In my last post I discussed that we can take this time of less outward distraction (i.e. social distancing and quarantine) to really pay full attention to the rhythm of the Church year and celebrate and anticipate the Great Feasts just as we might have been anticipating the end of the school year or a big community event. My daughter keeps asking me “It is still Easter?!” and I keep smiling and…
Christ is Risen! I was reflecting last Sunday as we were “in church” how much more difficult it is to engage our children in church without all of the ritual and sensory experience that our physical church provides. I remember when I became a mother how it felt like going to church with children was so hard. Don’t get me wrong it has lots of challenges! Not only in trying to help…
I mentioned in an earlier blog post that any moment with children can be used as a moment to invite God into the conversation. I also notice that children take the same opportunity. You may notice in your homes that your children do “Church celebrations” or “do Church” as in they want to imitate, in their pretend play, the joyous prayer and celebration that they are witness to through the life of…
Christ is risen!! Not sure how you all are doing, but I am seriously missing the rhythm of Great Lent and Holy Week. I really miss the excuse to watch services everyday and the anticipation leading up to Pascha. On Bright Tuesday I found myself rewatching Bright Mondays service. But that just didn’t seem authentic. And then I fell right off the bandwagon and aside from a boisterous singing of “Christ is…
A blessed Holy Week to all of you reading this this week. I originally wrote this much earlier and I’m only able to post it now after struggling with my login here. At any rate, if you are reading it another day, remember, it doesn’t need to be Holy Week to talk with your kids about Christ’s death and resurrection – we should be talking about it and marveling at it as…
The credit for this idea goes 100% to the Orthodox Parenting Blog. I read about it through their newsletter a few weeks ago. The basic idea is to find a jar and fill it with Psalms, prayers, wise words from Saints and holy elders, etc. In our family we’ve been using it at the end of morning prayers and trying to do a little bit of memory work. One of my dearest…
Make a joyful noise unto the Lord, all ye lands. Serve the Lord with gladness: come before his presence with singing. Know ye that the Lord he is God: it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture. Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, and into his courts with praise: be thankful unto him, and bless his name. For the…
As I lie here writing this I can hear the recording of an old service playing in my kid’s room. As I mentioned before we have been “doing” a lot of church these days – as I’m having the services on playing each evening. But it’s very different than being in church. Especially for our children. So how can we try and make this church at home feel more substantial? Well we…
The first small share I have is actually something that I had planned months before this whole pandemic struck and got started Forgiveness Sunday. At my daughter’s preschool they did a craft like this in the stairwell around Saint Valentine’s day answering the question – What does it means to be a friend? Each child wrote an answer on a paper flower and stuck it on the vine. In our home we…
A personal reflection Well I had been working on plenty of other blog posts for this month. A few months ago we had some deaths of those close to us- some expected and some less so. It had me thinking and pondering a lot on speaking of death with our children. And that post is still pending for the future, but things just got very real very quickly and it doesn’t seem…