Operation: Egg Hunt

Hello! I had a marvelous Easter and I hope you all did too! Last year I hosted our church Easter Egg Hunt and was asked to do it again this year. I was flattered and was happy to go at it again. Hopefully, I will be able to do it again next year. There is something about a party that I just love. Here are a few peeks into our Easter Egg hunt:

delicious cupcakes I baked up using Funfetti cake mix and Funfetti icing

See the Resurrection set in the background? My youngest son and I printed it from Catholic Icing and I cut it out and assembled it.

Here is the entire set-up

Hunting for eggs! That's my youngest son in the blue shirt and plaid shorts. He is getting so big!

How do you like these signs? I used letters from Dollar Tree and traced them onto purple paper and cut them out. The green numbers and letters are the original ones. Do you notice something on every poster? Look closely and you will see the Alleluia printables that I printed from Crafolic's blog! I planned to use them on my cupcakes but they look beautiful on my signs.

The entire hunt was $0 out of pocket other than a few materials I purchased and the eggs and candy that was all donated by the wonderful parishioners at our church!

Thanks for stopping by!
     Alicia

Sacrifice Beads

Thanks for stopping by! Alicia

Lenten Goals

I've said it before and I'll say it again- Lent is my favorite Liturgical Season! If you are unfamiliar with Lent, you can check out American Catholic's Lent page. Very basically, it is a liturgical season in the Catholic Church (and some other Christian denominations) where the people prepare thier souls/spirit for the miracle of Easter. It lasts the 40 days (not including Sundays) before Easter. To become closer to the Lord, there are three areas we can focus on:

1. Prayer

2. Fasting

3. Almsgiving

I like to set my goals to cover all three areas. Another wonderful thing about Lent/Easter is that adults who are preparing to be baptised or converted to the Catholic Faith, are brought into the Church during the Easter Vigil. I will be celebrating my 4 year spiritual birthday this Easter! April 2007 was when I was baptised. I have come SO far in these past 4 years and have a long way to go. Lent is wonderful because we can renew what we (or our parents) started with our Baptism! On to my goals:

Prayer

I am a scholar at heart. It is much easier for me to read something that someone else learned and then apply it to my life than to try to start from scratch. I decided that for my "prayer" goal, I needed reading material. After much forthought, I decided upon the following:

Jesus of Nazareth, Part Two Holy Week by Pope Benedict XVI 
I am still looking for a cheap/free devotional

Fasting

This is the most popular tradition of Lent that non-Catholics know about. We fast from meat on Fridays and completely on certain holy days during Lent. We also sometimes choose to "give up" something else. Many people choose things such as sweets and fast food. I like to make it even harder on myself and choose things that I think would be nearly impossible. This year I am giving up spending money.

Yes, you read it right. There are a few reasons to my madness. First, I am unemployed during the summer and my "summer" starts before Easter. Therefor our income level will be dropping a bit. We have a goal of finally going on a trip to see my family in Pennsylvania this summer and I think this will help us get the money together!

Almsgiving

Basically, this is sharing what you've got. My long time Lenten committment has been to clear out clutter. I clear clutter so often that I wonder if there will be enough left for Lent. There always is plenty left! I take everything that I clear out and give it to someone who needs it. This is so much fun to me because I am doing something nice and then I look around and my home is more peaceful and harmonious. Also for almsgiving, I am taking some of the money I am saving from my fasting and donating it to whatever cause my children choose for thier Lenten Goals!

I hope you enjoyed reading about my goals. I would love to read yours! Please leave a link in the comments if you have a post with your goals! Check back for more on my kids' goals soon!

Thanks for stopping by! Alicia

Making Easter from Valentine's Day

Today I wanted to show you a little something I did. I spotted a ton of Valentine's Day items on clearance for 75% off at Wal-Mart the other day. I picked up a few things in hopes that I could either use them for something else or save them for next year.

One of the things that caught my eye were some adorable little heart shaped jumpy-things. You know, the things that you push one end and they hop across the table? I had to get them for a steal of 25 cents for 9!

As I pondered a way to make them suitable for Easter, my thoughts went to animals made from heart shapes. Then I thought about bunnies with hearts for faces... and it all started from there.

Easter Bunnies from Hearts Tutorial

Here are the little heart guys in the package:

And here is my adaptation. I used a Sharpie to draw a little nose and whisker dots. I then attached some of the twenty billion teensy weensy wiggly eyes I own onto them using scrapbook adhesive. I am thinking about using hot glue on the rest (with the help of needle nose pliers, of course!).

Quick and easy! I hope it inspires you to take a look at some of that clearance stuff!

Thanks for stopping by! Alicia

Lenten Journal Tutorial

I have been diligent this year in pushing myself to be prepared for Lent when it comes. Though many people dread the sacrificial aspect of Lent,  I actually look forward to this Liturgical Season.

This year my plan is to follow a Lenten Devotional (haven't chosen one yet) and to journal about my journey as I (hopefully) get closer to the Lord. I am actually not a "journaling" type. I want to journal but rarely put it into practice. I have come to the conclusion that I will meditate better if I slow down, think, and write. I really feel like journaling will help me pray better. We shall see....

