Can I Really Become a Saint?

When I was growing up, I actually thought it was arrogant to say (even secretly to myself) "I want to be a saint!".  I thought it was hubris talking.  And we all know "pride cometh before the fall", so who would dare risk saying that out loud?

It wasn't until I was well past 30 years of age that I actually heard these words spoken by a feisty cloistered nun many of us lovingly still call, Mother, "We are all called to be great saints. Don't miss the opportunity!"  Did I just hear that correctly?  We are called to be saints?  No. Not just saints, GREAT saints!  For the first time in my life, I gave myself permission to say those words (first of course secretly in my head, then ever so slightly louder and louder over the years in prayer) "I want to be a saint!".

Fast forward a few more years and my husband and I were in the midst of completing 33 Days to Morning Glory, our total consecration to Jesus through Mary when I came across this short prayer that I try to remember to say daily:

"Mary, I want to be a saint.  I know that you want me to be a saint, and that it's your God given mission to form me into one.  So at this moment on this day I freely choose to give you my permission to do your work in me, through your spouse, the Holy Spirit."

Then just yesterday, I was reading through some of the exerts of St. Faustina's Diary on the Divine Mercy App and this is what Jesus said about our desire to be saints:

"This firm resolution to become a saint is extremely pleasing to Me.  I bless your efforts and will give you opportunities to sanctify yourself.  Be watchful that you lose no opportunity that My providence offers you for sanctification. If you do not succeed in taking advantage of an opportunity, do not loose your peace, but humble yourself profoundly before Me and, with great trust, immerse yourself completely in My mercy.  In this way, you gain more than you have lost, because more favor is granted to a humble soul than the soul itself asks for. "(paragraph # 1361)

Our Lord goes on to say:

"Let souls who are striving for perfection particularly adore My mercy, because the abundance of graces which I grant them flows from My mercy.  I desire that these souls distinguish themselves by boundless trust in My mercy.  I myself with attend to the sanctification of such souls.  I will provide them with everything they will need to attain sanctity.  The graces of My mercy are drawn by means of one vessel only, and that is--trust.  The more a soul trusts, the more it will receive.  Souls that trust boundlessly are a great comfort to Me, because I pour all the treasures of My graces into them.  I rejoice that they ask for much, because it is My desire to give much, very much.  On the other hand, I am sad when souls ask for little, when they narrow their hearts." (paragraphs # 1577-78)

So if you are anything like me and you have thought "I'm weak. I'm a sinner.  I could never become a saint.", please find hope in these words our Lord Jesus has revealed to us.  NEVER lose heart but always, ALWAYS trust in Jesus' Divine Mercy.  Together we can help each other become great saints!!!!

Many blessings to you and yours,

Peg Doll Swap Christmas 2015

As I told  you a few months ago, this year has been full of change and so many wonderfully answered prayers.  I desperately wanted to find a truly Catholic group of women who see Heaven as their main goal for educating their children.  And I really wanted to make some cute saint peg dolls so I actually prayed for that.  Can you believe it?  Such a small thing, but yet we must be careful what we pray for because, as I've shared in my post A Lesson on Prayer, I have learned that the Lord will say "yes" to all things that will bring us closer to Him.  It's a lesson I must learn over and over again.

Isn't this an awesome view?!

But back to the fun of peg doll swaps!  So yes, I was randomly asked by a fellow Catholic homeschooling mom if I wanted to join their group of mom's making peg dolls for their children for Christmas. Um...YES, please! :)

Infant Jesus

I chose to paint St. Padre Pio, my oldest's favorite saint, and St. Francis of Assisi because we love him as well!  It took a few nights of labor after the kids were in bed to sneak around painting these dolls for my little loves so I could surprise them on Christmas morning.

The rules for our swap:

Bl. Margaret of Castello

1)  paint 1 saint doll per set you want (I wanted two sets, so I painted two different saint dolls)
2)  paint a copy of each set of dolls for each participant (so there were 25 sets of dolls we needed, so I painted 25 of each saint)
3)  Meet up, display and oogle over dolls and go home with your goodies!

That's is!  Easy peasy, lemon squeezy!


Check out some of the amazing dolls that were made!  I'm so impressed by the artistic abilities of my fellow moms.

Our Lady of Fatima

St. Agnes

Our Lady Undoer of Knots

St. Blaise

St. Catherine of Siena

St. Francis of Assisi (painted by yours truly)

St. Damien of Molokai

St. Florian

St. Gertrude

St. Hildegard of Bingen

St. Isidore

St. Kateri Tekakwitha

St. Margaret Clitherou of York

St. Maria Goretti

St. Martin de Porres

St. Mary Magdelan

St. Maxamilian Kolbe

St. Michael

St. Padre Pio (painted by yours truly)

St. Thomas Aquinas

St. Louis Martin (St. Terese' of Lisiuex's father)

St. Zelie Martin (St. Terese' of Lisiuex's mother)

I can't tell you how much fun this swap was!  And my sons were very happy to find this gift from mom and dad waiting for them under the Christmas tree!  We get to spend this coming year learning all about the lives of these saints!

