Pentecost Sundaes on SUNDAY

Easter came to a close a couple Sundays ago on Pentecost.  And we celebrated Pentecost with a fun dessert....

Pentecost Sundaes!!

Dove Chocolates --------> Holy Spirit

Red Hots --------> Tongues of Fire

Sundaes --------> we ate them on a Sunday (Pentecost Sunday!!)


It's so much fun to celebrate our faith in fun and yummy ways like this!!  :)

Twelve Days of Christmas basket and ideas

Yesterday was Christmas Day and the first day of Christmas!  So, chronologically, that makes today the second day of Christmas!!  Keep on celebrating!

For the past several years, we have celebrated each of the twelve days by singing the song, doing the motions (you cannot forget to do those!!), and reading what each day symbolizes in our faith.  We had a grand celebration and dinner at the end of the twelve days, with food items to go with each day's theme.  It was always so much fun to see what they remembered at the end of the Twelve Days, not only the fun gift but also the spiritual gift symbolized.

When we drew names for my family's Christmas to swap gifts, I asked my sister if they would like a Twelve Days of Christmas themed basket.  When she said "yes", I was so excited to share this beautiful tradition of ours and to put it together.  As I was buying gifts for their basket, I thought some of the items would be great for our own family.  So when my sister-in-law asked for ideas our family, I told her a Twelve Days basket would be great for us too.  It's so nice when it works out so beautifully that way - many of the same gifts we bought and gave away, we received for our own family!   :)

Here is a look at what we put in the Twelve Days of Christmas themed basket and how we packaged it...

Items for each of the twelve days 

(we wrapped each of these in brown paper and labeled them with their day number and the date it could be opened)

(a partridge in a PEAR tree) 

 (two turtle DOVES)

 (chicken noodle soup for the three French HENS)

 (bugles look like megaphones to represent the CALLING birds and four evangelists proclaiming the Good News)

 (five RING pops --- yeah, these are skeleton ring pops....   we forgot to get these out and give them away at Halloween time, but remembered them for when we needed RING pops at Christmas time- lol!)

(silly putty EGGS for the six geese-a-laying)

(a fun game with a SWIMMING Nemo on it to help us remember the seven swans-a-SWIMMING)

(goat's MILK soap and MILK MAIDS caramels)

(a pirourette is a ballet DANCE move) 

(These chips look like little crowns and the LORDS-a-leaping are kings and all kings wear crowns.  We put a note on this item to save and eat it with day 11's item.)

(salsa is a PIPING hot dip) 

(bongos = DRUMS)

Ornaments

Jesse Tree Treasures on Etsy created and sells a beautiful set of ornaments to hang on your tree on each of the days.  

Books

You have to include some beautiful picture books, right?  

Puzzle

Here is a beautiful puzzle and you have twelve days to complete it as a family!

Lapbook

We made this lapbook many years ago and it has been THE staple to help us remember the symbolization of each day, so we made up another one for the gift basket.  

Throw it all in a laundry basket (I am way too practical - who can have enough laundry baskets??) and top it off with a soft velvety blanket (you can never have too many blankets!), and VIOLA, there you have a fun and faith-filled Twelve Days of Christmas basket!!

Want a printable for the kids to color and keep track of each day as you celebrate it??  Seton Magazine shared one this morning - how convenient!!  Isn't it beautiful!  

Have a blessed Twelve Days of Christmas and keep on celebrating!!

Our Lady Guadalupe, pray for us!!

Isn't living the liturgical year so wonderful?  In the midst of the waiting of Advent and holding back from Christmas festivities, we have three great saints to celebrate this week - Juan Diego (on Tuesday, December 9th), Our Lady Guadalupe (today), and St. Lucy (on Saturday, December 13th).

During our morning devotional and prayer time, I read this beautiful book and we lit our Advent candles and decorated our wreath with our crocheted Rosary roses and our Shining Light doll in honor of Our Lady Guadalupe.  We may even make some paper dolls and color themed pages for today's saints later today. Tonight for dinner, we will have a Mexican feast as well - walking taco's, chips and salsa, and chocolate cake.

