Homemade Rosary Holders

 We found a great activity for a chilly afternoon over at Catholic Icing.

The result were beautiful for a VERY low cost. 

 We made decoupage Rosary holders. 

I bought wooden plaques at Walmart for about .50 each. 

I had tissue paper in the crafting stash.

The most expensive item was the modge podge... I could have used watered down white glue, but I want to make autumn luminaries so I will be using the modge podge for that.   

 The first step was to cute tissue paper into small shapes and painting the modge podge over the wood and the tissue. 

 We then picked images from the web.  I printed these out, but you could use old religious greeting cards are images from Catholic "junk" mail. 

 Then we  glued the image onto our plaques and covered the pictures with modge podge.  

 The results were just beautiful.  

I forgot that I also bought little screw in hooks to attached to the bottom of the plaque.

These were $1.98 at Walmart for a package of 10.

 A beautiful place to hold the kids most precious Rosaries.  

Make sure to check out Catholic Icing for many more family activities.  

The Poor Blog--gets a post....

 A yummy, 1 pound honeycrisp, freshly picked apple...as big as Kimberly's face, shared by 2 kids and a mom (with caramel dip!)

 Two thick softer than soft blankets ready to bundle a beautiful set of twins. 

I sell many knit and crochet handcrafts.  You can find me at. J.C.Marie Handcrafts on Facebook.  You can place orders by messaging me here or on my Facebook public page.

 The perfect visitors on yesterday's Feast of Saint Francis of Assisi.

 It was too bad my bow hunters were not home. (sorry St. Francis--but we need meat in the freezer)

 I found a wonderful quick and easy craft to honor St. Francis on the Catholic Inspired website.  

(Boy, does my craft--I mean kitchen---need an overhaul)

I love seeing St. Francis rebuilding our Lord's church. 

 Kimmy, Luke and Grace put together this beautiful autumn puzzle...a little modge-podge..and this will stay up until out Christmas puzzle is put together and displayed. 

Hopefully I will keep up with documenting our busy lives here in the "little house".  I may also have some big photo dumps of things that happened over the summer...especially the arrival or our first grandbaby... Carson Matthew...

Giant Miraculous Medal Craft

 Catholic Icing provided this great craft--perfect for my 10 year old Gracie.

We love our Blessed Mother, and what a perfect way to tell her so by making this giant Miraculous Medal.

 Catholic Icing provides complete directions and a pdf printable needed for this project.

It is also simple.  All you need is a dull pencil and the ability to trace.

 The Miraculous Medal as it looked after being traced onto heavy duty aluminum foil.

 Grace then colored Our Blessed Mother with sharpie markers.

 The front

The back...it is now hanging in the living room...and Grace is very proud of her hard work--and so am I.

Our Lady of Sorrows

The Seven Sorrows
The Prophecy of Simeon over the Infant Jesus. (Lk 2:34)
The Flight into Egypt of the Holy Family. (Mt 2:13)
The Loss of the Child Jesus for three days. (Lk2:43)
The Meeting of Jesus and Mary along the way of the cross. (Lk 23:26)
The Crucifixion, where Mary stands at the foot of the cross. (Jn 19:25)
The Descent from the cross, where Mary receives the dead body of Jesus in her arms. (Mt 27:57)
The Burial of Jesus. (Jn 19:40)

Today, September 15th is dedicated to Our Lady of Sorrows.
It is a day to remember Our Blessed Mother's many sufferings.
Catholic Icing had many ideas to help children think about this day.
We made bookmarks, so that whenever we are reading, we can be reminded to pray for Mary's help us when we deal with our own small sufferings. The idea comes from Our Domestic Church.

The beads are Mary's tears....

Our Lady of Sorrow, Pray for us!!

Happy Birthday Blessed Mother Mary

Our table centerpiece for Mary's birthday.

We made the lapbook a few years ago.

You can check out the post about our lapbook here.

We added a lovely candle to our display this year. I got the idea from Family at the Foot of the Cross.

Very quick and simple to make, but it will burn my our Lady of Grace shrine throughout the year.

Tt is for Saint Therese

T is for St. Therese, and since it is Tt week we have spent quite a bit of time learning about this Saint whom is such a wonderful example for children.

Kim and Luke have learned the little saying about Saint Therese from An Alphabet of
Catholic Saints.

We really enjoy the Catholic Treasure Books, and have learned a lot about St. Therese's young life, including the fact that her sister made her "sacrifice beads."

Whenever Therese and her sister performed a "gift for God" or made a little sacrifice, they moved a bead toward the crucifix. At the end of the day, the girls could look at their beads and "see" the gifts they gave Jesus.

I found easy to follow instructions to make the 4 younger kids sacrifice beads

at The Little Ways website.

Amy was my assistant. (a much needed assistant)

All ready for little pockets.

And now all the little pockets around here look like this!

A Grotto For Our Lady of Lourdes

I found this real cute idea for The Feast of Our Lady of Lourdes over at Catholic Cuisine.

A rice krispie treat grotto. The complete directions are at Catholic Cuisine, but we didn't follow the directions exactly.
It came it so cut- and very
yummy!! I believe this will be a new yearly tradition around here!