Pope Francis visits the US - activities for kids!

Oh yes!!  He'll be here on Tuesday.  Well, "here" meaning the United States!!  And, we *know* he'd be visiting us personally if he had some spare time, eh?  ;)   But since we know he's a busy man and we couldn't swing out to visit him, we had to celebrate these days nonetheless.

When I saw this Flat Francis idea, I jumped on it!  We couldn't go to see him, he couldn't visit us, so why not bring him to us in a special way - as Flat Francis!!

I printed out a schedule of his visit, so that we can refer to it throughout his stay, and a couple more print-outs.  And, I'm sure we'll be watching EWTN plenty as well.  Can't wait!  :)

Stay tuned - we are planning on taking lots of pictures of Flat Francis during his stay with us and sharing them here on the blog!

***click on the image below to take you to a beautiful post on praying a Novena during the Papal visit***

2 weeks old PLUS a first feast day

Our sweet little guy, our no-named-baby-on-the-blog, turned 2 weeks old today!!  Neil and I are dragging with very little sleep feeding a preemie every 3 hours, but this lack of sleep is such a blessing to be given the opportunity to hold and snuggle and love a baby again!  How blessed we are to have another little young one to raise!!  So, if it seems we are out of it, and especially with my hubby returning to work, just give a good pinch or shake to wake us up again.  ;)   The transition and babymoon have been going marvelously well, and we are so thankful for the outpouring of love and support with "meals of love" from family and friends.  With Neil taking care of baby and I and the rest of the crew, he hasn't had to prepare one meal since baby was born because of the generosity of others feeding our bellies.  It has given us more time with each other and most especially, more time snuggling and bonding with baby!!

Not only was today our little guy's two week birthday, but it was also the first feast day of a new saint - Pope Saint John Paul II!!  Kiddos colored pages of him today, watched a show "John Paul II:  Be Not Afraid" on EWTN, watched two cool videos on YouTube....

...and we celebrated by eating Polish Sausage for dinner. How cool for Neil and I to grow up with him as Pope and then also be around for him to be named a saint and celebrate his first feast day!!  What an amazing man he was!! My favorite quote of his means so much every time we have a new baby, so how fitting it is that we are celebrating his first feast day with a newborn brought into our lives and family and home just two weeks ago today...

++Pope Saint John Paul II, ora pro nobis!!++

Some Lenten and papal links....

There is so much we can do to deepen our experience of Lent and prepare ourselves for Easter.  I have shared some of our family devotions in the past, and we are doing pretty much the same this year.  I always like to add a couple new things each year.  Here are some links and video's for Lent and also some for the election of our new pope as well....

An abundance of Lent activities here (USCCB)

Lovely printable Lenten calendar that the kids can color each day (Pondered In My Heart)

Crown of thorns   (Raising Young Ones)

 Lent and Easter book ideas (Shower of Roses)

Holy Thursday Liturgical Tea  (Raising Young Ones)

Good Friday Liturgical Tea (Raising Young Ones)

A Papal Unity Study and Lapbook (Shower of Roses)

Pope Activities for Kids  (Catholic Icing)


Papal Conclave Lesson Plan (The Religion Teacher)

"Sweet Sistine" March madness brackets  (RNS)