Easter Sunday at the Bay

This post actually starts on Saturday, the day before Easter.  Steph was sure Dacen had caught whatever crud Brielle had so she took him to the doctor to get him antibiotics.  Brielle, Caden and I hung around the trailer doing work/school work.  In the afternoon we dyed eggs.  I’m not sure what it is about this activity but I am always surprised about how fun it is.  Our favorite way to decorate is while the eggs are still piping hot we use crayon to partially decorate the eggs.  Then we use the little pellet dyes that use vinegar.  This combo makes for some very vibrant eggs.  Dacen got up enough energy to do a couple but the poor kid was dragging big time.

Steph and Dacen had picked up a RedBox movie (The Good Dinosaur) while they were out so we watched that before bed.  The next morning the kids got Easter baskets.  Steph found a way to make nifty little bunnies out of a paper grocery bag.  They turned out really great.  Everyone got snorkel gear in their basket because we plan to do some snorkeling soon (yeah, wish we had the stuff while we were in Key West but oh well).

Then it was off to church.  We decided to try out Life Point Church.  This place felt very much like our home church in Berthoud, Grace Place.  Lots of young families, a cafe, edgy graphics and a sort of industrial feel to the building.  People were very friendly.  A guy made eye contact with me and we shook hands.  I said “Christ is risen,” he seemed a bit surprised and responded “He’s risen indeed!”  We found some seats in the auditorium and sat through a pretty epic count down clock.  At zero seconds some dancers came out and did a quick little ditty…I’m not into dancing but this was pretty good.  It was tasteful and well executed.

Then the band cranked it up.  It was pretty typical contemporary Christian sound except there was a sax player.  He did a good job avoiding the dated sound that sax can have on rock music.  I did not know ANY of the songs they sang.  But they had good lyrics and were easy to catch on to.  After a short video introduction the pastor came out.  Hey, wait a minute….I know that guy!  He was the one that I exchanged the Paschal greeting with in the lobby!  And the first thing he talked about was…can you guess?  The Paschal greeting!

The sermon was good.  It focused on Peter denying Jesus 3 times but that God is a God of second chances, third chances….He’s the God of another chance.  I’m not sure if its an original quote but I liked what pastor Travis said…”your setback is just a setup for your comeback”.  On our way out of church they were handing out Chinese style food boxes promoting their upcoming series on the book of Proverbs called Misfortune Cookies.  Inside the box were fortune cookies you were supposed to give out to people you invite to church.

The misfortunes inside the cookie had an invite to church but also a misfortune.  Here are the ones we got:

‘Give a person a fish and he will eat for a day.  Teach him to fish and he will smell funny’

‘A foolish man listens to his heart.  A wise man listens to cookies’

‘Don’t do today what you can put off until tomorrow’

‘404 Fortune not found’

We figured we didn’t have anyone to invite so we ate the cookies!

 

We treated ourselves to a Subway sandwich before heading out to Biscayne Bay National Park.  The park was really busy with lots of locals picnicking at the picnic areas on the bay.  There is no admission charged at this park and with its close proximity to Miami and Homestead it is quite popular for the locals.  Dacen really started seeming like he was feeling better so we walked the boardwalk just enjoying the nice temperature and breeze before we went in to work on the kids junior ranger books.  In the visitor center we watched a great movie on the different ecosystems in the park.  What made it good is it was done by some younger rangers and they had fun with it…they weren’t the stick in the mud serious rangers on the old film reels we watched in elementary school. The center had lots of hands on displays that the kids took full advantage of before we left.

Back at home Steph whipped up a great supper of fried chicken and roasted red and purple potatoes…it was delicious.  It was an amazing day spent together as a family celebrating Christ conquering the grave!  HE IS RISEN!!