Reading through our Faith

The girls got books in their Easter Baskets.  They enjoying reading books at night.  The books they got were all about the Catholic Faith but presented through children books. I have included a review of 2 of the 4 books the got.  The other two books not included are Hail Mary by Sabrina Bus and My First Catechism from Ignatius and written by Christine Pedotti.

One of my favorites that we will use next year during lent and leading up to Easter is called God's Easter Gift by Brenda Castro.  I found it on Amazon for about $10.  The story starts with brother and sister going to Easter Mass then to an Easter Egg Hunt in the park.  They believe that the hunt will be a traditional egg hunt with candy and goodies.  This is no ordinary Easter Egg Hunt but an egg hunt that takes them through our faith. The children notice how light and beautiful the church is Easter morning.  I have to say I notice the same thing when we went early (7:30am) Easter Mass.  The sun was just shining through the windows onto the sanctuary that was filled with lilies.  The statues and cross were all uncovered and church just lit up with joy.  Anyway back to the story.  The children are told that Easter is more than candy and toys, but something very special.   The children go through the park looking for the most beautiful eggs.  As they find the eggs they open to see beautiful art work and discover one of God's gifts.  The stories in the eggs include  Lent, Palm Sunday, washing feet, Last Supper,Garden of Gethsemane, Good Friday, Resurrection.  The girls attention was a little hard to keep through the whole book, but I think I will make some eggs to go with it for next year and we will read just one egg at a time.  The artwork is amazing and the illustrations are fantastic.  What a great gift to give our children reading material that helps them grow in their faith.

Here are some pictures:

Another book the girls received was Horray! I'm Catholic by Hana Cole  I got from Amazon for about $12  This is a short book that the girls really enjoyed.  It is never to early to teach our children some apologics about their Catholic faith.  Throughout the book the same question is asked "What makes being Catholic great?" However the answers to this question are different and take our children through different aspects of the Catholic faith.  The book starts out in church and the little things like candles, bells, stain glass windows to vestment colors, receive communion.  The book talks about Jesus love and forgiveness for us.  The book touches on specials days like Christmas, Lent, and Easter. The book touches on serving other through charity.  The girls really enjoyed listening to this book and it held their attention.  It has rhythm to the reading that I think helps at this age.  

Teens walk through Lent

	LENT FOR TEENS Pray,Fast, Almsgiving

The other day I posted about the girls (ages 2 and 5) journey through Lent.  Well today I thought I would seek out some resources for the teens in our house.  They know to "give" something up for Lent, but do they truly realize what Lent really stands for and how to grow in Christ through Lent.

Well they are about to get some resources to help them to read, watch and reflect on.  (Hopefully, our Adult child will take a look as well)

The first blog post I read was called Lent: 40-mini-crucifixions by Faith Noah.  I like this blog because it is written by a young adult for teens.  It is easy to follow and understand, no big theological words to throw their attention span off track.  She lays out a very simple explanation of Lent and reasons behind some of the Catholic traditions.  Honestly, I think even upper elementary and middle schoolers would benefit from this.

The next blog post I looked at was also on LifeTeen called What to Give Up for Lent: 25 Creative Ideas by Life Teen.  They put a survey question out on facebook and it lists 25 of the responses they received.  Some of them are very creative, like going without shoes, giving up their bed and sleeping on the floor, spoons and forks.  Teens can be very creative and imaginative if we do not limit them and try to challenge some of their ideas.

I came across a website called Catholic Youth Works.  This website is full of links to other Lent and Easter resources.  Their are videos, challenges, missions, talks, reading and so much more.  I encourage you to take a look.  I liked the video

The last blog I looked at was from St. Michael's Parish in Maine.  It  appears upon further reading that their ideas came from Lifeteen.  However they have listed them  by Fasting, Prayer, Almsgiving.
I like the idea for fasting "Give a hug to everyone in your family", "Compliment each person in your family sometime today"- Wow not sure the teen boys are up for that!!  Some of these ideas could be a real challenge and put the teens in our house out of their comfort zone.  Which is exactly what Lent is suppose to do?!  Are we not suppose to step out from ourselves and challenge ourselves to so something different, something hard, something that calls upon the strength of God to help us through?!

I came across this video done by Father Jack Collins You Don't Know Jack..About Lent.  He stands out side of St. Patrick Church in New York City and ask people about Lent and Catholic Traditions around Lent. It is sometimes good to have multimedia approach when trying to teach our kids about Lent and Catholic Traditions.

