(Shout out to my cousin Steve in Hawaii who just found my blog!- exciting:))

It's late and I'm crazy exhausted. I've been going hard all day long. I cooked today for the shut-in/elderly meal delivery program at our church. That took the afternoon. Then my mom had been spazzed up about what we're having for Easter dinner tomorrow. My sis and her hub and kid wil be here for church etc. We had to go right after dinner to the store to get all the extra stuff for the food tomorrow. With family friends all about 12-13 adults and 3 rug rats at my mom's house. Round these parts in Monkeyville holidays mean food and serious food, not any wimpy stuff. Ya gotta have much more than anyone could actually eat.

We're having spiral cut ham, crab cakes, sweet potatoes, little red potatoes, roast asparagus, green bean casserole, marinated bean salad, fried apples, stewed tomatoes, sour cream biscuits and whatever else I can't think of right now. Here's the marinated salad I made tonight to soak
overnight. Then I had to get the stuff together for the monkeys easter baskets, which really aren't alot of candy, mainly stuff they can use but definitely has to include a chocolate bunny and two monkeys. Also, books, sand digging toys, sunglasses, a cup w straw in the shape of a big chubby bird with a hat on, stuffed bunnies, and bunny ears.
Also some totally radical Easter matchbox cars if you can tell in the front there. You can click to make it bigger.

With all the hustle and bustle and preparation for dinners, and what new outfit everyone will wear to church, we lose track of the real meaning of Easter until we rush around and get to church then hurry to sit down and get everyone straightened out and looking spiffy. Then we look up and see the Easter lilies, hear the songs, the Easter message, and get a reminder that it was Jesus, not Peter Cottontail who rose from the dead.

I ashamedly admit that each year I find myself I buying into the commercialism that Christ's death has become. I was in Target and I was looking at all the rows and rows of Easter stuff- things that I would never even have imagined. Plastic hens that lay bubble gum eggs, 20 types of chocolate rabbits, jellybeans, easter candy and toys of all shapes, colors, and sizes. I was consumed with the commercial excitement of buyingbuying buying until I stopped to think and a true feeling of sadness overwhelmed me. Where was Jesus in all this?

I searched and searched to find something- anything that represented the true Easter message. On the last aisle at the very bottom in a small box were some chintzy looking chocolate flavored crosses in foil boxes. Is this what Our Savior has been reduced to-a little hidden box in the back corner of Easter? Don't let us do that to Him.

Through all the chocolate wrappers and marshmallow peeps, seek a vision of the first Easter, of Christ dying on the cross and coming back to life after three days. It's true you know. Chocolate melts, eggs spoil, but the Word of the Lord endures forever.

If you have a minute check out a few of my favorite flash presentations. I think you'll dig 'em. Make sure your speakers are on. Maybe you've seen these before but each time I watch they mean something new.
Click here for Presentation 1
Click here for Presentation 2
Click for Presentation 3

Happy Easter!