Tami has inspired me with her service efforts and sense of humor for some time now. She knows just what to say to make me laugh on a tough day! I am so happy to have her come share with us! And guess what? It's Tami's birthday today, ya'll!!!!! And like every good birthday girl, she has brought some blog candy to the party! Read all the way down to find out how you can win this Jenny Phillips CD, compliments of Tami of Tami's Eclectic Corner:
I am honored and excited to be a guest blogger! Thank you Jocelyn for this amazing opportunity.
Here's Tami!
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I am honored and excited to be a guest blogger! Thank you Jocelyn for this amazing opportunity.
We have a strange tradition in our family. I say it’s strange, because only a handful of other families seem to have the same tradition for Easter.
When I was born my parents decided that they wanted Easter to be a very sacred and special holiday. So they decided that the Easter Bunny would still be a part of the festivities, but he would come on Friday night instead of Saturday night. I don’t remember any Easter egg hunts though. But then again, I have a TERRIBLE memory.
My parents would also “encourage” us to write in our journals. I remember one year that I wasn’t very happy that I had to write in my journal. I didn’t appreciate the significance of the holiday yet. I still have that journal and every time I look at the entry I giggle. I wrote, “Today is Easter. I am happy.” And then I drew a couple of Easter eggs on the paper. I remember showing my mom and, well, I think she thought I’d write more. Funny now, not funny then I suppose.
When my husband and I got married and we started a family I told him that I too wanted the Easter Bunny to come on Friday night. He was a little surprised, but he went with it. We also have our big Easter egg hunt on Saturday.
Why do we do this? We do this because we want Sunday to be a very spiritual day. It’s the ending to a very special week. We celebrate Easter all week long, starting with the triumpful entry into Jerusalem the Sunday before Easter.
I was looking through pictures of Easter’s past and stopped when I saw this picture. Look at all the hub hub and the chaos from our Easter egg hunt. I LOVE it. I love having this tradition. But it made me grateful that we do this Saturday morning. I couldn’t imagine having this chaos on Easter Sunday. It’s a quiet day at our house. A day filled with testimonies, songs, prayer, music, good food and thanksgiving.
I truly believe that there is balance in all things. I love that my kids look forward to the egg hunts, Peeps, sitting on the Easter Bunny’s lap, and their baskets. I LOVE spoiling them rotten! I start shopping for those basket treats as soon as they hit the shelves. I love the looks on their faces as they open the eggs and find those surprises inside. But I love Sunday even more when I see the looks on their faces as they are filled with the Sprirt as we talk about Christ and his sacrifice for us. I love to see their faces each year as their understanding of the Atonement grows.
Easter has become my absolute favorite holiday. I look forward to everything about Easter, the colors, the eggs, the stories, bunnies, and Peeps! But that’s not why it’s my favorite holiday. I love my Savior. I have a very strong testimony of the Atonement. I have truly leaned on my Savior so many times not only to repent but to have peace and comfort during very difficult times in my life.
I know that as we strive to keep a Christ centered Easter we will be blessed. I love family traditions. I know that as you come up and create traditions for Easter you will not only make special memories as a family but testimonies will grow. So what do you say? Will you make a new tradition this year? Will the Easter bunny come on Friday night or Saturday night? I promise you’ll notice a difference!
Thank you again Jocelyn! Happy Easter everyone!
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Now for the Giveaway:
Birthday Girl Tami, who neglected to mention that she sings with the Jenny Phillips Choir, is giving you the opportunity to win the Jenny Phillips Sabbath Morning CD.
To be entered to win do any of the following:
1. COMMENT on this post.
2. BECOME A FOLLOWER of Tami's Blog!
3. READ & COMMENT on my FHE Post over at Women in the Scriptures!
(Please leave a separate comment on this post for each entry.)
I will announce the winner on Tuesday.
I will announce the winner on Tuesday.
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Now to announce the winner of this pendant from nonsense & whimsy:
Random.org picked comment #36
Erika of The Texas Flower
(OOoh, I like you, Erika...From the looks of your profile, we have a lot in common:
Favorite Movies
- Steel Magnolias
- Fried Green Tomatoes
- Twister
- Pride and Predjudice
- Thoroughly Modern Millie
- Runaway Bride
Favorite Music
Except Twister...TWISTER? Really? Ha ha...actually I've never seen it, but I've also never seen anyone put Thoroughly Modern Millie on their profile!! Love it!
Email me to claim your prize!
(jocelyn dot christensen at gmail dot com)
I would love to win this cd - I'm always looking for inspirational music to listen to!
ReplyDeleteI am now Tami's newest follower! Happy Birthday Tami!
ReplyDeleteI commented on your other post too!
ReplyDeleteI could have used these ideas 35 years ago...lol!
ReplyDeleteThanks for this post, Tami. My husband and I don't have any children. However, we often talk about the way we would like to do things when we do. I would also like to keep Easter Sunday a holy day and "celebrate spring" with the Easter bunny and all the goodies on another day. It's nice to know that it's worked out so well for your family. Thanks for your ideas.
ReplyDeleteWe do the same thing at our house - I love how it separates the secular from the sacred in our kiddos minds. Glad to see there are others doing the same!
ReplyDeleteThank you Tami for this wonderful idea. I do not have children of my own right now but this year for Easter my 3 young cousins are going to be here visiting me. I was worried about how we would wake up in time to have breakfast, an egg hunt and then get ready for church without the day turning into all about the bunny and eggs. This is the solution that I needed and will help our house to feel of the special spirit on such a day. Thanks again and HAPPY BIRTHDAY!
