Thursday, February 26, 2015

Bingo Night

As a part of this month's virtue Kindness we wanted to show some kindness to people outside of our little group. What better way to do that than to visit the lovely ladies and gentlemen at Elmcroft Assisted Living and spend a nice evening playing bingo with them?

Everything was nicely set up when we arrived so we settled in and waited for the rest of the players to arrive. At first the girls were a little shy and the older folks had a hard time hearing their whispered answers but after the first couple of bingos had been called and the girls realized that this was a place where they could use their "outside voices" we had a great time.
Some of the participants clearly played for the prizes and smiled like little kids when they got to take their pick from an array of sweets and snacks. Others very much enjoyed the company and we had some nice conversations going on throughout the evening.

After the last bingo was called the girls helped put away all the tables and chairs. Once everything was back in place we thanked everyone for the lovely evening and headed out into the single digit winter weather.

Monday, February 23, 2015

Kindness - Complete Notes



One problem with waiting to write up a blog after a meeting is that I tend to forget!!  Boy is my memory getting bad as I get older.  Anyway, fortunately for me, the mom who led it, had her notes written up.  Here are the notes for Kindness.  Thank you, Christie.



-Tonight we are going to talk about kindness, its such a simple word, such a simple action and it can have huge results!

-our memory verse is…be kind to one another, compassionate and mutually forgiving, just as God has forgiven you in Christ.

-If I say to you, kind words can be short and easy to speak but their echoes are truly endless, what do you think this means?  This was actually a quote from Mother Teresa.  This quote is true because acting with kindness is so easy to do that it is also easy to forget.  Kindness comes out of charity, out of love.  Kindness could be said to be the motivation for every virtue we practice.

-Kindness is not a complex virtue to explain, its challenge comes in making it a habit that is never broken.  We are kind to those we know, our own circle of friends but not with those who look different or act different.  We are kind to our own but cold with the stranger.  Your goal is to practice kindness even when it is uncomfortable to do so.

-How many of you have heard the phrase random acts of kindness?  Some examples would be paying for someone’s toll or picking up a friends dropped keys.  This is great encouragement; however our faith would encourage us to be kind on purpose.  Not randomly, not without thought, but done on purpose and out of habit.  We shouldn’t have to think about stooping to pick up a drop paper or holding the door for the next person we just do it.

-This is #4 in your books,   I want you to think about the last week, think about when people were kind to you, your siblings and others, (after they give some ideas) now, from these ideas of how others were kind to you, let’s make a list of ways you can be kind.

-In the bible Paul speaks of the Fruits of the Holy Spirit.  Paul challenges us to act out of freedom and love and kindness.  I want to read part of this now….read   Galatians chapter 5 verse 13.  In a few minutes we will be making a fruit tree illustrating the fruits of the holy spirit, this way you can hang it in your house to help your family remember.  This is #5 in your books

-Our Saint this month is St. Marie-Marguarite d’Youville, here is a little information about her:
She was born in 1771 in Quebec Canada.  Marguarite was able to attend the Ursuline school in Montreal.  She married Francois d’Youville a fur trader in 1722 with whom she had 6 children.  In 1730 her husband died and she had also lost many of her children to sickness and hardship.  By 1737 both of Marguarites remaining sons had become priests and Marguarite had joined with other women in serving the sick and the poor.  They formed the first Canadian Sisters of Charity and became known as the Grey Nuns.  These women attracted others to join their order and spent their lives doing good for others.  Her Grey Nuns spread throughout Canada founding schools, hospitals, orphanages and more.  They are especially known for their great work among the Eskimo.  Margurite died in 1771 and was canonized by Pope John Paul II in 1990.  Her feast day is April 11.

-Our Country this month is Canada, our neighbor to the north.  The US shares a border with Canada it this border is the longest shared border between two countries.  It is a peaceful border with altercations between the 2 countries virtually nonexistent.   Has anyone ever been to Canada?  What can you tell us about it?

-we have two short crafts tonight the first one I already told you is the fruit tree, and we will be also making a craft that illustrates a quote about being kind.   This is #7 in your book.   There are a number of beautiful quotes about being kind from the scripture, here are a few…read the quotes.   

Then explain the crafts.

Here is the first craft.  It came from Oriental Trading


I will need to add a picture of the second craft. The girls got to use different scrapbook paper to cut out apples.  They pasted their "fruits" of the spirit onto each and glued them onto a tree.



Quotes about being kind


-Acts 20:35b - It is more blessed to give than to receive.

-“Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless.” 
 
Mother Teresa

-Ephesians 4:32 - Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.
-Matthew 25:35 -For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me,

-You cannot do a kindness too soon, for you never know how soon it will be too late.  Ralph Waldo Emerson 
-It's nice to be important, but it's more important to be nice. ~Author Unknown

-Kindness, like a boomerang, always returns. ~Author Unknown

-Be a rainbow in someone else’s cloud. ~Maya Angelou

-Kindness is the greatest wisdom. ~Author Unknown

-A single act of kindness throws out roots in all directions, and the roots spring up and make new trees. ~Amelia Earhart



***We will be doing our Baby Shower in May so that will take care of #8

***After the lesson  #’s  4, 5, 7, and 8 are completed.

Another Successful Cookie Sale

I think I've finally recovered from our cookie sale.  It really was a lot of work, but once again, we had a very successful year!!  We made $266.50 from our little 50 cent cookie sale.  What was really amazing is that we were almost completely sold out before the 11 am Mass.  The selection was looking so sad by that time, we didn't even have the sale announced at the Mass.  We sold out!!

It started on the Sunday before, I made all the dough for the cookies. We were so blessed this year to be able to use the parish kitchen to bake the cookies.  On Monday morning, 4 of us got together.  It took us less than 2 hours to bake over 200 cookies.  The past 2 years, it would take an entire day to make the cookies in my oven.  Look at this beauty!!! We packaged them all and put them in the freezer.  It was nice to be able to put them in the church freezer instead of worrying about having room in mine.


On Friday, I made 100 chocolate covered pretzels, 5 batches of Rice Krispy Treats and 8 batches of frosting.  My kids kept letting me know that if I should happen to break any of the pretzels, they would be more than happy to eat them for me.  Such generous kids!

Saturday morning, we met at the church to decorate all of those delicious cookies.  This is a huge job.  I learned a very valuable lesson this year.  We didn't have as many moms to help this year and we were lacking one very important job, someone to really supervise the girls.  While the moms were frosting, the girls were putting sprinkles on the cookies.  When I say putting on the sprinkles, I should be saying DUMPING on the sprinkles.  Wow, did we go through a lot of sprinkles.  A whole lot more than in the past couple years.  It made for huge mess to clean up.  This doesn't even come close to the mess that was made.  So next year, one mom will just sit with the girls to keep an eye on things and there will be lots of plates for the girls to sprinkle over!!  Packaging all the cookies is what takes us the longest.  I still think the pretty packaging helps sell all those cookies!!



Next year we need to double Mary's famous chocolate chip cookies and add at least a couple more batches of sugar cookies. 

Thank you Lord for our very generous parish!