Our All Saints Day Celebration

We have been so busy lately, with Rob’s dad in and out of the hospital (thankfully he is ok and home now,) both the van and Rob’s car requiring major maintenance at the same time, and planning for our All Saints Party. Whew…I’ve barely had time to turn around. Alas, with so much going on, it does make for the speedy passage of a pregnancy, and I love that!

Each year, for the month of November, we set up our Communion of Saints wall on our family feast table. It provides rich opportunities for all of us to discuss our “family tree.” The kids love arranging the saints and all of the names of the deceased family members just-so. In the end, it provides a visual for the Communion of Saints which is confusing for me to try to just explain. Not sure if you’ll be able to tell, but in the picture we start at the top with a picture of The Holy Trinity, then below, Our Mother and the Mother of the entire Church. Within the “clouds” are the saints in the Church Triumphant. Below that the Holy Souls in Purgatory with the flames of purification. The kids were sure that some of the souls should be inching closer to the Church Triumphant – like Granny 🙂 and Pope John Paul II 🙂 so they took liberties. Then on the floor (here on Earth,) The Church Militant – that’s us! So there’s a picture of Pope Benedict XVI, and a picture of our family. I’m proud of the kids this year – here’s their hard work…

One of our favorite feasts to celebrate is the Feast of All Saints. Every year the kids choose a favorite saint, write up a biography of that saint, and then we (I) sew a costume. It’s so much fun, and it brings to life and to the forefront of our minds our older brothers and sisters who already enjoy the Beatific Vision as a part of the Church Triumphant. We’ve cultivated a real devotion to some great saints over the years as we learn about their lives and bring them to life through our playets and costumes. Sparkly is still a devoted fan of St. Dominic Savio. I am too! What a wonderful little boy for my little guy to be devoted to. And of course, Sweet Pea will tell you she’s torn between St. Clare of Assisi and St. Therese. I have to say that of all the years we’ve been doing this, my favorite year was the year the kids dressed as St. Clare and St. Dominic. And just because I knew you’d want to admire my little saints as much as I did, I’ll include a picture of the two of them. Keep in mind that this was taken on the Feast of All Saints 2 years ago…

Well, this year Sweet Pea very much wanted to stump the crowd (the other children at the All Saints Party that are all also dressed up as saints) so she spent the last several months digging and pondering on an obscure saint. She chose St. Euphrasia. Google her if you’re curious, but Sweet Pea was thrilled because she did indeed stump the crowd, which is not an easy thing to do with our crowd! Here is St. Euphrasia giving her playet/biography.

Sparkly was deeply concerned that his saint would be easily recognizable, but he was insistent that he wanted to dress as St. Joseph, the foster father of Jesus. He was adorable, especially after the Saints procession when he launched into action on the football field still dressed as St. Joseph. Too cute. He did convince Sweet Pea to read his biography of St. Joseph because he was too shy.

I wanted to dress the Peanut up, but I ran out of time to make a costume, and the only thing ready made I had sitting in our costume bin that would have fit him was a blue tunic and veil for the Blessed Virgin. Oh well, he didn’t seem too bothered by not dressing up…