Our mother's day

My mom and dad drove down for mothers' day this year. We had a really nice visit and absolutely gorgeous weather. Vern and the children planned the meal and prepared it and cleaned it up. Delicious food, relaxing holiday with family and perfect weather. We even got to sit around on the front porch!

What else could a girl ask for?

Vern picked a delicious BarbecuedGarlic Chicken recipe from a Lebanese cookbook we were given. It included a dipping sauce (called Tratoor bi Sade) with *45* cloves of garlic in 1/2 cup of olive oil and the juice of one lemon.

He also made and Afghani bread, called Nan or Nani, to go with it.

My mom brought a Nona salad. And the children made herbal mint tea to drink. Mmmmm.

Happy Resurrection Day!

In my mind, I have long thought that the events of Easter, or the Resurrection, warrant a much bigger and more significant celebration than Christmas. The Resurrection is central to the whole purpose and significance of Christianity, after all.

In reality, Resurrection Sunday always falls around week 6 or 7 of a 9-week run of five birthdays in our family. And I never get it together to do the things I would really like to do.

One thing we try to do every year is Resurrection Cookies. I didn't have much hope that we would get to do them this year, but last night at about 11:10, we were putting our Resurrection Cookies into the falling oven. When everyone is up, we'll get them out.

Here are the instructions:

Resurrection Cookies


1 cup whole pecans
1 teaspoon vinegar
3 egg whites
a pinch salt
1 cup sugar
a zipper baggy
1 wooden spoon
scotch tape
Bible

Instructions:

These are to be made the evening before Easter. Preheat oven to 300F. (this is very important --- don't wait until you are half done with the recipe).
Place pecans in zipper baggy and let children beat them with the wooden spoon to break into small pieces. Explain that after Jesus was arrested. He was beaten by the Roman soldiers. Read: John 19:1-3

Let each child smell the vinegar. Put 1 teaspoon vinegar into mixing bowl. Explain that when Jesus was thirsty on the cross He was given vinegar
to drink. Read: John 19:28-30

Add egg whites to vinegar. Eggs represent life. Explain that Jesus gave His life to give us life. Read: John 10:10&11

Sprinkle a little salt into each child's hand. Let them taste it and brush the rest into the bowl. Explain that this represents the salty tears shed by Jesus' followers, and the bitterness of our own sin. Read: Luke 23:27

So far the ingredients are not very appetizing. Add 1 cup sugar. Explain that the sweetest part of the story is that Jesus died because He loves us. He wants us to know and belong to Him. Read: Psalm 34:8 and John 3:16

Beat with a mixer on high speed for 12 to 15 minutes until stiff peaks are formed. Explain that the color white represents the purity in God's eyes of those whose sins have been cleansed by Jesus. Read: Isaiah 1:18 and John 3:1-3

Fold in broken nuts. Drop by teaspoon onto waxed paper covered cookie sheet. Explain that each mound represents the rocky tomb where Jesus' body was laid. Read: Matthew 27:57-60

Put the cookie sheet in the oven, close the door and turn the oven OFF.

Give each child a piece of tape and seal the oven door. Explain that Jesus' tomb was sealed. Read: Matthew 27:65-66

GO TO BED!

Explain that they may feel sad to leave the cookies in the oven overnight. Jesus' followers were in despair when the tomb was sealed. Read: John 16:20&22

On Resurrection Sunday (Easter) morning, open the oven and give everyone a cookie. Notice the cracked surface and take a bite. The cookies are hollow! On the first Easter Jesus' followers were amazed to find the tomb open and empty. Read: Matthew 28:1-9

You could even do them tonight if you like... or you can save the recipe for next year. In the meantime, everyone here wishes you a meaningful Resurrection Sunday!

The wall, part 1

Since we moved into our house--just about 2 years and 2 months ago--we have had one big wall that is still studs. Our hope, when we built, was to cover the wall with some sort of stained wood and build bookshelves on most of it.

Thanks to a very generous Christmas gift, we finally started! Vern wanted to put insulation in the wall between the living room and bedroom to dampen the sound.

