Thursday, December 20, 2018

O Antiphons, ERO CRAS

   The most beautiful part of Advent in our domestic church is getting to do the Jesse Tree and light candles and sing right before bedtime. The last few days of Advent we get to also use the O Antiphons, it sort of ups the anticipation for Christmas and clues the kids in on how close we are to this huge feast day. A few years ago I made did some paper crafting with my Cricut and made some O Antiphon prayer cards. If you like Jesse Tree ornaments you can try making O Antiphon ornaments as well. 

The prayer cards get used differently each year around here. This year my kids decided to put the O Antiphon prayer cards right onto our Christmas tree.



  December 17th  O Sapientia  or  O Wisdom- comes from Eternity and the Word of God
       
       Veni, O Sapientia,                   O come, Thou Wisdom, from on high
       Quae hic disponis omnia,        and order all things far and nigh;
       Veni, viam prudentiae             to us the path of knowledge show,
       Ut doceas et gloriae.               and teach us in her ways to go.

       Refrain
       Gaude, gaude, Emmanuel       Rejoice Rejoice! Emmanuel, 
       Nascetur pro te, Israel.           Shall come to thee O Israel.

December 18th  O Adonai - the time and law of Moses

Veni, veni, Adonai,          O come, o come, Thou Lord of might,
qui populo in Sinai           who to thy tribes on Sinai's height
legem dedisti vertice        in ancient times did give the law,
in maiestate gloriae.         in cloud, and majesty, and awe.
       
       Refrain
       Gaude, gaude, Emmanuel       Rejoice Rejoice! Emmanuel, 
       Nascetur pro te, Israel.           Shall come to thee O Israel.

December 19th  O Radix Jesse or  O Root of Jesse - Prophecies from the Line of King Davi

Veni, O Jesse virgula,     O come, Thou Rod of Jesse's stem,
ex hostis tuos ungula,      from ev'ry foe deliver them
de specu tuos tartari        that trust Thy mighty power to save,
educ et antro barathri      and give them vict'ry o'er the grave

Refrain
Gaude, gaude, Emmanuel       Rejoice Rejoice! Emmanuel, 
Nascetur pro te, Israel.           Shall come to thee O Israel.

December 20th  O Clavis David or  O Key of David - Prophecies from the Line of King David

Veni, Clavis Davidica,        O come, Thou Key of David, come,
regna reclude caelica,          and open wide our heav'nly home,
fac iter tutum superum,         make safe the way that leads on high,
et claude vias inferum          that we no more have cause to sigh.


      Refrain
      Gaude, gaude, Emmanuel       Rejoice Rejoice! Emmanuel, 
      Nascetur pro te, Israel.           Shall come to thee O Israel.

December 21st  O Oriens or  O Dawn of the East - look for a rising star in the East
  (Although part of this isn't necessarily Nativity related-  also don't forget the prophecy from Ezekiel Ch. 11- read that also, then think about about Jesus re-entering Jerusalem and the lowly creature he was on and the direction from which he came- WOW how everything ties together huh?)


Veni, veni O Oriens,             O come, Thou Dayspring from on high,
solare nos adveniens,            and cheer us by thy drawing nigh;
noctis depelle nebulas,          disperse the gloomy clouds of night
dirasque mortis tenebras.      and death's dark shadow put to flight.

     Refrain
      Gaude, gaude, Emmanuel       Rejoice Rejoice! Emmanuel, 
      Nascetur pro te, Israel.           Shall come to thee O Israel.

December 22nd- O Rex Gentium or O King of the Gentiles- prophecy that He is a King for all Nations

Veni, veni, Rex Gentium,       O come, Desire of the nations, bind
veni, Redemptor omnium,      in one the hearts of all mankind;
ut salvas tuos famulos            bid every strife and quarrel cease
peccati sibi conscios.            and fill the world with heaven's peace.

Refrain
Gaude, gaude, Emmanuel      Rejoice Rejoice! Emmanuel, 
Nascetur pro te, Israel.          Shall come to thee O Israel.


December 23rd O Emmanuel, it means God is with us

Veni veni, Emmanuel       O Come O Come Emmanuel
captivum solve Israel,      And Ransom Captive Israel
qui gemit in exsilio,         That mourns in lonely exile here
privatus Dei Filio            Until the Son of God appear.

Refrain
Gaude, gaude, Emmanuel      Rejoice Rejoice! Emmanuel
Nascetur pro te, Israel.          Shall come to thee O Israel.

Take all of the Latin Messianic Titles and put the first letter them in order like this- ERO CRAS, meaning, "Tomorrow, I will come." 

Friday, December 14, 2018

St. Lucia morning 2018 at home and real Saffron buns


I hope you got to see our pictures from the Lucia fest in Lindsborg, KS, for the 2017 and 2018.  After our meal in honor of Our Lady of Guadalupe we had a lot of prep to do for St. Lucia's feast day breakfast the next day.

