St. Mary Magdalene Day

I feel like it has been a long time since I have done anything for my patron saint’s day. I tried to make it a priority this year, but it ended up only going half way. I did manage to make the Magdalenbokt, or Magdalene fingers which O made the very first time Zi celebrated this back when we lived at the Laburnum Bungalow. (I managed to have white sanding sugar on hand this time instead of pink. 😆) I’m always saving recipes for different madeleines, and yet I never remember this idea and default to my copy of Cooking With the Saints which has two almond themed desserts in it. Maybe I’ll remember next summer? Or maybe I’ll try the pumpkin ones this fall and that will trigger me doing it properly next July.



In any event I did get the cookies made and set out a humble tea table outside.



I did not have the memory or energy to get the little Magdalene icon I bought this Lent in advance of Easter. 

My mom happened to be dropping by with some birdseed at about the same time so she socially distanced a cookie for herself. Little Miss was
 not at all interested in having her picture taken. But look at how long her hair is getting!

My Mary Magdalene rose is also in bloom which is nice. It was my intention to have a little bouquet of these for our tea, but I didn’t manage to get that together either.

St. Peter’s Day

Ever since I learned there is a St. Peter’s fish I have tried to get ahold of some or prepare another white fish for St. Peter’s Day. It is often hot this time of year and fish doesn’t require that much time in the oven so it seems like a good plan. With the quarantine this year we have been totally cooped up and feeling a bit stir crazy. One of Deuce’s Bffs has a family beach house and they were able to shelter in place there for a few months. They are back in town now and I casually mentioned that if they ever have any midweek cancellations that we would live to rent it. I went a couple years ago with my grade school girlfriends and have been wanting to take Mr. W there. Lucky for us they did have a cancellation so we were able to spend 4 nights here.

I had already picked out my recipes for St. Peter’s Day so I decided that we could just prepare it at the coast instead, fresh fish is always appropriate when you are so close to the ocean. The pickings were a little slim in Manzanita as well as a couple other fish markets in nearby towns so we substituted halibut instead. We made this fish and I found this tahini sauce to accompany it. It was my first time making the sauce and it was SO good! Little Miss helped to make the sauce.

We also made an orzo salad to go with the fish and fresh fruit since we knew the kids wouldn’t eat the 

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We also bought a marionberry pie from the local bakery.



In nearby Arch Cape there is the St. Peter the Fisherman parish. T-Bone and I have been there before for Mass on another vacation. I did not get the kids up early enough to go to daily Mass, but we did drive by and enjoyed the artwork outside.

There is so much wildlife to enjoy at our friends’ house. We’ve been seeing tons of humming birds, some bunnies and chipmunks, and today I went to sit in a quiet corner to take a zoom call and discovered a pair of deer right outside!

Easter Egg Tree

My mother has a table top Easter egg tree to display her collection of hanging eggs. I was inspired to maybe start a collection myself and during the 5th week of Lent I decided to look into purchasing a little tree. But then I found this article about Ostereierbaum, outdoor German Easter egg trees. I decided that our young cascara tree would be a good place to start. Another part of my inspiration was the little tin eggs that were offered in the Emma Bridgewater Easter line, so cute!

When I saw the pictures of live trees  covered with eggs I figured it was a good way to use up the bag of plastic eggs I have in the attic. I prefer to do egg hunts with real, hardboiled, decorated eggs and yet I have accumulated all these eggs from church egg hunts and it was the preference of my cousin for Easter Sunday. Too difficult to have my kids sit out just because I think it is too much candy. This is a good way to fill out the tree with eggs since I can only afford a few of the EB eggs. :D

I decided to use ribbon that I threaded through the two holes in the plastic eggs with the center of the ribbon inside the egg so that there were the two loose ends outside which I could use to tie around the branch. This cascara is already leafing out so I knew I could not rely on slipping a loop of ribbon over the baby leaves without damaging them, or worst yet being able to remove them later once the leaves have really filled in.  I used the thinnest ribbon I could find in my ribbon stash and used a wooden skewer to finesse them through the little holes. I started with a small quality of eggs this year as a test run.

I woke up early and was able to get out an hang them while they were all still sleeping. Now I wait for them to wake up so we can bring in the new little chickies for our Easter surprise!