ReplyDeleteI have been wanting to do the easter bunny this way for a while, but I've never been able to make a decision about how to do it. I think Friday night is a great idea! My kids know that we make the easter baskets, too, so changing the day they get them won't be a big deal. And they're little enough that they won't even realize we've changed the day. I'm so excited about this easter, though because our oldest is old enough that we can try to have a meaningful Easter celebration and he would "get it" so thanks so much for this post! It has given me the courage to finally do what I've been wanting to do! And bsides, our Easter Egg Hunts are never on Easter Sunday, so what would be the big deal, right? :-D I can't wait!!
ReplyDeleteAnd I checked out Tami's blog....way cool. So I'm a follower now. :-)
ReplyDeleteOh, and I read and commented on your awesome FHE post yesterday :-)
ReplyDeleteThis is exactly what I'm planning to do when my children are old enough (the first one's in the oven right now). We'll do the same with Christmas. I think it's a great way to keep the religious day holy, and still get the cultural holiday. It also opens up opportunities for gospel discussions, with our children and with other people, as the kids get old enough to realize that we do things a little differently. Thanks for the post!
ReplyDeleteI really wish I had thought of making Easter last all week long for my kids. Too late now, but I am going to tell them about this, so maybe my grandkids can benefit. And I love doing the Easter bunny on Friday night, Easter egg hunt on Saturday, and spiritual side of things on Sunday. What a great idea!
ReplyDelete=)
Awesome post! I would love that CD!
ReplyDeleteIt's not too strange--I did the same thing growing up, and we do it now with our kids. I love keeping the two celebrations on different days.
ReplyDeleteWe also did this growing up and called it "Secular Saturday"...We always thought we were special because the Easter Bunny came a whole day before he went to the other kids' houses! ha ha! We also do this with out children. Great post, Tami! And thanks for the fun giveaway!
ReplyDeleteMy husband and I recently decided that we were going to start doing this.
ReplyDeleteMy family always did this growing up and I've continued the tradition with my own family. I love it! (Besides... the rest of the kids at church are all on a sugar high from candy before 9:00!!!)
ReplyDeleteThe Easter Bunny is coming to our house on Friday night, too. My parents started this tradition when I was a kid and I love it. My kids are too young (17 months old) to really understand but I want to start now to help them understand the true meaning of Easter. Our home is decorated with Easter bunnies and eggs but also with an Easter Tree and pictures of the life of Christ.
ReplyDeleteI checked out Tami's blog and now a follower! I would love to win this CD!
ReplyDeleteI left a comment on your post about FHE. I loved your thoughts and ideas on how to have successful FHE's.
ReplyDeleteI love this tradition!! What a great idea!! Will definitely have to talk to my hubby about doing this!! Thanks for sharing! :)
ReplyDeleteThat is a great idea I love watching my children excitement with the Easter egg hunt we usually do the hunt on sat night inthe dark with flashlights. This is their favorite things. I never thought to do the baskets on Friday. The Easter bunny usually just brings books and a few things of candy. I don't like it over taking Sunday and I hate the commercialism. Friday would be a great tradition. I would also love the Jenny Phelps cd she is one of my daughters favorite artists. It would be such a treat for her, and me!
ReplyDeleteI would so love to have this CD. I know it would be amazing. I loved this post. I love the way that you have mixed the secular with the sacred and still kept the important essence of it all.
ReplyDeleteI am now following Tami's blog.
ReplyDeleteI went and read you FHE post. I always do, but I don't always comment. This time, I did!!
ReplyDeleteThank you for all of the Easter ideas! I want Easter to be my kid's favorite holiday so I am starting a lot of new traditions. I can't wait!
ReplyDeleteI am a follower!
ReplyDeleteI commented on your FHE post. Loved it.
ReplyDeleteI want to celebrate Easter for an entire month, just like Christmas! It's a bit hard to do since there are extremely few songs just for Easter (unless you count sacrament hymns, which we sing all year anyway...), and there are extremely few decorations to choose from (call to creative people: Please someone create an Easter scene, like the millions of nativity scenes I love to collect!). But we've come a long way in creating Easter traditions for our family. Some day we'll have a months worth of celebrations:) Spreading the day-of celebrations is a grand idea.
ReplyDeleteCool . . . I've been purposely celebrating Easter more in the home. Today, we read a secular and religious Easter book and then sorted picture someone had shared for younger children. We talked about how we can do both, but that the whole purpose of it is to remember Christ in our lives!
ReplyDeleteLindsey--I saw a couple of scenes that might work at Oriental Trading when planning for an Easter party.
OT has this (Resurrection scene):
ReplyDeletehttp://www.orientaltrading.com/resurrection-set-a2-92_486-12-1.fltr?Ntt=easter+scene
and a Palm Sunday scene, too.
I commented on Women in the Scriptures. Thanks for sharing and the inspiration to keep plugging along with it!
ReplyDeleteWe too celebrate the easter bunnty Friday night. I dn not like how easter has become so commercialized.
ReplyDeleteP.S. I would love to win this CD (I left a previous comment on this post.)
ReplyDeleteI became a follower of Tami's Blog
ReplyDeleteI left a comment on the blog "Women in the Scriptures."
ReplyDelete