Gus...

I find as the kids get older, it's harder to get pictures of them. I have lots of pictures of the girls simply b/c they are around more.  The boys love their room and their own space.  So I have to take advantage of picture opportunities when I can.

I snuck this picture this afternoon while he watched a show on giant fish or some other nature show.  He loves these types of shows (his siblings aren't so fond of them).He's always learning something new though.

Christmas Reading

I know it's early seeing as it's only October, but someone on Facebook asked for suggestions for Christmas books to read to her child.  As it happens, I just emptied the rest of my kids books from boxes onto shelves and organized them, so I knew just where they were.  Yay me!!!

I have always wanted to do the 24 days of Christmas Books that I've seen other moms do, but it takes a long time to gather 24 books on one theme.  Well, I realized today that I am close.  Gifting the kids books from St. Nicholas has helped.  I skipped books last year for financial reasons (6 books is a lot of money), but this year I have them picked out and ready to order slowly.  My big hope is that one day my children will each have a small collection of Christmas books to share with their own children.  I am a sucker for books and books with beautiful pictures really call to me.

The "Advent Storybook" contains 24 short stories to read throughout Advent

"The Miracle of Saint Nicholas" is my all time favorite Christmas story. If you buy only one book this year, this would be my recommendation 

 These are the books I've picked out for this year.  I'll be buying them slowly over the next 6 weeks. 

I am looking forward to snowy winter days at home, reading w/ the kids, hopefully baking Christmas goodies and enjoying our books as we prepare for Christmas.

Sometimes you just need a nap

Rosalia was apparently tired this afternoon.  She told me she was tired and wanted to take a nap.  She went into her room, closed the door and slept for an hour.  Ummm, this mom won't complain.

Communion of Saints Project

Back to our roots...or at the very least, Liturgical projects to bring the Faith alive with the kids.

Tonight, a friend had me over and we made Communion of Saint's posters to hang up in November. I made this 8 years ago and kept reusing the same one, but then with the move I decided not to move it and just remake it. I'm sad I don't have the original, but it was so much fun to make again and update with new pictures.  We have new children in the family, some of the Church Suffering are now part of the Church Triumphant, so it was exciting. 

I kept looking back and my last one hoping to replicate it fairly accurately. This really is my favorite project I've ever done.  You can see the original here. 

Below is what I did, feel free to copy or make your own.  You can adjust the text to fit your project. 
****For my project I made the text a size 7 and used Comic Sans for the font style. The link to the wording and prayers is here.

At the top I put a picture of the Holy Trinity surrounded by angels praising God.  Below that is the Blessed Mother and various saints that we have a special love for or the children are named after.  All in the Church Triumphant.  I then used cotton balls to make the clouds to separate them from the Church Suffering where I put photos of our deceased relatives and holy men and women.  I then made flames out of construction paper to separate them from the Church Militant.  For the bottom section I put photos of family members…all the kids, grandparents, the Pope, our parish priest.  I included a picture of a priest holding up the Eucharist during Mass since our prayers at Mass are so special for those in Purgatory.

For each section I included an explanation and scripture. I took things from different sites I like and changed them around to make our own project that fit our family.

At the very top I added the following….

This Church, comprises of three parts which make up the complete Body of Christ or Communion of Saints.  Death does not separate us, as Our Lord said Himself, (Mark 12:26-27) “As for the dead being raised, have you not read in the Book of Moses, in the passage about the bush, how God told him, ‘I am the God of Abraham, (the) God of Isaac, and (the) God of Jacob? He is not God of the dead but of the living. You are greatly misled.”

The complete Church supports each other by prayer and sacrifice.

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I then broke up the rest of the text as follows

The Church Triumphant

This is the Church of the saints on Heaven and we celebrate these members on the feast of All Saints.  They do not need our prayers, but the Church Suffering and the Church Militant are in need of their intercessory prayer. Hebrews (12:1-2) tells us: “Since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses (saints), let us lay aside every earthly care and run with perseverance he re that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith…”

First Peter (3:12) and James (5:16) remind us: “For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous and his ears are attentive to their prayer...”  “…A good man’s prayer is powerful and effective.”