Have you participated in a saints peg doll swap?  Have any tips you can share?  Feel free to comment below!

Blessings to you and yours,

How We Celebrated St. Patrick's Day 2015!

I know it's a week late but I thought I'd share how we celebrated our St. Patrick's Day 2015!

We started off with some green mustache family fun!

How cute are these boys?!!!!

Then we discussed the story of St. Patrick, who we was, what he did for Ireland and why he is associated with wearing green, what miracles have been attributed to him, etc.

Since we have just moved and I still haven't found all of my craft supplies, I decided we could draw our own St. Patrick using what we had...packaging paper and crayons!

I traced Pickle's body to make the body of St. Patrick, then decorated him with his bishop's hat and staff!  Pickle was in charge of coloring (which turned out that mom also had to help out with that as well b/c it was a LOT of coloring)!  But turned out pretty good if you ask me.

This was followed by a nap to which Pickle woke up to a gold coin trail beginning at his bedside and went throughout the house to the "treasure" which seemed to be left by our friendly Leprechaun.

Psst...the bag of gold coins and the mustaches were grabbed at the Dollar Tree a week before.  Other than than, all other items were found around our house...yes, including the Skittles! Hahahaha!

While I prepared dinner, delicious cornbeef and cabbage (a tradition) pictured below, Pickle and little Bean sat and watched CCC of America's Patrick: Brave Shepard of the Emerald Isle pictured below also.

This picture is courtesy of the CCC of America's website.

Have you checked out their Saints and Heroes DVD selection?  They have wonderful DVDs and several times a year some really great deals!  I bought my Saints and Heroes bundle at 60% off!!!!

So that is how we celebrated our St. Patrick's day!  Always some religious learning as well as some imagination and fun.  

How did you celebrate your St. Patrick's day 2015?

Blessings to you and yours,

St. Valentine's Day 2015

I'm sharing this only a few days early in case you are still looking for some quick St. Valentine's day ideas.  Sorry I wanted to get this up last week but time got away from me.  So what is this chaotic family doing to celebrate St. Valentine's day/week?  Check it out!

St. Valentine's Book

This year, St. Valentine's day is all about God's love for us.  We started with the story of St. Valentine (I purchased this on amazon for less than $7...woot, woot!).  It's a nice book to discuss the history of St. Valentine's day and where all this "fun" comes from.

St. Valentine's Memory

I also made an easy St. Valentine's Day memory game for my son.  I simply went to google images and copied and pasted pictures of images associated with Christ's love:  the Sacred Heart of Jesus, the Immaculate Heart of Mary, St. Valentine, Blessed Mother Theresa, the Holy Spirit and our family's patron saint this year, St. Angela Merici (if you missed that blog post you can find out all about her here), into a table I created in microsoft powerpoint.  I find it's much easier to deal with pictures when I work in ppt.  

Note: Because I couldn't find these pictures under public domain I do not have the rights to public reproduction and therefore cannot share this memory game with you.  Good news though, you can simply head on over to google images, type in what you are looking for and copy and paste to create your own memory game.  Be sure to tailor it to your family!

We talked a little bit about what each picture meant and why they were chosen for our St. Valentine's day puzzle.  Then I cut out the pictures, glued them to the backs of some construction paper hearts and we played memory!

Simple game twist: the player who finds St. Valentine's match wins the game.  It's a race to the finish line! 

Sacred Heart and Immaculate Heart DIY craft

THIS I can share with you as I made it in ppt with clip art pictures from Microsoft.  So if you want a copy be sure to click the link below for your copy.

Again, I just went into power point and used the clip art they had there to make all the symbols my son would need to assemble the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary.  See the pictures below of assembly!

Oh I also added a page that explained the symbols and what they represent so if you choose to make this with your own children you'll be able to share the meaning of each heart!

Want to do this DIY craft?  GRAB IT HERE!

Here are the pictures of our DIY craft! 

Coloring Sheets

Sacred and Immaculate Hearts and St. Valentine

Don't have time for a craft or want to do a little bit more?  Well over at Catholic Inspired there is an AWESOME coloring page and craft you can do for the Sacred Heart of Jesus and Immaculate Heart of Mary.  

If you are not already a member you may have to register to become one to print these goodies off but don't fear.  It's FREE and easy to do!!!  

We also took advantage of the wonderful coloring sheets that Catholic Playground offers for free!  They have two wonderful coloring sheets for St. Valentine at the link above.  Scroll down the find them at the bottom of the page.   Note: Do not attempt to color print out these sheets below as they will be much too small and distorted to color. I just added them to this post so you could have a visual of what you were looking for at Catholic Playground.  

   

So these are just some ideas of how we are celebrating St. Valentine's week!  Don't worry, we will still be enjoying some heart shaped cookies and pancakes and we are definitely going to exchange some St. Valentine's cards!  

What are your St. Valentine's ideas?  Did you do the DIY craft or color the page from Catholic Inspired?  Comment below!  

Blessings to You and Yours and Happy St. Valentine's Day,