Grace at Home No. 245

Hello, friends! Welcome to this week's Grace at Home party. We're in the middle of Holy Week, and I pray you're having a wonderful week as we prepare to celebrate on Easter Sunday.

Here are some posts from last week's party I thought you might enjoy.

Sara from Find It, Fix It, or Build It gave us a step-by-step tutorial for building this picture frame–and she also provides several free printables that will fit perfectly in it.

If you're doing some last-minute decorating for Easter, you'll want to check out this post from Christine at Little Brags. Lots of inspiration!

I love a good cleaning hack, and Diane from An Extraordinary Day provided one of the best I've ever seen. She shares a method for cleaning silver I've never heard before–and just look at the beautiful results!

Belinda from Live Life with Your Kids shared a great way to celebrate Easter with your kids, including a way to tell the Easter story with–of all things—jelly beans!

A big thank you to everyone who joined last week's party!  I'm so grateful for each person who links up each week. If you've been featured, feel free to grab the "I was featured" button.  I'd be so proud if you displayed it!

Now for this week's party!  Grace at Home is a place for you to share anything related to making your home a place of grace. I invite you to link posts about

• DIY projects
• decorating
• recipes
• hospitality
• homemaking tips
• parenting
• marriage
• faith
• self-care
• soul care

Whatever you do to make your home a place of grace, I'd like to hear about it.  Here's what I ask of you.  Please include the permalink to your post, not your blog's home page.  Please let people know that you've linked up.  No more than three posts per person, please.  Note that if you link a post here, you are giving me permission to share your post, including a photo.  And visit at least one of the other party participants--that's what really makes it a party!

Grace at Home No. 244

**I'm so sorry for the glitch earlier! Please link up now!**

Welcome to the Grace at Home party, where we celebrate all the ways we make our homes places of grace. I'm so glad you're here!

Here are some links from last week's party that I thought you'd enjoy.

Lindsey from Repurpose and Upcycle gave us a tutorial for creating a shiplap wall with no power tools. Shiplap is certainly all the rage in home decor right now; here's a great way to get the look even if you have minimal DIY skills.

Home tours are always fun to see (I haven't done one in so long!), and you'll enjoy this one from Angela at Simply Beautiful.

Easter is right around the corner, and many of us need to make Easter baskets for kids. Eileen from Just Measuring Up shared over 200 ideas of non-candy ideas for stuffing Easter eggs.

Leslie from Journey to Imperfect shared some beautiful thoughts about the great gift of gaining a new perspective. Excellent read!

As for me–well, it's been quite a week around here. There was great jubilation in this neck of the woods this week when Carolina won the national championship in men's basketball, which got me to thinking about how Christians celebrate Easter. I'd love to know what you think!

A big thank you to everyone who joined last week's party!  I'm so grateful for each person who links up each week. If you've been featured, feel free to grab the "I was featured" button.  I'd be so proud if you displayed it!

Now for this week's party!  Grace at Home is a place for you to share anything related to making your home a place of grace. I invite you to link posts about

• DIY projects
• decorating
• recipes
• hospitality
• homemaking tips
• parenting
• marriage
• faith
• self-care
• soul care

Whatever you do to make your home a place of grace, I'd like to hear about it.  Here's what I ask of you.  Please include the permalink to your post, not your blog's home page.  Please let people know that you've linked up.  No more than three posts per person, please.  Note that if you link a post here, you are giving me permission to share your post, including a photo.  And visit at least one of the other party participants--that's what really makes it a party!

What I want to learn about celebrating

I am a lucky mom.

My house is located about halfway between Duke University and The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. A few minutes' drive in either direction can take me to an amazing university.

And I'm especially lucky, because one of my sons went to Duke and another went to Carolina. Which means I get to root for both teams. It can get sticky when Duke and Carolina play one another, but when they're playing other teams, I can cheer to my heart's content.

You can imagine the cheering that took place here last night.

At 1:00 this morning, I got a text from my middle son: a photo of himself:

Preston was hanging out on Franklin Street in Chapel Hill, one of thousands of Tarheel fans celebrating the NCAA basketball championship.

As much as my heart hurts for the Gonzaga Bulldogs (what a great team!), I'm so happy for the UNC community this morning. What a celebration they experienced last night! After coming so close to the championship last year, this year the confetti fell on their team.

Even if you don't like the winning team, you don't begrudge the fans their victory.

Celebrations are fun, aren't they? And the festive spirit is contagious. Today, although tired from a late night last night, UNC fans are walking around with a spring in their step. It's fun to be around them.

I don't mind telling you that I think the world needs more celebration. In the midst of so much doom and gloom, we need reasons to cheer. We thrive when we come together to celebrate.

All this celebration has me thinking about what's coming up in the church calendar. Less than two weeks from now is the celebration of an amazing victory: the resurrection of Jesus.

Carolina fans are celebrating what's been called a "redemption" victory. It's easy to understand that they're especially thrilled about this triumph. Who wouldn't be celebrating such a win? Their excitement is understandable.

I'm thinking that Christians on Easter should be more like these Carolina fans. We should get together to celebrate! The whole world should know we're jubilant. We should have such a spring in our step that we're fun to be around. Our joy should be infectious.

But how many times do Christians act like curmudgeons? How often are we the joy-killers instead of the ones who give the party? There's something wrong with that picture!

Jesus has defeated death. The good news is for everyone. We can celebrate with reckless abandon. Anyone who wants to come is welcome.

There's a huge victory celebration coming up. Are you ready to party?