He is Risen!!

This is one of my favorite general conference talks ever. I love my Savior Jesus Christ, and I know that He lives. Happy Easter!!!

Easter Festivities

It's been such a wonderful weekend! We had nothing going on this weekend except an Easter celebration, and General Conference. It was really nice to enjoy some unstructured time together without any major plans. I'm pretty exhausted right now (as usual these days), so I won't write much, but I'll let the pictures do the talking. Here's what we've been up to over the last few days...

Hope you had a wonderful Easter too!!

Easter Egg-stravaganza!

Here are a few pics from our Easter Saturday festivities. After a few years of trying out different easter egg hunts in the area, we finally found a WONDERFUL one! If you're interested in checking it out next year, let me know and I'd be happy to give you the info. It was AMAZING!

There was a live band, and an adorable puppet show about Jesus Christ and the resurrection.There were 20-30 different stations set up for the kids with games/crafts, and some of them featured spiritual object lessons.

Cookie decorating
A petting zoo... in the church (I thought that was a little weird, but the kids loved it)
An egg hunt of course!

And a train ride (I think I was even more excited than the kids for this!)

Here they are posing. I don't know why they do these funny poses every time we whip out the camera! It cracks me up!

I continued a tradition from my childhood and added scriptures to their eggs which we read during Easter dinner.

The worst part about the day was that Baby Jakey absolutely HATED the Easter Bunny. Every time he would walk by, Jakey would either start screaming, or he would scowl at him. :( We ended up having to completely avoid being in the same room!

Here he is on the way home... completely exhausted from all that screaming and scowling!

Poor little guy.

Hope you had a wonderful Easter!

Happy Easter

This is a beautiful video I thought I'd share in celebration of the resurrection of Jesus Christ. This song make me cry every time I hear it. Hope you're moved by it as well.




Lyrics:

Weak and wounded sinner
Lost and left to die
O, raise your head,
for love is passing by

Come to Jesus
Come to Jesus
Come to Jesus and live!

Now your burden's lifted
And carried far away
And precious blood has washed away the stain, so

Sing to Jesus
Sing to Jesus
Sing to Jesus and live!

And like a newborn baby
Don't be afraid to crawl
And remember when you walk
Sometimes we fall...so

Fall on Jesus
Fall on Jesus
Fall on Jesus and live!

Sometimes the way is lonely
And steep and filled with pain
So if your sky is dark and pours the rain, then

Cry to Jesus
Cry to Jesus
Cry to Jesus and live!

O, and when the love spills over
And music fills the night
And when you can't contain your joy inside, then

Dance for Jesus
Dance for Jesus
Dance for Jesus and live!

And with your final heartbeat
Kiss the world goodbye
Then go in peace, and laugh on Glory's side, and

Fly to Jesus
Fly to Jesus
Fly to Jesus and live!

Happy Easter!

I'm just overflowing with gratitude right now for my family and for the blessings in my life. This has been such a wonderful weekend. For our date night on friday, Jon and I did some cleaning/purging/organizing around the house. Not the most romantic date ever, but I can't believe how much better I feel when the house is orderly. It's been such a challenge lately to keep it that way. I heard a quote once that is so true... "cleaning the house while your kids are still growing is like shoveling the walk before it stops snowing". So we watied until they were in bed, and took advantage of the opportunity. :)

Then on Saturday we went to an easter eggstravaganza in Piqua, and had a great time, despite the fact that it snowed again this year! Here's Celeste trying to fake a smile through her frozen lips...

Ironically enough, the kids got coupons for free ice cream cones from DQ which we had to redeem because they were only good at the Piqua store! But the kids were thrilled, they didn't seem to care that it was 30 degrees outside!
The best part of the weekend of course, was going to church as a family and celebrating the real meaning of Easter. I am so grateful for the resurrection of Jesus Christ which makes it possible for us to live again after this life, and to have eternal families. I KNOW that Jesus Christ lives, and I am forever grateful for this knowlege which has brought such indescribable joy to my life. Happy Easter!