28 Days to Easter Advent Calendar!

 I've been thinking a lot about Easter lately and how we can better prepare for it and make it a bigger holiday since it really should be the most significant holiday according to our religious beliefs. Jesus Christ's Atonement and Resurrection are the centerpiece and that should make Easter HUGE! I definitely don't want Easter to become like Christmas with all the gift-giving obligations (Christmas is way too much work, especially for moms) but I would like the Easter season to be frequently in our minds and hearts instead of the afterthought it sometimes feels like.

So after seeing some ideas about Easter advent calendars, I decided to come up with one and here it is. I borrowed heavily from this website: https://www.cranialhiccups.com/2012/03/the-living-christ-a-30-day-easter-countdown.html but simplified A LOT. My goal was to make it very doable, easy and short. I want it to fit easily into our life instead of feeling like a burden. My version is for older kids. You could easily change the questions to make it better for younger children.

Like that website did, I based it on The Living Christ: The Testimony of the Apostles. I quoted a sentence or two, found a scripture to go with it, then asked a discussion question or two. Here's a section of it:

Day Ten: “He was arrested and condemned on spurious charges, convicted to satisfy a mob.”
Luke 23:13-24
Why did Jesus allow the people to persecute him?

Day Eleven: “He was sentenced to die on Calvary’s cross. He gave His life to atone for the sins of all mankind. His was a great vicarious gift in behalf of all who would ever live upon the earth.”
John 19:16-19, 25-30
Whom did Jesus ask Heavenly Father to forgive and how did he forgive those who killed him?

Day Twelve: “He was the Firstborn of the Father, the Only Begotten Son in the flesh.”
D&C 93:21-22
How is Jesus the Firstborn of the Father? How was he the Only Begotten Son?

Then I bought a bunch of plastic Easter eggs and some small Easter candy so I could fit the candy (enough for each member of the family) and the paper strip for each day into the eggs which I numbered. My granddaughter helped me and drew some faces on some of the eggs.😊

Then I put them in a bowl. I thought about putting strings on them and hanging them on some branches to make a tree effect but that sounded too involved (remember the goal is doable and easy). So the bowl it was. You could probably find some nicer looking eggs and definitely a nicer bowl than the one in this picture, but this is it for now--less focus on the exterior, more focus on the interior. If we save the paper and put them in the right eggs, I can store the whole thing for next year and just need to add the candy.

My plan is for us to start Sunday (4 weeks before Easter) and take an egg out each day and read it and talk about it, ideally at dinnertime. It will finish the day before Easter. We'll see how it goes! Here's a PDF of the document: 28 Days to Easter Advent Calendar