1. What are you doing in your house and life to prepare for the season of Lent?
2. If you feel comfortable sharing also, what are you planning to add or give up as a sacrifice for Lent? (This might help some people that feel stumped for ideas.)
Thanks to everyone who shares some of their plans.
Angie can be found writing at Many Little Blessings about faith, family, and household management. She is also the founder of The Homeschool Classroom and Catholic Mothers Online.
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What a great topic. I can’t wait to see what everyone else has to offer!
We do a family penance of a sweetless Lent, and that’s all we ask the kids to do. We do our own penances. Some recent years, I’ve given up complaining (ooh. That might be a good one this year), gossiping, & internet stat checking. I haven’t decided what to do this year, except that I think my husband & I are going to dig in and really do some prayer/scripture study together.
I am thinking about it differently this year as well because I’m working on writing a book for Liguori Publications on Lenten observance for families. Unlike my Advent project, which grew out of something we were doing as a family, this Lenten book is being written “cold.” So I’ll be trying out my own ideas this year. Hopefully I’ll have a lot more to say if you ask this question next year!
Personally I have created a new schedule and made adjustments to my program of life to allow for more spiritual reading and re-committment to prayer times, which also include family prayer time ( daily rosary or at least a decade with the family).
Along with adding extra prayer time, I plan to make one sacrifice at every meal.
Tima recently posted..Learning Through Mourning
Oh, I’ve been meaning to write a blog post on this. I’ve really been thinking. I am usually nursing or pregnant during lent, so I’ve never given up much food, but this year, I have the perfect thing. I’m really going to limit my internet/facebook/blogging time, to drastically reduce the time I spend on my computer, and want to instead pray more, read more (spiritual books), and practice the virtues in my family (where I think it is hardest to practice them). I have a great book called 12 Months of Monastery Soups which I’d like to cook my way through this lent. I’m afraid I just LOVE soups, so maybe it’s not a huge sacrifice, but I think after a while, it will be one, they are bland, simple, soups. Anyways, that’s what I’ve thought up for now.
We have decided to give up TV time. We will be reserving it for family movie night on Saturdays and when our weather is bad(living in Tornado Alley, it is a good idea to have access to a TV when it is stormy.) My husband usually follows a cold fast for Lent, and the family a vegetarian or vegan fast.
Lisa recently posted..Deacon Weekend
Last Lent, I made a concerted effort to honor the Lenten fast, making sure the portions were appropriate. It was one of the hardest things I have ever done. I will do that again this year. I have given up wine in the past and will do so again. I am learning how to fast and abstain with a gracious heart.
Although I don’t eat sweets, I love to bake, so I will bake far less. My husband likes to give up sweets and beer. Since sweets and baked goods are in the tope tier of his food pyramid, it is tough for him, but he gives me such a good example of graciously fasting and sacrificing. No radio in the car, no stops at Starbucks, adding more spiritual reading daily and saying the Stations of the Cross with my daughter on Fridays.
I was listening to EWTN radio last week, and the suggestions were so amazing and personal. Such as not wearing earrings on Fridays. Drinking only 1 cup of coffee daily instead of your usual 3 cups. Adding just one extra decade of the Rosary daily. So many and wonderful ways we can incorporate sacrifice into our daily routines.
Gods’ blessings on all of us as we journey thru Lent 2011!
Already working on portion control and no snacking as part of the Catholic Lightweigh program…but hoping to get the family to quit complaining (starting with me!) I posted a tutorial for our unique style of Good Deed Beads Bracelet and I think we’ll use them to record special sacrifices, extra prayers and abandoned-opportunities-to-complain.
Please check it out!
Monica @ Equipping Catholic families recently posted..Good Deed Beads Bracelet for LENT!
I am planning to give up white sugar & sweets (using fruit, natural sugars-honey IF needed for cooking) along with removing myself from Facebook, my son chose to learn a new prayer (he is 3 & didn’t want to give up his favorite snack which was his other choice!), & as a family we will be attending Stations of the Cross on Fridays through Lent.
I have also been printing some great resources from CatholicIcing, and we will have our calendar to color daily, and our printable pocket Stations of the Cross cards, and maybe the Stations of the Cross in a box!!