7 Quick Takes: Confirmation, War Room, Our Lady of Sorrows, Co-Op, Sunflower Cupcakes, 4H

Another quick week has gone by jammed packed with blessings, tantrums, family, sibling rivalry, memories, fun, and dirty diapers.

Take a peek of what our week has been like with another edition of  7 Quick Takes hosted by Kelly at This Ain't the Lyceum and I also linked up to "My Week in Review" with Home to 4 Kiddos and Every Bed of Roses.

1

Our oldest daughter was confirmed this past Saturday, Sept. 12th!  She, along with about 60 other high schoolers, received the Sacrament of Confirmation after preparing for the special day for 2 years.  It was a beautiful mass and celebration!  Our dear friend was my daughter's sponsor and we were blessed to have both my parents and in my in-laws attend the mass too. 

2 

War Room the movie!  Have you seen it yet?  No?  Then you must!  Last Saturday, my husband and I saw it and we loved it!  We laughed, we cried, we teared up, we enjoyed it!  It is a beautiful story of how prayer is the weapon that will get you through any battle!  Chris over at Campfires and Cleats has a wonderful review of this movie when she was lucky enough to preview it before it came out in theaters.  Her great review was one of the reasons I was convinced this was worth the ticket price!

 3

On September 15th each year, the Catholic Church remembers the 7 sorrows of our Blessed Mother with Our Lady of Sorrows feast day.  These 7 occasions brought Mary so much pain and suffering as she lovingly cared for Jesus, but she always trusted in God's will and never complained.  Mary's 7 sorrows are:

1. The Prophecy of Simeon. (Luke 2:34–35)
2. The Flight into Egypt. (Matthew 2:13)
3. The loss of the child Jesus in the Temple. (Luke 2:43–45)
4. Mary meets Jesus on the way to Calvary.
5. Jesus dies on the cross. (John 19:25)
6. The piercing of the side of Jesus, and Mary's receiving the body of Jesus in her arms. (Matthew 27:57–59)
7. The body of Jesus is placed in the tomb. (John 19:40–42)

Kendra at Catholic All Year came up with a fun children's activity to meditate on these 7 sorrows.  It was a free printable and the instructions were to have each child eat 7 sour candies (I bought Lemonheads) while the scripture verses were read.  We did this in our Co-op group this past Tuesday and then again at home after dinner.  I hope to make this another liturgical tradition and add it to my A Slice of Liturgical Life page.

 4

About 8 of our Catholic homeschooling families in our area meet once a week for Classically Catholic Memory (CCM) co-op.  Last week was a review week and it was a great day!  The weather was beautiful and perfect so we were able to take the youngest class out to play some relay races on the beach to learn the 9 different phyla of the animal kingdom, review games, student presentations, prayer, pledge, singing our poetry memory work (Thanks Elaine!) , dissecting earthworms, grammar and IEW writing.   It was a blessing!  

 
5

Today my 4 older children met for their bi-monthly 4H meeting.  Currently they are learning more about gardening and they planted barley in the pots that they painted during last meeting.  It is a great group if kids and the moms volunteering their time are doing such great work!  I am so grateful for my mom friends who are leading this program!  Thank you J.A. and M.P.!

6

Today was my turn to bring snacks for the 4H meeting.  My 11 year old daughter loves surfing Pinterest to find creative ideas so I like to give her Pinterest "assignments".  I told her it was our turn to bring snacks and I asked if she would find some garden themed snacks.  So she found these grape caterpillar snacks and these sunflower cupcakes.  Perfect!   They were a hit and really easy to do!  I made my homemade chocolate cupcakes with cream cheese icing and then used mini oreos and a can of yellow and green frosting with the tips included to make the sunflowers and leaves.

 7 

It's really late so I better sign off, but before I do, I wanted to mention that on Saturday night, Sept. 19th,  Dr. Peter Kreeft, THE Dr. Peter Kreeft, will be speaking at my parish and I can't wait to go listen to him with my husband and my 2 oldest children.  He will speaking on "Catholicism and Culture: How Catholics are conforming to American culture instead of conforming the culture to God."  I can't think of a better subject to present and we are looking forward to hearing him speak on this important topic!

Have a blessed weekend!