Pictures below show the first steps. (I'll put up more once we get them downloaded from the camera.) I really enjoyed watching and listening to Vern and Owen work together. My heart longs for the day when they can work together all the time!

'Tis the Season: Be flexible and let the Lord speak to you!

Some years ago, our now-older children looked forward to Christmas. Every time they saw an evergreen tree, especially one with lights or decorations, they would exclaim with great glee, "Look Momma! Look Daddy! It's a Christmas!"

Of course the best Christmas of all was the one we had in the living room at our house.
Try as we might to explain with words and other family traditions that the trees were not Christmas and that Christmas was Jesus' birthday, we could not seem to get the message through.

Vern and I talked about what might finally help the children, so we had a smaller tree and gave the creche a more central place in our already limited decor. That didn't work either.

Somewhere in there, we must have finally asked the Lord for wisdom. He sent us a dog. She was a black lab and would be about six months old at Christmas. I was also seven and a half months pregnant with our fourth child.

We talked about simplifying Christmas, since we had a very active puppy and a very pregnant mommy, and had the bright idea that maybe this would be a good year to skip on the Christmas tree. Some of our friends and family thought we had really gone off the deep end, but after Christmas, Vern and I agreed that not having a Christmas tree significantly decreased our Christmas stress. We would certainly keep open the option of skipping the tree the next year.

We skipped out on Christmas trees for eight years, and somewhere in there, our children stopped calling them Christmas. What a huge relief that was.

Two years ago, for our first Christmas in this house, Owen, who was then 11, found a tree that would need to be cut down anyway and asked if we could have a tree. He volunteered to cut the tree, set it up, decorate it with the help of his sisters and take it out after Christmas. We all agreed, since we couldn't keep the tree watered, that it would only be in the house for three days--it came in on Christmas Eve and it went out the day after Christmas.

Since Christmas trees no longer seem to be a stumbling block to anyone, we are free to enjoy having one. It no longer causes additionally stress and it doesn't detract from our celebration of our Lord's birth.

And that helps us keep Christ in Christmas!

Merry CHRISTmas!

This post is part of 'Tis the Season Carnival--Keeping CHRIST in CHRISTmas--hosted by Hannah and Mckenzie. You can find more Carnival posts here.

'Tis the Season: Advent helps us keep Christ in Christmas

This post is a part of 'Tis the Season: Keeping Christ in Christmas carnival hosted by Hannah, over at her new blog, One Southern Girl, and her friend, McKenzie, from Pecan Pastures. Hop on over to Hannah's blog to find links to more Christ-honoring-Christmas ideas.

I don't remember where I found our copy of Family Celebrations, but I know we have been using it for about 15 years now.

We really enjoy this advent celebration. Although we keep saying we are going to try something new or different each year, we nearly always come back to this book. (One year, we read through Jotham's Journey--it was also very good, but had no 'props' to really involved everyone.)

The advent celebration in Family Celebrations includes a tradtitional advent wreath with candles, a banner with a Christmas tree and homemade felt ornaments appropriate to each night's advent devotional, and devotionals with hymns to sing for 24 nights leading up to Christmas. Initially, I thought that repeating the same thing every year for advent would be boring and less meaningful, but, after 15 years, it seems that the repetition is both beneficial and comforting to the children. It's kind of soothing to us adults as well! Even though the devotionals are scripted, we can tailor it with different questions and extra thoughts, but it is still the same story and the same, timeless ideas.

The book also has a Christmas worship service and an Epiphany Party plan. We use the Christmas day celebration most years and we enjoy doing the Epiphany Party whenever we can.

The Epiphany party is a great wind-down and wrap up of the Christmas Season. It includes a feast (which is relative to whatever you want to make--we have done real feasts and we have done soups with homemade bread), a pageant (in which the children re-enact the Christmas story--ours have been better if they have a chance to plan ahead) and a service (during which time we read all the advent devotional scriptures and take down the ornaments from our tree banner and sing some of the Christmas hymns.) It makes for a late night, but lots of sweet, Christ-focused memories.