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Monday, September 1, 2008

Teatime Preparations and Liturgical Year Celebrations

In preparing for a new school year (now approaching a warp speed), I felt the need to organize my Teatime decorations and "accessories". Teatimes are a fairly new tradition around here, so for the past year, I have been collecting everything from candles to fabric to picture frames. All in liturgical colors, all going into one spot.......my overstuffed china closet. So this year, now that I have acquired a decent amount of Liturgical "decor", I wanted a way to organize it. So here we go.....

Each of these photo boxes contains the items for a certain liturgical season or theme. In this picture I have a boxes for 1. The Saints 2. The Blessed Mother 3. Advent 4. Lent.

In each box is the appropriately colored cloths for our family altar and for use in our Teatimes. Also included are candles, a few framed pictures, candle holders, napkin rings, and odds and ends (decor and kids crafts). All of these things are now ready for use when it is the right time. No more weeding through the china closet drawer anymore.I also tried to make the boxes the right "color" for the liturgical season or theme (I'm a very visual person). I did ok with what we had, but today, after taking these photos, I purchased 2 lavender boxes to be for Lent and Advent (on sale at Michael's!). There is a bunch of stuff that will work for many Teatimes, so those items remain in my china closet drawer. Things like shaped muffin tins, paper doilies, religious artwork, misc. candles, etc.

Our Teatime craft supplies are mostly kept in the garage on a shelf. I have 3 boxes of these supplies out there. A list of what those boxes contain is in here at my desk.

This is what the boxes look like on the shelf, under our family altar (I didn't have the lavender ones when taking this photo).

The floral box on the top shelf contains our rosaries, Mysteries of the Rosary prints and prayer books.

Another thing I do to plan for our Teatimes, is keep a Teatime Basket. It sits high on top of my bookcase (out of Evan's reach). In it I place the upcoming week's Teatime supplies as I collect them.

I will usually have :

1. The children's bulletin from my mom

2. A story that ties into the "theme" (usually a Catholic Mosaic story

3. any supplies needed for the craft (including glue, scissors, etc.)

4. doilies or any other special touches

5. the appropriate holy card (one for framing and displaying and 3 for the girls to do a craft with.

6. a prayer

7. the cloth in the right liturgical color.

By gathering this all up in one spot, and keeping it all together, I save time and I'm able to just grab the basket when it's Teatime.

It has gotten very late. Morning comes too fast, these days, so I'm heading off to bed. I'll be back tomorrow to post some of our lesson plans, or maybe photos of our very recent vacation!

TTFN

~Tina

5 comments:

Grandma Jo said...

Yes, I'll these crafts and organizational things are very interesting, but I do want to see vacation photos! Love you all!

Grandma Jo said...

I could use those boxes for my CCD classes. But I have just barely started collecting. I'll have to get to JoAnn Fabric's to get some liturgical color materials and go from there. I like to set up a prayer table for each class according to the liturgical time of year - and I usually wear that color to class, also. Helps the students remember. Good luck with the new school year!
Love you all!

Anonymous said...

This is just a beautiful idea. I'm going to have to borrow it!

Aliadelaide said...

I love this idea, being organised ahead of time. Not sure I can get a whole year organised but maybe I could do it a season in advance. Could you e-mail me what you put in your lenten box?

Tina said...

Aliadelaide,
I'm actually working on this as I go along, too. I pulled from what I have to sort out by liturgical season or theme, and I plan on adding to each box as I acquire or we create new things. But to answer your question, in my Lenten box, I currently have a purple altar cloth, a purple beeswax candle, a ceramic crown of thorns and scroll with a poem on it and a crown of thorns pin on a card. I plan to make (with my girls) and add simple purple napkin rings for our teatimes and some type of candleholders. Sorry, don't have your email address to send this to you directly.