Easter Week (Family Night, Facebook, Coloring Eggs, the Wedding, Volleyball, and Easter Sunday)

This last week I have really been trying to do some things that would help us remember the real meaning of Easter and to keep those thoughts in the forefront.  So for family night I played two videos from lds.org.  One was #Halleluia and the other was frommormon.org " Because He Lives." I also used 7 Family-Friendly Ideas for Centering Easter on Christ By Irinna Danielson March 4, 2016" blog.   So I asked those who were here to answer this question. Where do you see Jesus influence in your life? 
Where do you see Jesus' influence in your life?
I see it in my family, in my home, in the scriptures the temple and in church.
Olivia ‪#‎BecauseHeLives‬

How does Jesus influence your life?
When I am going through a hard time or I'm frustrated, I know that He is there for me and understands me.
Kristen ‪#‎BecauseHeLives‬
 

How does Jesus influence your life?
His example makes me want to be like him and try to be good.
He lives and makes me want to influence people like He did to me.
Natalie ‪#‎BecauseHeLives‬ 
 

5 years ago in January, Jeff's Dad passed away. He was a big part of our lives. We have many happy memories with him and Grammy. Here he is with a lot of his posterity.
Because of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, we will be able to see him again. It will be an amazing reunion. ‪#‎Hallelujah‬

This is what we posted from Annalisa.

"Be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason for the hope that is in you." We have so much to hope for through the atonement of Jesus Christ, Hallelujah!
I hope you all have a wonderful week and a fantastic Easter. Don't forget the reason for the season! 

Jeff said: I see in in every kind act that individuals do for one another .  I see it in the hope and joy I feel knowing that he will come again.

Mary said:Because He lives I have hope, peace and forgiveness.  I know that I will live after this life with my family. My life is complete because of what Jesus Christ did for me.  

I was planning on posting one a day, but only got Anna's posted on Monday and she was doing the same thing with her email with the #Halleluia.  Then I posted about Jeff's Dad on Tuesday and then finally got the girls on Saturday.  

 Monday night we colored eggs for our activity.  I have mentioned before that I love to color eggs.  We had two new kind of kits.  One was tie dye and the other was marble.  The tie dye kit we loved and used over and over. The marble kit, not so much.  So we started with boiled eggs. Then, 4 1/2 dozen raw eggs later we called it a night. I am usually the last one coloring eggs. Nat stayed 'til the end as well. It makes me happy to have colored eggs around for longer than Easter.

 Kristen claimed that her tie dyed egg was the best of the night.

Another thing I was going to try to do was to talk about what was happening to Christ each day of the week before the resurrection.  Just add it to the end of our scripture study. We did it Monday and Tuesday, but didn't really get any further than that.

 We did have a crazy week.  

So Thursday we went to Utah at about 2:00pm to go to Abigail's reception.  She had the reception on Thursday night and the Wedding Friday morning in the Provo City Center Temple.  We got there in time to change and see Heidi Jo's apartment.  Then we went to the recepton over by Thanksgiving Point.  She served Pie of all varieties and it was sooo fun.  There was a dance and  a lot of family to visit with.

 This is my favorite picture of Abigail and Will when they are dancing.





The Cousins

My sister Susie and brother-in Paul( Abigail's) parents.

Half of my siblings.  Heidi Jo, Susie, Me, Charlie and Laurie

The Bouquet

Dancing the night away! It was so fun to be with Katelyn too.

The sealing was wonderful.  I couldn't believe that they were married.  It happened so fast.  Then they had a great luncheon with western singing entertainment and cowboy poetry.  We decorated their car and off they went. 

 

My mom had a dear friend who brought her to the temple.  It was so great to have her there.

We made a quick stop at Amy's and saw their new house.  It is great and I'm excited for them to get to live there.  We dropped some stuff off at Kate's and visited Elliotte.  Then we got on the road and came home exhausted.  Went to sleep and both got up early for tournaments.  Natalie and I had to be at Snake River Junior High at 7:30 and Jeff and Kris had to be at Bonneville around 8;00am.  So it was a long day of volleyball.

