We’ve celebrated Passover in our home for a number of years now, and each year it’s different, as we adapt it around who will be there. We tend to have a big feast-like meal interspersed with parts of the service (seder). We include elements which we use each week in our Shabbat meal, for example … Read more
Have you ever wondered where the idea of communion came from? It’s something we can take for granted especially if we experience it as a regular part of our church life. However, the roots of communion go back thousands of years to the first Easter, the week Jesus died, the week we sometimes call Holy … Read more
My children love small world play. When they play with Lego, they make models then use them to create a world and tell a story. They love Play Mobil (although not as much as me!), and any sort of small toy they can tell stories with, so this is an easy way for me to … Read more
I love food. I love making things from scratch and experimenting with new recipes. I love how something which nourishes my body can nourish my soul and spirit too, so it should come as no surprise that I love using food in our faith at home rituals. Food is central to so many of our … Read more
Each year we indulge in the lovely part of the Passover meal where an adult hides the afikomen, the broken middle matzah (which represents the lamb killed at Passover) and the children have to hunt for it. When they return, they get a prize. To help the dynamics of the hunt, I’ve used colour spot … Read more
There are many great benefits to reading a big chunk of the Bible all in one go. We see many themes better when viewing a story from a distance, and see how the characters and plot of one story fit into The Big Story of the Bible. It helps us not to take one verse … Read more
As part of our Passover preparations, we listened to the Exodus story (Exodus 1-15) using the NIVUK version on Biblegateway, streaming the audio read by David Suchet (aka Poirot) from my phone over breakfast and in the car. Afterwards, as we began to reflect on the story, my 6yo ask: Why did Joseph’s family stay … Read more
Make a plan to remember Jesus and what he means to you together as a family. When Jesus had his last Passover meal with his friends, He broke bread and asked them to remember Him “whenever they did this”. The text isn’t clear whether He meant whenever you break a piece of bread, whenever you … Read more
Challenge: Read the whole Easter story by Easter. You have four gospels to choose from, so maybe pick the one you like or one you’re less familiar with. You could choose a different Bible version from that which you usually use. If you’re doing this with very young children, you might want to use a … Read more
This week I made a photobook using actual Bible text and toys to ‘act’ the story then set the book up with the toys in an ‘Invitation to Play’ the story. When I found a company doing photobooks for £6 (!) I got to work making a photobook of a Bible story using Bible text … Read more
Spring is a fab time for planting seeds. I love watching them grow, so this year we’ve put a few into glass jars so we can see each stage as it happens! (We also have some in the garden which will hopefully get to the harvest stage too!) It’s been great to chat about what seeds need … Read more
It’s almost time for Lent, so I find myself also preparing for Passover. We celebrate this Jewish festival as a family at home on Good Friday as a kind of ‘big Shabbat’. This year we’re going to share it with another family too, so I’ll be reworking our service sheet from last year, adding in … Read more