Celebrating Pentecost, the Birthday of the Church

Our Annual Pentecost Cake

Since Pentecost if the Birthday of the Church, our family always celebrates with a birthday cake! Our cake is usually a white cake with white frosting since Pentecost is also known as Whitsunday. The large candle in the center represents Christ our Light, who promised to send the Holy Ghost, and the 12 smaller white candles represent the 12 Apostles and the tongues of fire. The 7 red hearts (strawberry slices on this cake) represent the 7 gifts of the Holy Ghost, and the 12 strawberries, placed around the cake, represent the 12 fruits of the Holy Ghost.

 

I didn't realize until looking back through some past pictures that "Rose" wore that same rose covered outfit as a baby on Pentecost Sunday 10 years ago... How has that possibly been 10 years already?!?

Scroll through past Pentecost Sunday posts here and over at Catholic Cuisine.

Flower Fruit Sandwiches in May

O Mary we crown thee with blossoms today!

Queen of the Angels and Queen of the May.

Bring flowers of the rarest

bring blossoms the fairest,

from garden and woodland and hillside and dale;

... our full hearts are swelling,

our glad voices telling

the praise of the loveliest flower of the vale!

 

O Mary we crown thee with blossoms today!

Queen of the Angels and Queen of the May.

Flower Fruit Sandwiches for Our Lady over at Catholic Cuisine

End-of-School Interviews

Who else is ready for summer break?! We are so ready and I am excited to finally pack up this past year's school books and start making some plans for next year. On May 8th I sent Kolbe Academy all of the required paperwork for our high school students records/transcripts and on May 14th the older boys took their last final exam (here at home due to the shutdown) wrapping up their freshman year of college!

Years ago I started compiling End-of-School Interviews for each of our children and I've been making them every year since. It's so fun to look back through them and see how much our students have grown each year and how their answers change over the years. I actually used them for graduation party decorations last summer! 

I didn't plan to continue interviewing our college kids, but we changed up some of the questions and they were more than willing to join the fun once again. Our 16 year old got the project started this year, asking everyone all the questions, helping take and/or choose photos, and then helping to compile it all in PicMonkey.

Here are this year's End-of-School Interviews (revised with blog nicknames):

Captain's Favorite Books: The Odyssey and Beowulf

Ranger's Favorite Books: Inferno and St. Augustine's Confessions

Twinkle Toes' Favorite Books: Black as Night, Waking Rose and The Brides of Montclair

(none of these were actually school books...) 

Chiquita's Favorite Books: Oliver Twist, Mansfield Park, and North & South

Snuggles' Favorite Books: The Hobbit and LOTR

Rose's Favorite Books: The Little House Series and Stories about St. Therese and St. Clare

Bud's Favorite Book: The Hobbit: Illustrated Edition

Grace's Favorite Books: Madeline

My Favorite Toys: Chews Life Rosaries and Cuddle+Kind Dolls

(*All the kids have voted to change our sweet baby's blog name from Lily to Joy. It fits her perfectly.) 

Looking Back: 2011-2012, 2012-2013, 2013-2014, 2014-2015, 2015-2016, 2016-2017

Hiking on Mother's Day

On Mother's Day some of my kids and I headed to a nearby trailhead to hike for the afternoon! It was a little more intense than I had imagined... The hike down to the river was easy, but I ended logging 5 1/2 miles on my FitBit and 89 flights of stairs by the time we got back... Whew! Next time I hope we can all go, but perhaps find a different route back to the car which doesn't include practically scaling the side of the mountain like the loop we ended up taking... It did motivate me to continue working towards getting back in shape so that next time my kids won't have to worry about their hyperventilating mother. Nevertheless, it was a gorgeous day and we all enjoyed it so much! 

 

 

   

“The way Jesus shows you is not easy. Rather, it is like a path winding up a mountain. Do not lose heart! The steeper the road, the faster it rises towards ever wider horizons.” - St. John Paul II