 That night we all went to Women's conference.  It was incredible and inspiring. The Stake young women presidency was in charge of hosting for the stake so I went early to greet people and left late to turn the lights off.  We are using the messages for family night tomorrow night.  Kristen missed the point of serving the refugee in your neighborhood and thinks we need to adopt a refugee baby boy.  So she has been talking about it a lot kind of to be funny and kind of serious.  You know how she has all of the ideas.   

This morning I visited  the 9th ward young women.  Heidi Southwick was teaching and paired the girls up and had them go through the days before the resurrection and had the girls match up the picture of their event and tell about it.  I loved it and had to do it with our family.  So I could finish what I started. 

Grammy was gone to New Orleans so we planned our own dinner.  We served Chicken Cordon Bleu instead of ham.  It was delicious.  We took a family picture.

 

Olivia did an Easter egg hunt for the big kids with 5 eggs

 

  We went to the cemetery to bring flowers to Grandad's grave.

We came home and the kids played a game Kyle learned on his trip, while I finished the bunny cake.  Then each person chose a day of the Easter week of Christ's life to research and decide how to share.  It turned out really great.  Olivia added "The Miracle," and had people hold pictures up when it came to that part in the song.  For Wednesday, which no one had and the list doesn't have anything each person told their favorite story about Jesus and why. Kyle talked about when the apostles were in the boat with Christ and their was the big storm.  Christ said why are you afraid I am here with you.  And how in our lives, we don't have to be afraid if we have Jesus with us.   Dad talked about he Crucifixion and Kyle talked about the resurrection.  I loved it.  People shared their testimonies and we ended with the video clip, "None were with Him." by Holland.  It talked about how Christ lived this long lonely road, but we don't have to do it alone because of Him.  I loved it because even though in Gethsemane, he took on our sins and hardships, he also had a hard life and at the end a very lonely life. He was a man of sorrows and he actually experienced many hardships that people face.  That just hadn't occurred to me. 

Picture Diary

Hello, this is Mary and I wanted to tell Annalisa's adventure from the pictures we received.  So she never said that she would call us, but since Kate did we wondered. She told us that she would skip her P-day because she had to fly out at 2:50am on Tuesday morning to go to her mission.  Jeff and I put our phones right by us and were expecting an early call.  At about 3:00am Jeff said," I think your phone made a noise."  So I checked and there was no call from Sister Jones.  So we went back to bed. Then at about 7:00am a call came to our land line.  Who calls a landline at 7:00am?  It had to be her and it was.  It was soooooo great to here her sweet voice.  She sounded like the same girl and was very happy.  She'd had a lovely week and a half at the MTC and got to travel with her darling companion from the MTC.  She had to leave before we were ready to be done, but that's usually how it goes.  As we have learned with our vast experience of one previous missionary. Then at 7:45am some sweet mom sent us this picture.  

 Then shortly after another sweet person sent this picture.  Then that was it for a few days.  Since she skipped her P-day we didn't hear from her.  We didn't know anything until Thursday.  When another kind couple took this picture and her companion's mother informed us that her companion/trainer is  from Illinois and has been serving since last July.  Then we found out that the couple that took the picture are the Bowman's from our home town. Brother Bowman's brother is Brother Bowman in our ward.  Also the girls were coming to dinner at their house this Saturday.  Sister  Bowman said that they are both sweet beautiful girls.  She also told me what city in California she is in.   It is a lovely, safe, family community of about 100,000 people.  Sister Bowman in my ward also called me to tell me that Anna would be eating at her in-laws. 

 So, this is what I know.  Annalisa did make it to California. She is serving in a safe, family community. She has a sweet companion from Illinois and she will eat dinner at the Bowman's at 5:00pm on Saturday.  They can try to hide, but our LDS network will find the missionaries.