A Simple Way to Involve Older Children in Almsgiving This Lent (or Anytime!)

When I asked my youngest what he thought we should add to our Pray-Fast-Give chain this year for fasting, one of his first answers was, "Buy food to put it in bags for the homeless."

I knew right away why he had said it.

Last Sunday, as we were on our way home from Mass, we pulled up at a stoplight where a homeless gentleman was standing. It was cold, and we had a blanket in the car, so we handed it out the window to the man, but, sadly, did not have any food, warm socks, or other things on hand to gift him.

So it is that, as a part of our Lenten practices, we are hoping to repeat a Works of Mercy effort that some of our homeschool friends and us got together for during Advent: Making Blessing Bags!

To make the bags, each family that was participated shared what they would be bringing using this helpful how-to as a guide for what the homeless might find helpful or not.

Then, upon arrival at the host house, we set up a "buffet" table of sorts with piles of 25 of each item.

Younger children went in another room and made hand drawn cards and pictures to include in the bags, while older children and parents each stood behind a pile and we passed a bag from one to another, filling it assembly-line style.

It took less than an hour to assemble all the bags, inclusive of the time it took to reassemble the few bags which had zippers break or were just not closing due to the way that space-taking items such as a bottle of water, thick socks, and foot warmers had been put in amongst smaller items.

So, making Blessing Bags truly proved to be a simple project that brought us together as a homeschool community to prepare to help our larger community.

We hope to have another Blessing Bag get together this Lent and encourage you to try it with family or friends.

Among the things in ours, were all the things pictured below, plus tuna and crackers and water.

We pray this idea inspires you in your almsgiving and would appreicate hearing your ideas, too!

6 Questions to Help Prepare for Lenten Fasting

Fasting.

How do you get your tweens and teens to want to fast?

With only one older child here who seems to "get" Lenten fasting and two who now tend, sadly, to fight fasting more and more each year, I have been thinking about how to approach this part of our Lenten practice this year.

I decided that I will start with six reflective questions, see what my family's private and shared answers are, and, then, go from there as we choose fasting ideas for our Pray-Fast-Give chain and personal Lenten practices.

Perhaps the questions will help lead your and yours into more meaningful fasting this Lent, too.

1. Are there habits that we engage in that are destructive to our spiritual health?
2. Which areas of our lives feels unbalanced?
3. What causes discord in our family or disorder in our days?
4. To what are we devoting too much time or not enough?
5. To what materials things are we too attached?
   
6. Where do we think God is asking to to grow or to let go in order to better love Him and others?

My hope is that in reflecting upon and discussing these questions, my children will find plenty of purposeful fodder for fasting during our Lenten journeys.

How do you approach ideas for fasting with your growing children? I would love to hear about it!

May God draw each of us closer to Him as we enter into Lent and place increased focus on prayer, fasting, and almsgiving (service and Works of Mercy.).\

20 Prayer Ideas for Lent

Okay, I admit it: I have not even gotten all of our Christmas books and nativity sets put away and, yet, Lent is almost here.

With the way our life's been rolling, I don't think we'll embrace many of the traditions and customs which we have for Lent in prior years. I do, know, however, that I will attempt to keep my family focused daily on the three pillars of Lent - prayer, fasting, and almsgiving.

Thus, I sat down and quickly brainstormed ideas to suggest to my children for for personal Lenten prayer practices as well as for our collective pray-fast-give chain this year. Although most of these are no-brainers, I am sharing them here in case they might inspire you in deciding what to focus on or add to your own Lenten journey with prayer

1. Attend Mass daily whenever possible.
2. Make a spiritual communion together on days when we cannot get to Mass.
3. Make frequent confessions.
4. Get to Adoration.
5. Spend extra time reading Scripture.
6. Get back to praying the Rosary together more often (as opposed to Mom praying it on her own.)
   
7. Read The Creed in Slow Motion together.
8. Attend all or part of a local Lenten mission.
9. Pray the Stations of the Cross.
10. Make a special prayer notebook and list all of the people in our lives that need prayers. Pray for them daily, and add someone new daily.
11. Return to doing a guided examen at nights.
12. Pray the Jesus Prayer throughout each day.
13. Reflect daily on which of the seven capital sins we have been slave to and pray for an increase in its corresponding virtue.
14. Pray together every time we get into our vehicle, not just the first time each day.
15. Pick someone new each day to offer our challenges and sacrifices for.
16. Pay special attention to the intercessions at daily Mass and choose one to pray for especially throughout the day.
17. Go to bed five to ten minutes early and spend extra time chatting with God.
18. Spend an extra five minutes a day in Spiritual Reading.
19. Notice what world event pops up on our screens at the start of each day and pray specifically for the people involved.
20. Spend several minutes in silence each day inviting the Lord to speak to our hearts,

I would love to hear some of the ways you'll be adding extra prayers into your Lenten journey.

Enjoy Simple Eats with Our Lady of Lourdes

French toast is super easy to make - even if your gluten-free like some of us. So, it has become one of our go-to's for celebrating the liturgical year at home on Feburary 11, the Memorial of Our Lady of Lourdes.

Why French toast? Because Our Lady appeared in Lourdes, France.

And, of course, one of our toppings is always Our Lady's blue(berries).

We also sometimes serve something yellow - such as defrosted frozen mango chunks or chunked pineapple to remind us of the yellow roses at the feet of the apparition of Our Lady of Lourdes.

And to drink? Water, of course, which reminds us of the miraculous and healing spring in Lourdes.

For decoration at the table, we typically put out our Our Lady of Lourdes and St. Bernadette peg dolls from our Marian apparation set.

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Then, if our day is not too jam-packed, besides praying and recalling the story of Our Lady of Lourdes, we revisit a variety of stories or movies, which include:

The Saints Chronicles, Collection 3

Source: Amazon

Bernadette: Our Lady's Little Servant.

Source: Amazon

 Saint Bernadette Soubirous: And Our Lady of Lourdes.

Source: Amazon

Saint Bernadette: the Little Girl of Lourdes.  

Source: Amazon

Our Lady of Lourdes Coloring Book

Source: Amazon

Bernadette, Princess of Lourdes

The Song of Bernadette

If you're celebrating, too, you might consider having an Our Lady of Lourdes Poet-Tea like we did in the past.

Source: Training Happy Hearts

Some years, we even get fancier with our eats, such as they year we hosted an Our Lady of Lourdes Poet-Tea.

We also sometimes play our All Saints Day Build-a-Grotto for Mary game!

Always, we are blessed by our simple eats with the saints.

Perhaps you can enjoy similar simple eats and blessings!

Our Lady of Lourdes, pray for us!