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Kelly
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OK, what great ideas do people out there have for celebrating the Feast Day of Mary??? Inspire me, please!
Kelly in FL
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Kelly
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Excuse me, I mean the Birthday of Mary! 
Kelly in FL
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Marybeth
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We placed our largest statue of her on our buffet table. You see her immediately when you come up our stairs to the main level. I placed candles all around it. We are having a birthday cake and decorating the house. We will be reading our Mary story books the next few days.
I am interested to hear other people's ideas.
Marybeth
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alicegunther
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Our Mary is born on the Feast of the Birth of Mary, so we always celebrate in a big way, with a special cake and singing. We also try to attend Mass and the children spend time picking flowers in the garden to place before our large statue of Our Lady of Fatima.
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mother of seven!
     
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Brew yourself a cup of tea, and come for a visit!
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Marybeth
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Oh, Alice, what a beautiful birthday for your little Mary to have!
I hope she has a wonderful day.
We would love to pick flowers on Thursday except the drought didn't leave too many behind for us to enjoy! 
Maybe we will shop for a little bouquet.
Happy celebrating!!
Marybeth
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Marybeth
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I was just doing a little on-line research for Mary's birthday. Does anyone know of a good site to get some nice coloring pages?
I saw how to make a cake and decorate with ten candles one for each Hail Mary for a decade of the rosary.
Marybeth
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jdostalik
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Hi Marybeth,
I did a quick search and found these lovely coloring pages , including one of my favorite images of our Lady as Madonna of the Streets.
Alice, my littlest, Tess, was born on the Feast of Mary's Birth, too! She turns 1 year old this week, so we plan on making a birthday cake in honor of Our Lady (and Tess!), and doing the activity from CHC's A Year with God. We hope to pray our evening Rosary with the added Litany of the Blessed Virgin Mary. What a wonderful day to celebrate the gift of life! 
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Jennifer in TX
wife to Bill, mom to six here on earth and eight in heaven.
Let the Little Ones Come
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alicegunther
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jdostalik wrote:
| Alice, my littlest, Tess, was born on the Feast of Mary's Birth, too! |
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How lovely! Happy Birthday, Tess!
We are truly blessed.
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Love, Alice
mother of seven!
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Marybeth
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Happy Birthday Tess!!
Thanks Jennifer for the coloring pages. I just printed out one of the Holy Family.
We are off to visit a 33 ft. statue of Mary which travels throughout the Chicagoland area. It is at our parish from 9/4-9/11. They are having Confessions, a rosary procession, Mass and a birthday party for Mary. It should be just a glorious time.
God bless,
Marybeth
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Karen E.
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Tomorrow is also my Elizabeth's baptismal birthday, so we always celebrate doubly as well. Cake for Lizzy and in honor of Our Lady, and in the past the girls and I have:
*made birthday cards for Mary
*made wall decorations in honor of Mary (using blue, discussing it as Mary's color -- one year the girls used paper plates and tissue paper and made abstract blue designs, and another year they did pictures of Mary)
*discussed what the Immaculate Conception means
*watched a video about St. Bernadette
*made a special effort to pray Marian prayers, or to learn a new one
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Karen E.
mom to three on earth, and several souls in God's care
Visit my blog, with its shockingly clever title, "Karen Edmisten."
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MaryM
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Karen E. wrote:
| *discussed what the Immaculate Conception means |
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A great video on Mary is the one from Steve Ray in the Footprints of God series (Mary video summary). It really brings the Marian teachings to life and is enjoyable for children as well as adults. Karen's comment made me think of how Steve Ray presents this doctrine in the video. Many of you are probably familiar with this analogy of the Immaculate Conception:
"Suppose a man falls into a deep pit, and someone reaches down to pull him out. The man has been "saved" from the pit. Now imagine a woman walking along, and she too is about to topple into the pit, but at the very moment that she is to fall in, someone holds her back and prevents her. She too has been saved from the pit, but in an even better way: She was not simply taken out of the pit, she was prevented from getting stained by the mud in the first place. This is the illustration Christians have used for a thousand years to explain how Mary was saved by Christ."
