Easter 2021
It’s just over 3 weeks till Good Friday! Which for us means thinking about starting our Easter Bible reading plan, and preparing for our other Easter traditions. Perhaps even adding a few more!
Here are some Easter activities to consider (based largely on my Easter post from last year):
1. Bible Reading Plan
For the past couple of years, I have used one of the 14 day Bible reading plans put together by a lady called Wendy on her blog Musings In Adelaide. These are similar to a Christmas advent Bible reading plan, and basically take you through the whole Easter story. Provided by her is a daily reading plan with questions, plus an idea for either a picture or item to go with each day. She suggests placing the appropriate items inside plastic eggs (e.g. from Kinder Surprise) for children to discover before reading the day’s passage.
Alternatively, you could do a colouring-in picture or find another way to incorporate these. One year we created a collage made up of the key verse and picture from each day to display on the wall so the kids could remember the whole story. Last year the kids all drew pictures each day to represent that part of the story, and one per day was chosen to go up on the wall to form a graphic retelling of the story. Of course, I made sure to pick as fairly as possible (not necessarily based on artistic ability), which meant some days the picture was a little harder to make out!
The Musings in Adelaide blog has two Bible plan options; one for younger children in Matthew, which should start on the Monday 11 days before Good Friday, and one for primary-aged children in Luke, which is meant to start on the Wednesday 9 days before Good Friday. I usually try to start a little earlier as I’ll probably only do the readings on weekdays and there might also be the odd missed day or two.
2. Make a tomb
Although this sounds a little depressing, the idea is to depict the Easter story in a more hands-on way. Once, we made a grassy hill with a tomb in it out of actual soil and grass seed (an idea suggested by a colleague of my husband’s) – it was fun to watch the grass grow but it required a bit of fore-thought! I’ve heard of paper-mache tombs as well, or you could make cardboard or paper versions. You can actually re-enact the story on the appropriate days using a figurine, and then on Easter Sunday (after you sneakily remove the ‘Jesus’ figurine) the kids will discover the empty tomb!
3. Bake Hot Cross Buns
We finally made Hot Cross buns for the first time last year – and they were delicious! I used Annabel Langbein’s online recipe. All agreed they were much nicer than the shop-bought version. We’ll definitely be repeating this activity in 2021!
4. Passover Meal + Washing Feet
Imitating the Passover meal on ‘Maundy Thursday’ (the night before Good Friday) is another activity we have enjoyed for the last few years (also from Musings In Adelaide). We all take turns washing one another’s feet before the meal. The kids all want to have theirs washed by Dad or Mum, and oddly they fight over who gets to wash ours!! Following that we have a delicious dinner of roast lamb, couscous, middle-eastern type veges or salad and ‘unleavened’ bread (the wraps or pita bread I’ve bought usually still have yeast in them!) Red wine or juice is great as an accompaniment – but this year it’ll be sparkling red grape juice for me thanks to baby number 6!
5. Good Friday + Easter Sunday Services
Many churches have both a Good Friday and Easter Sunday service. Attending these is another way of marking these important days and teaching our kids about the story of Jesus’ death and resurrection. Hopefully this year we can all attend in real life but if not, live-streaming or meeting together in a small group would be the next best thing.
6. Easter Saturday
Noel Piper, in her book “Treasuring God in our Traditions” suggests keeping Easter Saturday as a low-key sort of day, because in the Easter story it was a day of waiting (between Jesus’ death and resurrection).
7. Easter Egg Hunt
Easter Sunday – the day we celebrate Jesus rising from the dead – is a great day to do an Easter egg hunt, since the empty egg represents the empty tomb! This could be combined with a scavenger hunt featuring questions on the Easter story, as one of my friends did last year with her preschooler.
8. Easter Party
Another option on Easter Sunday is to have a full-on Easter party with a cake, decorations, and games. Our church has done this in the past with the kids as a special event.