We do not intercede to dead people, (dead in the sense they are damned; lost souls) we pray to the living saints of God who are now completely righteous through God’s saving grace, as the Bible quote from St. Mark’s Gospel reminds us

The Church Suffering

These are the souls who have been saved, but upon death, were not completely freed from smaller sins and failings.  Revelations (21:27) tells us “Nothing impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life.”

Our understanding of Purgatory comes from 1^st Corinthians (3:12-15): “Now if any man builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, each man’s work will become evident; for the day will show it because it is to be revealed with fire, and the fire itself will test the quality of each man’s work. If any man’s work which he has built on it remains, he will receive a reward. If any man’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire.”

The Holy Souls are blessed, they have assurance of their salvation, but they are suffering as they do penance for the sins hey committed on earth that they did not make full atonement for.  They are helpful.  They cannot help themselves to pass through this place of suffering, faster than expected. They rely on our prayers and sacrifices.  While they cannot help themselves, they can pray for us in thanksgiving, especially once they have entered their blessed homeland – Heaven.

The Church Militant

This is everyone living upon Earth striving for salvation (ourselves, family, friends): Philippians (2:12): “Why, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.”

“The Lain word “militans” has a primary meaning of ‘serving as a soldier, military’, but it acquires a secondary meaning of “to struggle, to make an effort”, which is the intended sense here.  Christians on earth (the Church Militant) are still struggling against sin in order that, when they die, they might go to Heaven and be members of the Church Triumphant, those who have triumphed over sin. However, if this struggle is successful, but not completely so, then after death they temporarily become members of the Church Suffering before ultimately joining the Church Triumphant.”


We are able to pray for ourselves as the passages from Peter and James reminded us.  The offering of he Holy Sacrifice of the Mass on earth for people on earth and for the Holy Souls.  We also pray for priests (spiritual motherhood) and for religious. They in turn pray mightily for the whole world and are hat powerful human arm of prayer and sacrifice that often holds back God’s Divine arm of justice that weighs heavily over us. (We read about that in particular in the Diary of St. Faustina). Our Lady of Fatima reminded us that “some souls go to Hell because they have no one to pray for them.” We can also pray for the Holy Souls suffering in Purgatory.  We too rely on the intercessory prayers of the saints in Heaven and also the Holy Souls who finally enter the Church Triumphant.

This is the mystical body of Christ.

Then at the very bottom, I added the Prayer of St Gertrude the Great.  I like to work on memorizing this in November before her feast day.

Prayers of St. Gertrude the Great

Eternal Father, I offer Thee the Most Precious Blood of Thy Divine Son, Jesus, in union with the Masses said throughout the world today, for all the Holy Souls in Purgatory, for sinners everywhere, for sinners in the Universal Church, those in my own home and within my family. Amen

New House, New Season....

My last entry was several months ago as we closed on our previous home of 16 years.  The rest of Spring and Summer was spent looking for a new home. We were so blessed to be able to stay with my in-laws for the duration of our house hunt.  On August 31st we closed on a new home.  For the first time in 7.5 years we are in a home of our own....just us. It's strange and refreshing all at the same time.  We are slowly getting settled in and everyone is finding their space.

I thought a great way to start off in our new place was by restarting some of the fun stuff we did years ago when the boys were little and the girls weren't even born yet.

Last weekend we celebrated Rosalia's baptism day and the feast of Our Lady of the Holy Rosary by having a cupcake Rosary. I haven't done this since 2009 when Samuel was a baby and the kids loved it.  You can see the fun from 2009 here. It's fun to look back and see how the kids have changed.

Augustin helped me make the cupcakes the night before.  He was such a fun helper; very giggly and fun to be around. And definitely a good helper.

After lunch on Saturday we all gathered to pray the Rosary. I had a plate with enough cupcakes for a decade in front of each child; that worked out very well.  ** Note...again this year, I was short 1 cupcake (apparently I was in 2009 as well) despite counting numerous times.  We just substituted a small cupcake for a large one.

Almost done; last decade is starting

And...done. Look at that.  The kids couldn't wait to eat it.

Look at those smiles.  This got silly very quickly as the boys decided to see how many they could put in their mouth without using their hard.

She can't eat them, but sure did enjoy the activity and playing with a couple.

Beautiful girls.  Each so different in look and personality.

This is definitely an activity to every year.

#liturgicalyear #ourdomesticchurch #cupcakerosary #ourladyoftherosary #lityearcelebrations