Josiah was baptized on All Saints Day shortly after he was born, so we always make a point of celebrating both the day and his baptism. We chose to celebrate on Sunday this year instead of Tuesday because our Tuesday is incredibly busy this week, and that's no way to celebrate a baptismal day!

This year I wanted a fun (simple!) visual project that the boys could do, and I found it over at Catholic Icing. (In general, I've found that Catholics tend to be really good at including their children in the church year. Love it!)

I printed a pile of coloring pages of saints - Joseph, Mary, Anne, Francis, the Archangels, Paul, Peter, Augustine, etc. - and spread them across the table with lots of markers and crayons. I also made a huge heart on butcher paper, labeled it "Saints, Our Heavenly Family" and hung it on the wall. Then the boys (and a few of their friends from the neighborhood!) colored to their hearts' content while we talked about some of the different saints. When they were finished coloring, they cut out their pictures and taped them up on the heart on the wall. I was so pleased with how it turned out!



Everyone had fun, and the neighbor kids even took a couple of saint picture home to continue coloring. This might be a perfect All Saints project for young children - extremely hands-on throughout, low prep for Mom, with a great visual result at the end!

Labels: church year, raising kids