This past April, we took Ariel on her First Holy Communion trip down to St. Louis.  On our way back home, we stopped at the Shrine of Our Lady of Snows.  Here are a few pictures while visiting the grotto dedicated to Our Lady Guadalupe and St. Juan Diego...

++Our Lady Guadalupe and St. Juan Diego, 

pray for us!!++

Good Friday - 2014

Although Good Friday is a "down day" in our house in remembrance of the sacrifice Our Lord made for us, there are two things we always do and look forward to as a family - our Good Friday tea and Good Friday service at our church (the only day with no Mass).

Each food item below tells the story of Christ's Passion.  Here are pictures from our faith-filled Good Friday tea...

**The Water Bowl**

**The King's Crown**

**Out of Envy**

**Purple Cloak**

**The Crown of Thorns**

**The Seamless Garment**

**The Two Robbers**

**Vinegar To Drink**

**The Temple Curtain**

**Roman Centurion**

**Laid In The Tomb**

Thanks to Alice at Cottage Blessings for creating this tea idea and for Jessica at Shower of Roses for always inspiring me as a mother how to build our own domestic church.  Jessica made the printable signs for each food item - they can be found here.  My link from 2012 can be found here with more details on what each food item was.

Holy Thursday - 2014

Today begins the Holy Triduum in our Church!  It is one of my favorite Masses of the whole year. Fone and Mario served Mass and our family was asked to take up the gifts following the dressing of the altar and the presentation of the holy oils.  Super special night!!!

Before Mass, we fed our hungry crew a Holy Thursday themed meal, almost identical to the meal we have done for the last two years.  It's so sweet how the kids look forward to and remember and talk about these special traditions throughout the year.

Here was our menu...

**Hearts of Palm**

(we had salad - one plain and one Caesar, since palms are green plants too and we need a veggie)

**Costly Oil**

(plain ole olive oil - we sprinkled on some parmesan and crushed pepper for a yummy dip for the bread)

**Thirty Pieces of Silver**

(30 Ritz crackers)

**Unleavened Bread**

(skinny bread - went great with the olive oil dip)

**Mount of Olives**

(black olives)

**Cock Crows Twice**

(chicken pot pies)

**Gethsemane Figs**

(Fig Newtons)

**Judas' Kisses**

(Hershey's kisses with green wrappers)

**Clouds of Heaven**

(Cool Whip to go with the fig newtons)

**Peter's Tears**

(Altoid mints - they are so strong, they can bring tears to your eyes)

Here is our celebration for 2012.  And as always, a HUGE thanks to Jessica for sharing the idea of this tea to begin with - what a wonderful inspiration she is to me!!!

++Thank you, God, for ideas like this themed tea to help remember and understand all about the sacrifice of Your Son and His great love for us.++  

All Saints Day feast and celebration

We had a few families over tonight to celebrate All Saints Day, and of course, we had to have Saint-themed foods and games.  It is so much fun to tie food and faith together!  :)

Here was our menu tonight....

St Guissepe's pizza 

(although it was not from our local St Guiessepe's since they are closed on Sunday....

 it was Pizza Hut instead!)  

Mother Teresa's Indian Pineapple Chicken Curry

Juan Diego's Pork Carnitas

Martin de Porres cheese and crackers

St Valentine's sweet treats (pineapple) and St Therese of Lisieux' roses (strawberries)

Juan Diego's salsa and chips

St Isidore's pumpkin bars

St Cecilia's musical keys

St Christopher's traffic lights

**For games, the kids played....

Simon Peter Says

Pin the Flower on "The Little Flower" saint

Saint Treasure Hunt

(We did the treasure hunt twice, since we had so many kids -One time for the littler kids and then another time for the older kids.  Printables can be found here)

**And then we ended by gathering in our living room and singing a beautiful Litany of the Saints (led by my brother-in-law) where we invoked the intercession of everyone's patron saints and the saints they dressed up as this year.  It was super cute as each child heard their saint and seeing them light up!  

++Thank you, God, for the Saints who have paved the way for us to live with you forever in Heaven.  And, thank you for friends who hold our hands and walk along with us on earth to help us get There as well!++