We actually took the time to make real Saffron buns or Lucia cat buns. There are a lot of names for them. They aren't just served on Lucia's feast day, but for many different types of other special occasions in European countries. Let me tell you what I found out about Saffron. 



Saffron, which comes from a certain type of Crocus called the saffron crocus, apparently is grown in Persia or somewhere else far away. {I am thinking why can't I grow them then?}


Anyway, Amazon makes it pretty affordable. I bought the smallest amount (in case this failed) for around $9 here. That little vial they sent me will do about 4 batches of buns I think. I only did one, it was plenty for our family of 6. 



Zoe's job was to mix the sugar and cinnamon for cinnamon rolls, she worked on it for about 20 mins too, she was an excellent assistant.


See the yellow color that comes out in the milk? Back during one of the world wars, saffron got scarce and European bakers needed an alternative source for yellow food coloring.





They have to rise and for awhile. So I wrapped them up and stuck them in a warm oven.


To get that shiny look on the outside, I brushed them with a beaten egg and stuck the raisin in them. I think putting the raisin in second is easier, because when you brush them you accidently knock the raisins loose.




They turned out so pretty and actually had a nice flavor to them. It's nothing like I tasted before, it's just not your typical American spice. The dough below turned into out tasty cinnamon rolls.




The cute kitchen towel can be found online. The Dala Horse candy, heart cookies, and Lingonberry drinks are from IKEA. The cute candle girl with her attendant paper cut out is from the store in Lindsborg. I do believe you can find a similar one at The Scandinavian Shop's website.







Sankta Lucia Ora Pro Nobis.

Our Lady of Guadalupe 2018




Mr. Cowboy Caviar, recipe below:
  For those of you who would like to know what exactly we make, 
especially those people who don't get enough exposure to Mexican food. 
 And I don't have a written recipe, I just wing it.

Chop/dice up some avocados, add some corn and fresh cilantro, fresh diced/small chunks of tomatoes, diced red onion, you can add a diced bell pepper. Then add red wine vinegar and equal parts of sugar. You can decide how much you need, but It really is just a couple tablespoons and not very much, just enough to coat every thing (should be sweet not bitter). Eat it with Nacho Doritos!!




{We took dinner to Brad, we ran around town to 3 kids' programs that night.}

Our Lady of Guadalupe pray for us!


Wednesday, December 12, 2018

Zoe's birthday, St. Nicholas' Feast day etc..

Well I hit a clearance on Tiny Saints! WHOOT! Guess what they all got!
  St. Nicholas Feast day is the day after Zoe's birthday. 

ZOE's 3! Can you believe it?


Clearly my kids love hamming it up with their mini wine glasses?!



The freebies I got from my favorite Catholic book Store are below. The kids got the magnets for St. Nick's feast day in their goodie bags. The Guadalupe bands are for Our Lady of Guadalupe's Feast Day!




So this year (Like Brenden has done in the past) Zoe laid out two pairs of shoes on her own, and of course St. Nicholas filled them up with oranges and candy for her. She is such a sweet and trusting little thing. He couldn't disappoint her!




One of Genna's favorite Birthday week (cause literally we celebrate a whole week of birthdays, Grandma, Zoe and Genna) is to do Ginger Bread Houses. We got some sets on sale at Joan's and then used out coupons on top of it.










Our Jesse Tree- each kid has their very own set of Jesse Tree Ornaments finally! Took four swaps, but they are all there- NOW I NEED ONE!! lol!

Have you seen this lovely FREE planner yet? You can find it here. My lovely sister sent me this blog, basically I won't have any excuses anymore for leaving something special out because I definitely can't remember it all. She even references the Christmas to Candlemas book I raved about back in 2013. 


Here it is, it is free by the way on EWTN's website if
 you can't track down your own vintage copy like mine ;)


{As for both planners, and printing them and binding...I digress- if you are interested in learning how to bind it, I have The Cinch book binder. 
There are other inexpensive bookbinders out there, I have one other 
one that's cheaper- but definitely not as reliable or nice...and when wasting 
potentially nice art projects or paper and permanently binding things, it's good to 
get the higher quality binder in my opinion.}


Hope you continue to have a Blessed Advent!

How is your Advent going? St. Lucia festival pics..

   Our family loves going to carry on some cool old time traditions through Advent One of our favorite ones is visiting Lindborg, KS, for their annual St. Lucia Festival. You would think it was primarily Catholic, but it mostly takes place in the Lutheran Church there. We attended last year for the first time. It probably will not ever be skipped at all from here on out for fear of a riot from my kids who enjoy themselves a lot. It happens every second weekend of December each year. IT always falls right around Genna's birthday, the Feast of the Immaculate Conception :) This year my sister and her friends met with us there. We even randomly ran into 3 other friends from Wichita, including a family from St. Jude we are in Lego Robotics with.
















Of course when we got home they pulled out their St. Lucy dresses and matched up their babies.


Tonight we are making our dough for tomorrow morning.

St. Lucia Ora Pro Nobis!