Quarantine Good Friday and Tomie dePaola Tea

What a week! A second full one of trying to homeschool three children of three different grade levels, two of whom have distance learning parameters, one of which has special needs, another or which is a grumpy tween, and it is Holy Week. Whew! I'm tired! Fridays have mostly been a day for field trips, special projects, and such for us  this home school year. Today my goal was to make both Lenten pretzels for the last time of the season and hot cross buns for our tea time snack. The pretzels were supposed to go with a vegetable cheese soup at dinner time, but the way things worked out we just had tea time with both and skipped dinner entirely.

We always do some of the pretzels to look like arms crossed in prayer, but it is also an opportunity for the kids to get creative. Deuce likes to cut them into pretzel bites. T-Bone decided to make a pretzel man, which was fine until I I got to the step where I need to boil them for 30 seconds. I felt a bit guilty. While they were rolling out and shaping their creations I read Brother Giovanni's Little Reward by Anna Egan Smucker like I always do.

In between the mixing of the dough and waiting for it to rise I did some reading from Minecraft Holy Bible and Catechism of the Seven Sacraments by Kevin and Mary O'Neill in which the illustrations are all lego pieces while the children did coloring sheets. We did this yesterday for Holy Thursday too although I didn't mention it. The boys were remembering all the plagues that they learned about earlier in the year when we were studying Egypt and Moses. This format does a good job of keeping their interest to illustrate the stories.

And today we finally had our Goodbye, Mr. dePaola Tea. The children helped to set the table. Little Miss brought down her crucifix she scored while antiquing, Deuce arranged the two crystal crosses.

And I assembled a stack of all my copes of his books including the two new ones I ordered Quiet and The Birds of Bethlehem. We went through the stack and everyone said which ones were their favorites. We ended up reading from The Knight and The Dragon, The Legend of BlueBonnet, St. Patrick, and the Good Friday pages from Bible Stories.

Deuce made some tiny pretzels and Little Miss thought they were perfect for American Girl dolls so Mary got to join our tea party. So cute!

Deuce's pretzel bites that he topped with cinnamon and sugar.

I just like my pretzels as original recipe with salt and the basic shape.

And the tulips I planted last fall have bloomed in our front triangle. So cheery. I love the ones that have the more traditional Turkish shape.

Quarantine Holy Thursday

I have mostly been staying at home in part because I was so sick at the beginning of the shelter in place order. Mr. W got into the habit of running the family errands and since I am more of a homebody than him we have just kept that arrangement. But as I have been doing my spring weeding and pruning I realized that the best solution around the pond is to dig out the dirt that is full on endless weeds, add new soil, and then top with bark dust. This meant that I needed to go to the plant nursery. Mr. W had thought about going on the weekend, but he said the line was crazy long that he did not want to attempt. It was strange; we had to wait in line in the parking lot on little paint marks and get a pep talk/lesson on how to shop. There were signs everywhere about the social distancing and everyone was wearing masks. So creepy, yet so necessary.

All I needed was the dirt and bark dust, so I could have gone straight to the register line, but I wanted to add some yellow-eyed grass for the spot in front of the pond. I have planted two clumps of it in the past, but when I was weeding I only found one had returned. I don't think my passionflower made it through the fall and winter either, but really did not want to spend time browsing during quarantine so I went straight to the native plant section, grabbed the very last yellow-eyed grass and returned to the check out line.

Look how nicely the camas is self seeding in the native hedgerow around the fig tree.
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My dinner plans were very simple this week and I had planned for grilled cheese sandwiches, tomato soup, and dandelion salad. We didn't end up having any lettuce in the house though so instead Mr. W used the recipe for sautéed dandelions with onions. I think the trick is to chop it up nice and small, last year I had a hard time chewing the pieces because they were so stringy. Also I think he used a lot of butter, which makes everything delicious.
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We were so behind in our scheduled that we missed the live stream of Mass. Instead we washed each other's feet. The kids thought it was weird, and commented on not wanting to be each other's slaves, but we tried to direct the conversation toward humbling ourselves before each other and showing each other how much we love we share by this act. Little Miss really enjoyed doing it and asked to wash her dad's other foot. And the boys both enjoyed the feeling of the foot washing so each of them washed their own second foot. 
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Quarantine Palm Sunday

As the pandemic persists we are still being asked to shelter at home, the governor has closed the schools and the archbishop has cancelled all the Masses. I was so heartbroken when I learned that Easter was essentially cancelled this year. This has truly been the lentiest Lent that ever lented. But it has been an opportunity for people to get creative so that we can continue to lead our lives and celebrate our traditions with those with whom we live.