So as we try to engage our teens in the family Lenten journey.  It can be difficult among the school and sports schedule.  We can still strive to educate, encourage and support them on their journey to follow Christ.

Our Lenten Journey 2015

As we spent the first two weeks of Lenten sick, we have had a slow start to our journey.  As we focus on Pray, Fast, Alms giving, the girls have set up a "Lenten Table" in our family room.

For Fast the girls put together Sacrifice Tubs.  They were each given a small shoe box size tub to fill with the toys, and books that they were willing to sacrifice for the Lent.  We put a sign on the top of each box that reads "Sacrifice Tub for Christ. No playing, Just Praying"  (Just realized that Sacrifice is not spelled correctly on their tubs.  Good thing they are too young to read.)  

I found the Cross Calendar on Pinterest.com  I forgot to pin it and have searched but can not find it again. Their is no website listed on the copy I have.  (if someone knows where I found it, let me know in the comments and I will give credit where credit is do)

Anyways, the girls color a cross each day until Easter.  Since we were sick we are a little behind on the coloring.

For Prayer, we are doing Prayer Chain for Lent that I found on Catholic Inspired.  http://www.catholicinspired.com/search?q=prayer+chain+for+lent&x=0&y=0
 We went with their premade pray strips, since we were sick and not up to doing to much thinking.
The girls help to glue and tape the strips together.  They have enjoyed taking one off each day and saying an extra prayer.

We have several different hands on Station of the Cross Activities that the kids use to play and pray.

We also have resurrection egg set.

The following Stations of The Cross, I made from a poster from Oriental Trading, and the symbols for each station came from ideas found on Catholic Icing  It all stores in a bag that I sewed to store all the pieces.

One morning before the girls got up, I start to make a Easter Egg Rosary.  I found on Pinterest which lead me to www.designsbybirgit.blogspot.com.  

We really have not done anything with it but add it to our table.  It was easy to make but does get rather large so I decide to just make a decade this time.  

For Alms giving the girls have gone through their clothes and have gotten rid of 4 bags of clothes to take Rose Garden Mission in Covington.   We also are planning to go buy some diapers for the mission we just have not to do it.  

As for mommy, she is participating in a small group Lenten study with other homeschool mothers. That our church is doing.  It was nice to be able to make one this week.

It is never to late to get started on your Lenten Journey.  

 Some of my favorite resources are

http://www.catholicicing.com/

http://www.catholicinspired.com/

Pinterest.com

 "Whenever you fast, do not put on a gloomy face as the hypocrites do, for they neglect their appearance so that they will be noticed by men when they are fasting. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full."  Matthew 6:16 (NAS)

Peg Doll School

The girls and their friends have really enjoyed the Peg Doll Church that we painted.  We are still working on our growing our peg doll collection, but the girls do not seem to mind playing with unfinished peg dolls. Since most parishes have schools attached, the kids wanted their peg church to have school.  Our family does a mixture of home school and Catholic schools.

After a trip to Michaels, I found this "Train Depot"  I liked it because it opened all the way like their church.  The girls like the bench in front for the dolls to wait for the bus.

Since both the girls wanted to paint the school, I took off the hinges and gave them each a side of the "train depot."  I then just let them paint.  I am not a helicopter mom.  I set them up and went to do the dishes.  At the end I did go and fix drips and filled in places that were missed.

  I have to say we have the most colorful school around.

After the school dried for several hours, I put the hinges back on and it was ready for play.  The girls got right to it and set up the school.

They opened up the church so that it looked like they were attached just like at our church.

Girls are working on painting desks and chairs today.

Unclean Spirit

The Gospel readings recently have been about unclean spirits.  These gospels begin to prepare us for Lent and cleansing our own unclean lives.  For Sunday school this week we are going to make a man whose spirits are cleansed.
The  Gospel reading from February 1st :
Mark 1:21-28-
"Then they came to Capernaum,
and on the sabbath Jesus entered the synagogue and taught.
The people were astonished at his teaching,
for he taught them as one having authority and not as the scribes.
In their synagogue was a man with an unclean spirit;
he cried out, “What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth?
Have you come to destroy us?
I know who you are—the Holy One of God!”
Jesus rebuked him and said,
“Quiet! Come out of him!”
The unclean spirit convulsed him and with a loud cry came out of him.
All were amazed and asked one another,
“What is this?
A new teaching with authority.
He commands even the unclean spirits and they obey him.”