In the video Steve Ray actually does a visual illustration of this analogy which I think is great for kids.
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Mary M. in Denver
Our Domestic Church
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Karen E.
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MaryM wrote:
"Suppose a man falls into a deep pit, and someone reaches down to pull him out. The man has been "saved" from the pit. Now imagine a woman walking along, and she too is about to topple into the pit, but at the very moment that she is to fall in, someone holds her back and prevents her. She too has been saved from the pit, but in an even better way: She was not simply taken out of the pit, she was prevented from getting stained by the mud in the first place. This is the illustration Christians have used for a thousand years to explain how Mary was saved by Christ."
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Kimberly Hahn used this same analogy to talk about how God saved her from a sinful life -- she said she used to give a witness talk that began, "God saved me from a life of drinking, drugs and promiscuity ..." and she went on to explain that by His grace she had been saved from those things before ever experiencing them.
I've also used baptism to explain the Immaculate Conception to the kids -- I tell them, "You know how each of us must be baptized in order to be washed clean of original sin? When God allowed Mary to be without sin while she was still in her mother's womb, that was God's way of 'baptizing' her directly."
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Karen E.
mom to three on earth, and several souls in God's care
Visit my blog, with its shockingly clever title, "Karen Edmisten."
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JennGM
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Just passing along some links for the feastday:
Devotion to Maria Bambina (Baby Mary)
Birthday of Mary from Women for Faith and Family
Catholic Culture's Nativity of Mary ideas
I love the idea of a birthday cake. I also like to decorate with blue and fleur-de-lis. I might pick up a bunch of flowers that symbolize Mary for our table setting. Putting out blue candles and singing "Happy Birthday" to Mary is very simple, but will bring home the message to my almost 2yo son. Candles (any shape) means singing Happy Birthday.
How about making some cookies in the shapes of Marian symbols, such as the above-mentioned fleur-de-lys? (Could someone please tell me which is the accepted spelling?) Or decorating simple cookies with blue and white icing? Yummy!
Poor ds can't have many of these treats...so I'm trying to think of ways to incorporate "blue" into the foods he can have...nothing with eggs, wheat or milk. Right now, I'm thinking blue popsicles or dyeing some Italian ice blue. He'll love it. But blueberries will be included if they look good at the store.
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Jennifer G. Miller
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Family in Feast and Feria
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Meredith
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Karen E. wrote:
| I've also used baptism to explain the Immaculate Conception to the kids -- I tell them, "You know how each of us must be baptized in order to be washed clean of original sin? When God allowed Mary to be without sin while she was still in her mother's womb, that was God's way of 'baptizing' her directly." |
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Karen, I love this . What a great way to explain Our Lady's special sinlessness. I've always tried to explain it by means of her blessedness and that God made her the most holy woman on earth, even more holy than Eve, due to her commiting the original sin, but the baptism concept is wonderful! Thank you  .
Jenn, thank you too for the great list of sites, they look great.
The coloring pages are a site I haven't seen before either, thanks Jennifer!
Happy Feast!
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Meredith
Mom of 4 Sweeties
Sweetness and Light
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JennGM
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A couple more thoughts:
A cupcake rosary would be a great dessert.
I'm thinking blue glitter or blue sanding sugar would be fun to use in decorating a craft or food (choose your weapon )
Also found an interesting entry from Wilson's Almanac. Scroll down. I love getting folklore of weather related to feast days:
The Pennsylvania Dutch sing
It’s Blessed Virgin’s Birthday,
The swallows do depart;
Far to the South they fly away,
And sadness fills my heart.
But after snow and ice and rain
They will in March return again.
A wonderful custom that our family used on the feast of the Immaculate Conception but it could also be brought out for this day is The Mary Candle. There are different entries with similar ideas:
Mary Candle II
Advent or Mary Candle I
Advent or Mary Candle II.