On to the project. I thought it would be even more fun if I were to create a beautiful Lenten Journal! Here are the details:

Lenten Journal Tutorial

First I started with a regular el' cheapo notebook. I bought a ton of these at the beginning of the school year for less than 25 cents.

I chose some patterned paper to cover my notebook. This particular paper is two-sided so I used the front for my cover and the back/scrap for my strip. I tried to use something kind of muted but nice to look at.

The front and back cover pieces are 7 1/2 inches by 10 1/2 inches and the decorative strip is 3 1/2 inches by 10 1/2 inches. I attached the front and back covers first. I used a glue runner but you could use almost any adhesive- including ModPodge. I then used my glue runner to attach the one side of the decorative strip. I then loosely folded it over the spiral binding and glued it onto the back.

Want to hear a little secret?? The adhesive didn't hold well so I added a strip of scotch tape over the decorative piece and then attached that piece of turquiose paper to the front. On the back, I left the scotch tape exposed. To prevent this problem, you can use a tape called "sticky strip". It is red and double sided. I used it later on in this tutorial.

I used my computer to create the label. I set my font size to 26. The label was decorated with some thin ribbon and a pretty brad I won a while back. That's it! It is as super simple as it sounds so give it a try!

Well, I have gotten to be the kind of person who enjoys making accessories to go with my projects. I love decorated binder clips more than anything! They are the ultimate cute bookmark! I used sticky strip to attach a 1 1/4 inch by 2 inch strip of patterned paper to a medium (any size will work!) Binder Clip. After distressing the paper, I added a thin strip of scrap paper to it. Tie on a piece of ribbon and you are ready to rock!

I am really looking forward to digging into this.... I am also thinking that a matching pen would be nice... (have you ever read the book "If you give a mouse a cookie..."??)

Thanks for stopping by! Alicia

Divine Mercy Sunday

Today is Divine Mercy Sunday in the Catholic Church. On this day, we celebrate the Sacrament of Reconciliation . Reminders of our Baptism come forth. What a perfect day to make these adorable mini bird nests!

Eggs are a long-time symbol of fertility and new life. We recieve new life in the Church in two ways- Baptism and Reconciliation. Nests keep the eggs safe from enemies. Who is our nest? Jesus Christ.

Here are the nests my boys and I made:

The recipe we used came from the Betty Crocker website. I altered it a little. First, we used the amounts of chocolate chips and butterscotch chips it called for but we used 3 cups of Fiber One. We also melted everything in the microwave. I put the chocolate and butterscotch chips in a microwavable bowl and microwaved them for 30 seconds, stirred, and repeated until completely melted.

Hope you enjoyed! Let me know if you make some nests this Easter Season! Feel free to comment!

Alicia

Easter has only just begun!

Did you know that in the Catholic Church, Easter lasts 50 days? Yes it does! We spend 40 days preparing for the coming of Christ by changing our lives to be more like Him. Now, after Easter, we are going to celebrate! Jesus is Risen!
To celebrate the Ressurection of Jesus, Catholic Icing is hosting an "Easter Link-Up". (see my sidebar for a direct link to the link up) I REALLY wanted to join in and was racking my brain for creative ideas. I came up with a few things and I have some ideas to try out during the entire 50 days. Toad and I have one more week of work/school after this Spring Break and then we will get to do more activities.
Here's what I have so far:
This week I thought we could focus on the actual Ressurection. We talked breifly about the Ressurection and we did some experiments. We discussed how HEAVY the rock that sealed Jesus' tomb must have been. We came to the conclusion that no person could have moved it himself. Only an Angel of God could move it.

Jacob lifting a rock that is WAY smaller than the one that covered Jesus' tomb





Toad lifting the same rock.... it was really heavy



We tried moving the storage building, nothing.....



We tried moving the car. It wouldn't budge

I moved my ideas for the 50 days of Easter to this page also found on the tabs on top of my blog! Thanks!

Alicia

Money Saving Easter Celebration

We celebrated Easter Sunday quietly at home. Easter Monday, on the other hand, was a celebratory day! I decided to save our "celebratory Easter" until Easter Monday for several reasons but I think this will be something we will continue to do from now on.
On Monday morning, I went grocery shopping at Winn-Dixie and decided to check out the Easter stuff for our cookout/egg hunt. They had the plastic eggs on sale for 37cents a package. They had candy for 50 cents a bag. I got some cute baskets for 37 cents each and chocolate bunnies from $1- $2.50. I grabbed some items and headed to the bakery to look around. I noticed that the clearance bakery shelf was jam packed. I checked out the items and there were tons of Easter cookies for 50 cents a package (reg price $3.99 each) and they dont expire until April 11! I bought 3 packages! I got some other stuff for our cookout and eventually headed home.
I ended up getting everything for the egg hunt part for about $3. We also ended up with the cookies and each child got a new basket. We had tons of fun and I am looking forward to next years hunt already!

I am planning to join the "Easter Link Up" at Catholic Icing tomorrow so I need to get my ideas organized and get to posting. Stay tuned for some Easter ideas!

Alicia