We kicked off the celebration with an Easter Egg Hunt at Beachmont, sponsored by Grafted Families, that all of the host children and families attended.
Thankfully, there was a short non-raining window of opportunity for the children to race through the wet grass and playground in search of eggs. Standing back and taking photographs gave me the chance to see lots of smiles and giggles as the eggs were discovered.
From there we enjoyed a cross-cultural lunch together under the pavilion: American (pizza) and Ethiopian (stews, lentils, injera). I'm sure the Ethiopian children were excited to get a taste of home and I personally LOVED the dishes.
After lunch and some free play, we met together again to hear the Easter story. Wendy did an excellent job along with her husband and our faithful interpreters, in creatively sharing the best news in the world: Jesus is Alive! We sang some songs in English and Amharic to wrap up this memorable time.
As a host parent, this event was especially meaningful for me because I got a chance to interact with other host families. We swapped stories, laughed, and learned a bit about one another's experiences so far.
All of the children seemed to be doing so well with their host families!
That evening, along with some friends of our family, we dyed eggs together. {name} really seemed to enjoy this and we all got a laugh when my youngest son David (4) decided to drink a spoonful of the bright blue dye! His entire mouth, inside and out were blue!
Easter afternoon, after a great celebration at church, Matt and I had our extended family over for dinner. There were lots of people that {name} met and I think he felt included and welcomed into our crazy traditions.
There were baskets to open, games to play, chocolate to eat, another egg hunt, and our traditional "egg pecking" contest. {name} was quick to join in and had a winning egg for quite some time until my niece cracked his egg.
We now have enough candy in our home that will last till Halloween! We are keeping an eye on how much {name} eats because he certainly seems to have a sweet tooth.
And that's our day five/six wrap up...
Thanks for sharing Tracy. You are really creative with the pictures too. It's really great to see how things are unfolding.
ReplyDeleteWe egg peck with our family, too! Except we call it egg picking. Pecking makes more sense, though. I wonder if it got lost in translation in Highland town generations ago! How did you explain the butt of an egg!?!?
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