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Jennifer G. Miller
Wife to & ds1 '03 & ds2 '07
Family in Feast and Feria
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MaryM
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jenngm67 wrote:
| A cupcake rosary would be a great dessert. |
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I think we are saving that one for next month on the Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary (although, I'm sure no one would complain if I made cupcakes twice!) I think I'm going to do the mini-muffin cupcakes instead of full size. What have others done?
jenngm67 wrote:
The Pennsylvania Dutch sing
It’s Blessed Virgin’s Birthday,
The swallows do depart;
Far to the South they fly away,
And sadness fills my heart.
But after snow and ice and rain
They will in March return again.
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I love the swallow connection and the mention of returning in March - ties in to the swallows' return to Capistrano on St. Joseph's Feast Day.
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Mary M. in Denver
Our Domestic Church
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alicegunther
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jenngm67 wrote:
A couple more thoughts:
A cupcake rosary would be a great dessert.
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Jenn, that is BRILLIANT!!!!! I am going to do this with my Little Flowers group.
Years ago, I let all the girls make round suncatchers and asked them to sign their names. The circles formed a beautiful rosary in our sunroom. We had a priest friend visit, and I even asked him to make a circle and sign it. Our family spent the year praying for each and every person who signed a circle. It was truly special.
This cupcake suggestion reminds me of those suncatchers. If you were having a few friends over, you could ask five of the moms to provide 10 cupcakes each in pastel shades. What a beautiful idea!
Love, Alice
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Love, Alice
mother of seven!
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momwise
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MaryM wrote:
| I think I'm going to do the mini-muffin cupcakes instead of full size. |
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Ooohhh.....that's a great idea! The thought of 50+ cupcakes has kept me from ever doing this. This is now going to be the plan for Our Lady of the Rosary
alicegunther wrote:
| Years ago, I let all the girls make round suncatchers and asked them to sign their names. The circles formed a beautiful rosary in our sunroom. |
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Alice, how did you do that? Did you tie them up in the window at varying heights to form an actual Rosary? (hey I know it's another dumb question but remember I'm the one who tried to picture the Decl. of Ind. written on a butterfly wing )
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Gwen...wife for 30 years, mom of 7, grandma of 3.....
"If you want equal justice for all and true freedom and lasting peace, then America, defend life." JPII
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JennGM
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momwise wrote:
MaryM wrote:
| I think I'm going to do the mini-muffin cupcakes instead of full size. |
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Ooohhh.....that's a great idea! The thought of 50+ cupcakes has kept me from ever doing this. This is now going to be the plan for Our Lady of the Rosary |
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I really like the mini-muffin idea! I was thinking making a decade rosary...12 muffin tin makes 10 hail marys, Our Father and Glory Be for a mini-celebration! I think I would save the 50 plus for the actual feast of the Rosary!
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Jennifer G. Miller
Wife to & ds1 '03 & ds2 '07
Family in Feast and Feria
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alicegunther
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momwise wrote:
Alice, how did you do that? Did you tie them up in the window at varying heights to form an actual Rosary? (hey I know it's another dumb question but remember I'm the one who tried to picture the Decl. of Ind. written on a butterfly wing ) |
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Gwen, you couldn't ask a dumb question if you tried!
Yes, the room we had was all windows, so I arranged the suncatchers in a pleasing Rosary shape. The circles did not need "chain" to attach them. I just clustered the slightly smaller circles (about 5 inches in diameter) in groups of ten with larger "Our Father" circles (about 8 inches in diameter) between them. Then I had my own children make a Blessed Mother medal and a cross--all out of inexpensive black construction paper, contact and colored tissue! The suncatchers gave the whole project a stained glass effect, although it faded a bit with time. I think if I'd used kite paper instead of tissue, it would have lasted longer.
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Love, Alice
mother of seven!
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Topic: Birthday of Mary
