutes or so. Ovens, pans, and crayons may vary your oven temperature and baking time.

4. Allow crayons to fully melt. Once the crayon has melted, take out of oven, and let it sit to cool.

5. After the crayon becomes cool and solid, remove from pan.

6. Use for decorations, fun gifts, or to simply color. Have lots of fun.

Salvation Sunday: Your Darkest Hour!

Look back to your darkest hour. Why was this hour so dark for you? What did you feel, think, and experience?

Perhaps you are like me and experienced the death of your grandfather whom you loved very much. Or then you went through the messiness of job loss and betrayal of a boss. Another time, it could have been the medical complications you faced followed by depression and anxiety. On top of these physical and emotional pains, you lived through the pain of loneliness and despair.

Whatever the reason, your hour was dark and you felt alone, betrayed, unloved, rejected, grieved, saddened, exhausted, angered, annoyed, insulted, offended, anguished, panged, sorrowful, shamed, and many more in a long list of hurt, struggles, and ache.

Take those feelings and let's walk down another path. On this path is One who was called "Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace, " as found in Isaiah 9:6. On this path was the promised Messiah, the Deliverer, the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Really it was God, himself, come to bring hope and peace for all.

Along this same path, we stop and watch the crowd join in celebration as a man rides on a donkey into Jerusalem and a week later this same crowd cries unabashed, "Crucify Him." Further down this journey, we find this man unselfishly lower himself to wash dirty feet at the "Last Supper" looking up into the eyes of those individuals who call themselves the closest friends only to a have them a few hours later betray, deny, and run away from him. In the moonlit garden we find this man praying with a heart burdened with so much anxiety that he sweats blood. And yet, the pang does not stop. We find this man beaten cruelly, despised by men, and scorned by society. We find a man sentenced to a humiliating traitor's death. We find a man on whom God turned His back.

Here is the clincher - He did it willingly.

How many of us would go through our dark hour willingly? For "Who, being in the very Nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death - even death on a cross," Philippians 2:6-8. He

Whatever is your darkest hour and wherever it lies, He has felt all the emotional, physical, and spiritual pain associated with it because He has been there, done that. He went through His hour so that you would not be alone in your darkest hour. Fear not, you can "Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you, " as I Peter 5:7 bids. Imagine a God who really understands what you are going through.