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| Click here to visit Ann's post |
It all started with a big branch in a vase...at least ours did. In November we created a "Thankful Tree." My husband brought a huge branch home from a run with the kids (bless him - he ran in public with a large branch sticking out of our jogging stroller, gathering many a strange and curious look along the way). I placed the branch upright in a large glass vase and anchored it by filling the vase with glass "pebbles." We wrote things we were thankful for on foam leaves, tied strings to them, and hung them on the tree.
I thought that set-up transitioned well into Advent and the Advent Tree family devotional from Ann Voskamp (a great Advent tradition if you are interested). We filled our tree with the beautifully illustrated ornaments from Ann's devotional (printed, mounted on card stock, laminated, strung with ribbon). We missed a day here and there, but either caught ourselves up or just added the ornament.
Since I believe in minimalist (lazy) decorating and our Christmas decorations lingered embarrassingly long, our tree wasn't bare long before we decided to recreate the "Thankful Tree" with hearts instead of leaves in honor of Valentine's Day. The kids loved it and I loved not having to take it down - I have grown rather attached to our tree!
Imagine my delight when I realized (after doing some research upon hearing about Lenten Trees, a traditionally Catholic tradition) that the lovely Ann Voskamp has created a beautiful Lent/Easter devotional with accompanying ornaments to create an Easter Tree!
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| See how Ann's family does it! |
The ornaments are stunning - incorporating classic artwork.
What's that? Lent has already begun? Don't worry, the devotional has 17 days of readings, not 40 so you have plenty of time to make your tree and do all 17 readings before Easter. You really must go visit aholyexperience.com to see the amazing information Ann has and the touching post she wrote to introduce it.
What are you doing to celebrate the time leading to Easter?