Many Catholics around the country suggested marking our doors with palms or whatever branches we have on hand to celebrate Palm Sunday. My parish additionally recommended to tie those branches with a red ribbon since it is the liturgical color of Palm Sunday. What do I have a lot of that I can spare? English laurel. Our parish also emailed out a worship aid for how we could begin to worship before we live streamed the Mass. I was very pleased when T-Bone offered to be the lead reader. There were opportunities for everyone to have a reading part.

I had started pruning the perennial bed yesterday so we used some lavender cuttings for our individual 'palms' for before and during the Mass. AS much as they whip their palms around normally I felt like if nothing else at least the family room will smell nice.

He also was pretending to be one of the dads we see regularly at Mass who had a baby recently. He's bouncing and rocking his bunny like a baby.

Mr. W was totally sweet and had done a little research a couple days earlier and looked up some recipes for Palm Sunday. I don't actually have any ear marked for this day so I was so thrilled and flattered. He started with a hearts of palm salad which was really good. He also made chicken with roasted grapes. Little Miss really loved those roasted grapes.

Quarantine Stations of the Cross

My big plan for the week was to take the children to The Grotto today to do an outdoor Stations of the Cross. I have done it before and I figured that it would be okay since we are still allowed to go for walks even the though Governor Brown has the state in a Shelter In Place order. But when I decided to double check that we could get into the grounds at The Grotto today their website stated that the grounds are closed too in addition to all the regular Masses being cancelled. Sigh!

So what to do? I really needed to get these kids out of the house for some sort of field trip. I decided to quickly cobble together a Scripture/Marian Garden Stations that we could do in our own yard. Some of my ideas I don't actually have in our garden so we did some substituting. And keep in mind I whipped this together in about 30 minutes while being asked "when can we play video games?" about 47 times. Sigh!

1. Pilate Condemns Jesus to Death @ the laurel hedge. Pilate was the Roman governor and Romans liked wreaths of laurels, right? So technically mine is English laurel and not the bay laurel of the Romans.
2. Jesus Accepts His Cross @ a cedar, pine, or cypress tree. The Wood of the Cross is said to have been made from these three trees. We have none of them so we met at a Doug fir sapling.
3. Jesus Falls the First Time @ T-Bone's vine maple. I have three children and our landscape designer specified 3 vine maples for our yard. Naturally I named each of the trees after each of my children. We met at the oldest tree. I think if one has 3 of anything in their yard it would be good for consistency, especially if it is deciduous and has leaves that 'fall' in the autumn.
4. Jesus Meets His Sorrowful Mother @ the Statue of St. Mary. This is self explanatory, yes?
5. Simon Helps Jesus Carry His Cross @ the Statue of St. Francis because I figured he would be a good substitute. St. Peregrine statues would also suffice.
6. Veronica Wipes The Face of Jesus @ a patch of veronica or other purple ground cover
7. Jesus Falls the Second Time @ Deuce's vine maple
8. Jesus Speaks to The Women @ the fig tree. I went out on a limb here. 🤣 Fig trees are definitely part of a Scripture Garden and since we happen to have one I wanted to include it. Eve eats the apple in the Garden of Eden getting them thrown out of Paradise causing Adam and Eve to realize they are naked and they use the fig leaf to cover themselves. Then I sprinkled a little patriarchy on top and got fig leaf = women.
9. Jesus Falls for The Third Time @ Little Miss's vine maple.
10. Jesus Is Stripped of His Garments @ the rose garden. He was left with just a cloth and that Crown of Thorns. A holly, Oregon grape, crab apple, barberry, or other thorny plant would work as a substitute here or for station #2.
11. Jesus Is Nailed to the Cross @ primrose (or other 5 petaled flower.) The five petals represent the five wounds Jesus received during the crucifixion. Alternatively one could use lily of the valley which is Mary's tears, but mine hasn't even sprouted yet.
12. Jesus Dies On The Cross @ the dogwood tree. The dogwood the Good Friday flower because there are 4 petals like the cross and the tips of the petals have what look like little rusty nail holes on them.
13. Jesus Is Taken Down From The Cross @ a patch of dandelions. Dandelions are Mary's bitter sorrow, also the leaves as a good food to eat during Holy Week.
14. Jesus Is Placed In The Tomb @ the door under the front porch. This is the most cave like place I have in our garden. I also considered meeting by the passion flower  for this Station, but I haven't weeded over there yet and I'm not sure how that baby plant is doing yet. A rock garden could also be an alternative. My first thought was the garage door, but thought better of it. 