The Gospel Reading from February 8th:

Mark 1:29-39

"On leaving the synagogue
Jesus entered the house of Simon and Andrew with James and John.
Simon’s mother-in-law lay sick with a fever.
They immediately told him about her.
He approached, grasped her hand, and helped her up.
Then the fever left her and she waited on them.

When it was evening, after sunset,
they brought to him all who were ill or possessed by demons.
The whole town was gathered at the door.
He cured many who were sick with various diseases,
and he drove out many demons,
not permitting them to speak because they knew him.

Rising very early before dawn, he left 
and went off to a deserted place, where he prayed.
Simon and those who were with him pursued him
and on finding him said, “Everyone is looking for you.”
He told them, “Let us go on to the nearby villages
that I may preach there also.
For this purpose have I come.”
So he went into their synagogues,
preaching and driving out demons throughout the whole of Galilee."

How to achieve this understanding to preschoolers with out scaring them poses quite a challenge.

The research begins for crafts that have already been done.  I went to my favorite sites and blogs and could not find anything.  I did come across a coloring page that talked about unclean spirits.  This coloring page comes from Church House Collection Blog

This gave me the idea that the unclean spirit needed to fly out of the man.  How to achieve this??

I decided to use a toilet paper roll and have the unclean spirit pop out of the top.  And the construction begins.  

I now needed a man drawing that would go around the toilet paper.  After searching Pinterest, I decide to modify a drawing of Joseph from Catholic Icing.   

I then drew an unclean spirit on green felt and glued it to a stick.

Now the unclean spirit can be set out from man.

Celebrating Catholic Homeschool Week

Supporting Catholic Education at home
From 2015

This week is Catholic School weeks.  It has been fun to do new and different activities to support our Catholic Faith at home this week.     The girls and I have painted religious peg dolls, built a church, and added items to Mass kit. On Monday, we went to  Michael’s to buy our supplies for making peg dolls and church. We did some research on Pinterest and Catholic Icing for the Mass kit, stoles, peg dolls, and church.

On Tuesday, we got started painting our church and peg dolls.  We cut our vestments for the priest peg dolls.  It was a lot of fun to see how creative the girls could be.  We added a Paten, white candles, and stoles.  For the paten we spray painted a plastic plate gold.  At Dollar Tree I found 2 white candles for a dollar and a red candle (for our Sanctutary Lamp) that are battery operated.  We painted wooden circles white with gold crosses to use for the hosts. For the stoles we took wide ribbon and cut it to fit the girls and painted gold crosses on them. We already had Sacramentary, Lectionary, Chasuble, chalice, ciborium, Corporal, Pall thanks to a wonderful priest friend Father Phillip.  The boys had made a tabernacle years.

 

On Wednesday, we had a  Homeschool Preschool get together at our house.  Our theme this month was Priest.   We made invitations that look like Priest shirts that we gave to our parish priests and invited them to lunch.   Which one of them  graciously accepted the invitation to come to lunch with a house full of preschooler!  Let’s just say he had  know idea what he was getting himself into when he said “Yes.”  We decorated the house inside and out with pictures of priests taped to streamers.  We put out our pretend (although many items were real) Mass Kit for the kids to play Mass.  We set out our newly painted Church and religious peg dolls.  We asked some priest what their favorite snacks were so that the kids could enjoy a special treat.  It was fun to see how differently the priest view the word "snack".  One priest said he ate medium rare ribeyes.  Well you can imagine that would not go well for a preschool get together, but we did enjoy the humor in it.  The adults enjoy the antipasto from another priest.   The kids enjoyed the Pringles, Cheez-Its, and cashews to round off our priest favorite snacks.

Father Nick arrives: The kids talked Father Nick into saying a pretend Mass with them.  He first explained all the vestments that priests wear  before dressing for the his part as Priest of course.   Elisha dressed as the deacon.  The pretend Mass include a procession with an opening song, prayers, readings and even a homily.  The Mass continued with pretend consecration and distribution of the Eucharist by the kids.   Father Nick concluded with a blessing.   We than ate lunch that was blessed to be highly nutritious by one of the kids.  Father Nick than assisted in the battle against the monsters in basement.  (He  graciously blessed the mess down there)  We were sad see Father Nick  leave but understood he had to get to a meeting.  The kids than made priest peg dolls and played Pin the Collar on the Priest.     We concluded with Bible cookies, P-Reece-hood  blessings,  heart shape cookies.  

