4Real Forums: Need Parish Assumption Feast Day ideas

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Topic: Need Parish Assumption Feast Day ideas

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Donna Marie
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Posted: July 28 2009 at 12:58pm \| IP Logged

I have been 'nominated' to keep the kiddoes busy at our Parish feast day celebration/picnic. I NEED ideas, both game and craft to make the day extra-special!

We were thinking of a:
halo toss game
St. Peter's fishing game
some kinds of relay races????
a craft table (with what on it?)
simple prizes with a holy theme...

We will start the day with Holy Mass..then procession of Our Lady to the picnic area where we will have a special place reserved for her...rosary and then lots of eating and ...(whatever I can come up with). We will be both inside and outside.

This week is really nuts and I have to get my ducks in a row for a meeting on Thurs nite with the actual event being held on the 15th of August.

I guess the lady with lots of kids looks like a good person to delegate this to

Who am I to say no?

TIA!!

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Donna Marie from NJ
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Finding Elegant Simplicity

MaryM
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Posted: July 28 2009 at 2:21pm \| IP Logged

Donna Marie, I'm moving this thread to the Domestic Church forum.

This page on the Feast of the Assumption at Catholic Culture has a description of the various traditions around the world. Some of these could be adapted into the celebration.

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In many cultures this is the day for blessing the harvest of herbs. Polish custom even refers to it as the Feast of OUr Lady of the Herbs. So some herb related activities could be:

-To make an herb bouquet for the the families to take home to their table. Have Father bless them before everyone leaves.

-Or alternately have some herbs available that could be tied together in prep for drying and send those home to be hung for drying. Maybe each family could bring a bunch of a differnet herb.

-Making small potpourri bags or sachets with some of the more pleasant aromatic herbs (like lavendar).

-Guess the herb game. Have herbs (fresh or dried) in small cansiters or paper bags, and without looking, have chidren smell the scent and quess the herb. If they aren't familiar with the hebs, maybe it could start with a little herb study and smelling session, followed by the guessing game part.

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I thought the Italian custom of the horse race in the square could be used - maybe for your relay race - using stick horse.

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Feast of the Assumption shoe box triptych from a thread a few years ago.

I'll keep thinking...

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JennGM
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Posted: July 28 2009 at 2:24pm \| IP Logged

Perhaps you can find some ideas from these suggestions from Dorothy Spicer?

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Michaela
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Posted: July 28 2009 at 3:07pm \| IP Logged

I'm about to leave and don't have time to find it, but Alice of Cottage Blessings shared an Marian Star craft.

~Simple, inexpensive star ($1) from Michael's.
~Paint for clouds/sky
~Stickers (optional)
~an Assumption Holy Card
~glue stick
~ribbon to hang (optional)

Here is one my children made last year: Assumption Star

ETA: FOUND it!!!
Alice's post: Star of the Sea
It wasn't originally an "Assumption" craft after all.

Our hostess was creative and that's what it became for us.

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Momma to Nicholas 16, Nathan 13, Olivia 13, Teresa 6, & Anthony 3

Donna Marie
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Posted: Aug 15 2009 at 8:22pm \| IP Logged

Thank you all so much for the ideas. We had a great Assumption Feast Day picnic today.

We had a wonderful Mass (with all the trimmings!) followed by a procession to a special tent on the church grounds where we placed Our Lady for the Day overlooking the festivities...
We had a craft table with some wonderful coloring images of Our Lady and some Oriental Trading crafts. We also had loads of Christian prizes and "gold medals" from there...

It was hot so we did a lot with water including the super soaker challenge and the youth and then adult water balloon toss where we got our parish priest involved

We barbecued lots of meat and had a "stone soup" picnic explaining that we had to SHARE from our own homes dishes from the heart (that worked out very well).

We had a great local DJ who used to be on our local radio station playing oldies...we even had dance and twist competitions. (some adults overdid this of course) but made up for the ultra stretching by having a huge tug of war (adults vs the teens) and plenty of volleyball competitions.

We even had a petting zoo for the kids...and those animals and turtles and...were very cute!

We tried a halo toss...but the toddlers ran away with the halos and we just laughed...we had a David and Goliath bean bag toss competition...the toddlers confiscated that after awhile too.... and I learned that I had to WEAR the prizes so the kids didn't loot my box...either that or I have to put a Marine I know in charge of distribution

...tough audience..

There was so much of a family style camaraderie atmosphere and we were all sun-burnt and laughing by the end of the day! (us adults were all achey and needing a tall cold drink and a comfy chair by dinner time...and we will go back tomorrow to finish cleaning and trucking things to their proper homes. We even got a few donations for next year!

I did try and marry in the idea of Mary gardens and the symbolism of our faith when we were crafting with the kids. We even involved a very special parishioner who is 93! coloring an image of our lady...he has slowed so much this past year but he could hold a crayon and he did it very slowly and reverently. I couldn't stop grinning at him.

I have a lot of ideas that I want to try next year. I want to set up some things better so I can catechize people at the same time....more effectively with posters and books strewn around so they can 'catch' some wonderful ideas about their faith and make it fun...I got some ideas but I think I need to let them marinate in my mind for awhile....but I DO want to do that wonderful triptych idea next year for sure! and the star of the sea craft the kids will probably do with their friends in the near future too! I am glad I have some great crafty things in my mind ready to go...I am so bad at dreaming up my own some days!

Thanks again..just thought I would let you know how it came out!

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Donna Marie from NJ
hs momma to 9dc!!
Finding Elegant Simplicity

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