Tween super excited about Quarantine Stations. Laurel is so hard to manage; I always feel like I'm in the trash compactor in Star Wars with the hedge pressing in on me. Hoping we can get this all removed this summer.

The T-Bone at his vine maple for the 1st fall.

At the Marian garden for the 4th Station. (I still need to dead head those hydrangeas!)

At the fig tree for the 8th Station. We're starting to get a little silly here. I told the younger two they could bring out a stuffed animal as long as they didn't get distracting.

The rose garden for the 10th Station. (Totally needs to be weeded and pruned.) We decided to switch up our cross bearer at this point.

The nice thing is that we did a lot of walking back and forth between the front, back, and side yards so they got some energy out. This is the dogwood tree for the 12th Station. It is right outside of Deuce's window where his school desk sits so we have been tracking the little blooms to see if they will be fully opened by next Friday. (I'm guessing not this year.)

Fortunately (unfortunately?) we always have dandelions in the lawn so I knew this would be a possibility for the 13th Station.

We used under the historical front porch for our tomb. Roll away the lattice? 

In the Garden for the Annunciation

We weren't able to cancel our spring break cabin at Black Butte so we transferred our quarantine to achieve cabin fever in the mountains. When we returned home the first thing I did was walk the children through our yard to check out what had popped up while we were away for 5 days. (Also I really didn't want them going from a few hours in the car straight to play video games.)

The Mount Hood daffodils in the Marian Garden are up and looking very happy. I think I need to move the statue of St. Mary to be in front of the white fuchsia (or I ought to have cut it back in the fall.) The Marian name for daffodils is Mary's Star.

Also some of the petite peachy daffodils are up although they are not as robustly growing as the Mt. Hoods.  One of my purple pink Lenten roses in the background.

Under the fig tree is an eruption of violets or Our Lady's Modesty. It is associated with the Annunciation because of St. Mary's humility when the angel Gabriel told her she would be the Mother of God. I just love how these Marian flowers tie in the season of the bloom with the holy day or feast day. I think the little grassy spikes are camas flowers which have self seeded (exciting!!) or maybe native blue eyed grass? I will have to keep an eye out on what develops here.

And look at this happy patch of native wild ginger! Look at that bloom! I don't think I have ever noticed them blooming before, but it is such a subtle color and it is such a humble, modest plant itself. I'm thrilled at how things are establishing themselves in the native hedgerow bed.

Lastly I read a page on the Annunciation from Tomie de Paola's Mary The Mother of Jesus book.

Social Distancing Stations of the Cross

I wanted to share an idea for how to be able to celebrate the season of Lent during these crazy days of COVID-19. Masses and most places are cancelled or closed and it makes everything challenging. I normally like to visit a different parish every Friday during Lent to celebrate the Stations. For me it is a little bit like being a pilgrim in my own city. I had already planned out my whole Lent with which parishes we would visit on which Fridays and where we go out to eat afterward, whether that be a soup supper or fish fry at that church or fish house. My parish was even going to host their first fish fry this year. It has been disappointing to delete the might-have-been-plans each week from my calendar.

But we can still go outside for walks right? I know of at least two outdoor Stations in my area. Last year on a half day of school I met my mom and sister at a tulip farm with my children. Then, since it was a Friday, I was able to talk them into walking the Stations at Mt. Angel Abbey. I had discovered these outdoor Stations two years ago when I attended a women's retreat there. It is so lovely and peaceful, walking up the hill to the abbey through a woodland area; each Station has a little shed with the statues inside and the title of the Station written in German above with Gothic lettering. My German side of the family is from Mt. Angel so I like to imagine that maybe my great grandmother or great-great grandmother walked these stations before me.

Also, outdoor Stations are SO kid friendly! You have little toddlers that can't stay still? No problem, they can run around or run between the Stations. Your children never seem to be able to use an inside voice at church? No worries, you are outside and they can use that outside voice without embarrassing you. Cranky child who doesn't want to participate? No big deal, that child can get all kind the personal space they need either walking ahead, behind or sitting in one spot refusing to move. I feel like all of the stir craziness resulting from the pandemic leads to outdoor Stations being a totally appropriate solution for families right now.

Look, by the end I had lost all but one kid. Actually Deuce and Little Miss were pretty good about the whole adventure. They asked or answered good questions about which Station was which and what their little thoughts were about them. Those two can be quite pious if you get them in the right mood.

We also enjoyed how so many of the little sheds had been decorated for Lent.