Violin & Djembe: sweet Easter plus some older pictures

Sunday, April 16, 2017

sweet Easter plus some older pictures

I am so grateful for the sweet Easter season that my family got to participate in at our small Anglican church this year. Last year was great, but our lives were a bit crazy and we've gotten to fully drink from all that Easter has to offer this year. We started with a Maundy Thursday service Thursday night where we celebrated a Seder "Passover" meal at church followed by a foot washing ceremony. We missed this last year so our kids didn't know what to expect from it. Our pastor opened up the foot washing time with the instructions, take your shoes off if you want your feet to be washed, then ask someone if you can wash their feet. He asked a friend to start it, and then let the congregation go, and it was beautiful to watch. Husbands and wives washing each others feet, friends washing friends feet, but most especially were the kids beautiful to watch. They jumped right in and all of them wanted to wash their parents feet, then their siblings feet, then each others feet. I'm guessing each kids had his/her feet washed an averaged of 6 times and they loved it. I loved watching them get to participate, even if they can't fully understand in the same way an adult might understand, they were tasting what it feels like to serve one another and they embraced it fully.
Then Friday night we had powerful Good Friday service where we read through the Gospel narrative of Jesus being betrayed and killed. The congregation read aloud all the words that the crowds or disciples spoke, pulling our voices into the story as those who pushed for and demanded that Christ be killed. We then washed our hands on the way out, like Pilot did, in a failed attempt to excuse ourselves from guilt.
Then Saturday night we headed back for an Easter vigil where we read through some Old Testament prophecies about Jesus and then renewed our baptismal covenants and finally sang out hallelujah He's alive!
And this morning was a beautiful Easter service full of joy and life and hope and left me feeling so full. I end the day full and grateful. Full of hope and joy and also full of sugar. After a 6 week hiatus today brought it back in full force, but it was a celebration and there was so many good things to eat! Tomorrow I'll work on moderation :-)

So much fun remembering these dresses from my own childhood...with so many services the girls got to wear all their different dresses...can you tell Kaitlyn's smile is fake? She was not happy with me at the time.