The kids than enjoyed pretending Mass, playing church and just hanging out in the basement.  I do have to say the kids left at our house did an amazing job cleaning the basement and thanks to Fr. Nick blessing the basement is cleaner today than it was yesterday.

On Thursday, the girls and I went to Rose Garden Home Mission in Covington to serve Christ.   To serve Christ at Rose Garden is one of our favorite activities to do.  Unfortunately our schedule does not always allow us to serve weekly.

We have not settled on what to do on Friday we went another homeschool family house for lunch to  celebrate  Catholic Education at home!

Mathew 25:35

Season of Blessings
Thanksgiving and Christmas 2014

This week our family has been so blessed to have a true Gospel experience in Mathew 25:35.  Earlier in week Greg and Blake were blessed with being able to speak with a 22 year old man that was homeless.  His car had broken down and gotten towed by police before he got back to it.  He went to get it and was going to cost $150. It took him several weeks to save up $150, when he went back to get to his car they said it had been so long that it would now cost him $400.  He simply stated that he did not even pay that much for his car and walked away.  He was now faced with no car to get work, which lead to him loosing his job.  This is a young man who wants more out of life but now finds himself homeless.

The girls and I also were blessed by God this week to feed a homeless lady. She even choose to eat us with us at Penn Station. She was trying to buy something to eat with $1.50. After I told her I would pay for her lunch, she was so excited jumping up and down that she forgot to order sandwich. While eating with us, she shared how she lives outside but she was worried about her home not being locked and her belongings would be gone. I can only imagine that this means someplace in the alleys of downtown Cincinnati this women calls home. 
She asked me why I choose to get her something to eat as she had not eaten in 3 days. I told her simply Christ said feed the hungry and Christ loves her and does not want her to be hungry. We said our blessing and ate. She had much to say and some of it was just rambling but it was truly a blessing to spend a few minutes with one of Christ hungry children. I do not post this to be prideful but to remind everyone that homeless are Christ people and the next time you see one invite them to eat with you!

Then tonight Mother Seraphinia asked me how I would describe the experience of Rose Garden Mission at Thanksgiving and Christmas.  This is what I sent her:

Thanksgiving and Christmas experience at Rose Garden is to experience the love of Christ.  You can see the face of Christ in our friends that visit the mission.  Whether it is an elderly man who just wants his wife to be able to have a turkey to fix on Thanksgiving or a mother at Christmas who wants her children to have something under the tree.   Thanksgiving and Christmas at the mission is a time of year like no other where people truly get to experience what these celebrations really mean.   At the mission on these days we live out the Gospel of Matthew 25:35 " 35 For I was hungry, and you gave Me something to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me something to drink; I was a stranger, and you invited Me in; 36 naked, and you clothed Me; I was sick, and you visited Me; I was in prison, and you came to Me.’  We not only send them home with food, but we have a wonderful hospitality area where they can get shelter from the weather and feed their bodies with drinks and snacks.  This is a place where they can visit with friends and just hang out to experience the Love of Christ.  The helpers who come to assist at the mission on these days are blessed to be able to give to others whether in service, gifts or prayers.  The helpers are able to experience the mission in a different way then they usually do.  They may be working one on one with our mission friends, or sorting food, making food bags, giving out hats, glove, scarves.  They may be working behind the scenes in the back rooms directing giveaway of boxes, or in the kitchen washing dishes.  These days are where we are able to give ourselves to Christ to serve his people.  These are my two favorite days of the whole year.  I find great joy and happiness in serving others for Christ.  For these are his people that need to feel and know his love, we are Christ people to do this for him.

Tonight at Church we had Unbound visiting our church.  Elisha and I picked out a little girl name Jacqueline  from El Salvador.  She was born six days after Elisha.  It is exciting for Elisha to have  a little girl that is same age and interest as her.  Elisha has been looking at her picture and talking about her all night. 

Here we go again...

Here we go Again.... August 2014

As we finished up homeschooling the boys for 8 years, it is exciting to start a new with the girls.  The girls have been busy setting up their classroom with lots of new activities and books.  The boys had named their school St. Thomas, however, the girls have decided to call their school St. Catherine.  It is only fitting that we start a new school year, we call upon another wonderful saint to pray for us.  I believe they chose the name because their favorite cousin is named Catherine. :)  

It has been a lot fun planning out the preschool year for the girls.  We are going to focus on prayers, Saints,going to Mass,letters, and numbers.  We have scheduled lots of play dates around feast days for our friends to come over and celebrate with us.