The Deepening of Fall, A Gallery and a Give-Away!

The following post is a Smorgasbord ‘n Smidgens type of post. Pictures, thoughts and a give-away!

PHOTOS!

Vincent loves being a Grandpa!

This is at our last Finer Femininity Meeting. My daughters and daughter-in-law having a good time with tea, good conversation and babies!

The ladies graciously posed for a picture! <3

Caught in the act! Wolfing down the strawberries!

Now let’s work on the grapes!

Angelo (our 9 yr. old) sleeps on the top bunk so he decided to dry roses and hang them from the ceiling so he can gaze at them and think happy thoughts as he falls asleep. Actually, he is probably conniving some way he can sell them to make some pin money! 😀

Ummmmm….SOMEBODY got a hold of my wire!!!

Rosie and the new nephew, Adrian!

It was a rough pregnancy….but Devin and Theresa are now back to normal, happy living….even though the baby is high-maintenance! 🙂

This is the type of birthday gifts we give to our best friends!

The Shakespeare Festival offered much in the line of friendship, culture and good times! (Good food, too! 🙂  ) We had a booth and sold some of our handmade items.

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Some thoughts:

As fall deepens and the Season of Pentecost marches on, we all begin to turn our thoughts to the coming winter months, months that will bring with it the enjoyment of the warmth and closeness of our homes, the holidays, etc.

This next while proposes to us an excellent opportunity to make the liturgy come alive in our homes! We want our children to love our Catholic Faith, with all its beauty, its traditions, its customs of the seasons!

We had a conference not too long ago and Father said that our Faith is like a Table Top, the legs are the little “T” Traditions that our forefathers have passed on to us. The more we hack away at the traditions and eliminate them from our lives, the wobblier the Table Top gets.

We must not just count on Sunday or when we are at Church to have these “Traditions” exposed to our children. We must make the liturgy come alive in our homes! Let’s replace the worldly “magic” of the season and holidays coming up with the thrilling charm of Catholic customs that bring the sparkle of our Faith to the innermost recesses of our hearts!

There are many little gems that I will be sharing with you in the coming months: The Blessing of the Christmas Tree, The Making of the Christmas Stable, The Devotion of the Christmas Crib, The Advent Wreath, etc. I hope they will inspire you to do some of these things in your own homes.

I once heard something to this effect: If we just live a good life and expect our kids to turn out well, with no extra effort, thinking “We are moral, we give them a good home, we go to church, etc.” …without being proactive in making the Faith a living entity in our homes, we may be surprised to find that after the years have burned away, our children are not too interested in their Faith.

So….“If it is to be, it is up to me!” That’s a positive motivational quote that we should take to heart. But here’s a better one….This is by one of the Saints, St. Augustine, I think, “You take care of God’s business and He will take care of Yours” or the one that everyone has heard, “Work like it all depends on You, Pray like it all depends on God!”

A Give-Away!

With that, I would like to offer you today a Give-Away! It’s been a long time….

This is a handcrafted (by me), brass, wire-wrapped rosary bracelet with matching earrings so you can carry your rosary wherever you go!

Also included is a lovely Ribbon Ginjen Flower Accessory handcrafted by my daughter Virginia! (The amount of work that goes into each of the petals is admirable as she cuts, burns, folds and glues each piece of ribbon!)

I will also include my Finer Femininity Maglet The Heart of the Home During Advent and Christmas. It is full of inspiration for this upcoming lovely season! You can read more about it here.

All three will be given to the person whose name is pulled from the “hat”! Just leave a comment here on the blog. It is always nice to hear from you! 🙂

I will pick the winner next Wednesday, Oct. 28th.