My Favorite Posts from 2012

I wanted to take this opportunity to highlight three of my favorite posts from last year, one for each of the main themes I cover in the blog: liturgical lessons, healthy eating, and my poetry.  These themes are highlighted in the blog button I created last summer:

Feel free to hang my button on your blog!  I would be happy to hang yours in exchange, so contact me if you want to do that.  I also have a square button highlighting the healthy eating theme (pictured below).  Someday, I’ll make square versions of the other two themes.

My favorite liturgical post of the year is “Tabletop Shrine for Mary” from April 29^th. 

 

Here I share my idea for a table dedicated to Mary.  As I stated in the post, we continue to update our shrine, changing out the items we display there as we move through the liturgical calendar.  Right now, our accordion books about the Magi are standing there keeping our Mary statuette company.

For my favorite healthy eating post of the year, I choose “Healthy Eating: How to Get Started” from June 18^th.

Sharing what I learn and the recipes I try during our healthy eating quest is one of my passions, so I believe this post is a good introduction to how I incorporate healthy whole foods into our family diet.  This post offers suggestions for easy and quick healthy breakfasts as well as information about the detriments of sugar.

My favorite post of the year about poetry is “National Poetry Month” from April 10^th.

Another of my passions is promoting poetry, particularly from the angle of changing its reputation for being “too difficult” to understand or “irrelevant” to contemporary life.  Of course, I believe neither of those things!  In this post, I shamelessly promote my own poetry, and unsuccessfully tried to start a conversation about the relevance of National Poetry Month.  Try, try again on both accounts.

I hope you enjoy (re)visiting my favorite posts!  Feel free to tell me about your favorite posts from last year, or to offer suggestions for upcoming post topics.  I am still spending my writing time revising my book manuscript, but hope to return to regular posting in a month or so.

Linked with: Catholic Bloggers Link up Blitz, Best of 2012, Top Posts of 2012

Catholic Game Review: Lingo Bingo Católico

Several months ago, I volunteered to review Catholic Lingo Bingo in Spanish for the Arma Dei Shoppe run by Monica at Equipping Catholic Families.  I must apologize to Monica for such a long delay in posting my review.  After a busy summer during which my children did not want to color the cards or play bingo, I am now writing my thoughts about how we will use this game in the future.

I received the bingo kit as a PDF in black and white; we printed it on cardstock.  For children who enjoy coloring, the game preparation is an opportunity for them to express their creativity and to make decisions: will they color images that are the same but located on different game cards identically or not?  Will they use color schemes for groups of similar images (each picture is a Vessel, Vestment, or Sacramental)?  Will they use the same media or color some cards with crayons, others with pencils?

You can see that my youngest daughter did not consider any of these questions, outside of asking for markers, which I declined after she painted one of the cards so darkly that we could not distinguish the images.  She was still three when we started these, so we switched to colored pencils and have had much better results.  I also found pencils easier to use than crayons for the details on the small images (used to select the active images during the bingo game).  I actually colored the mini cards myself.

What I like best about the game is that it is an opportunity to learn the names of objects used in the mass, such as the pall and corporal.  We see them every week, but we don’t talk about them outside of mass.  For this reason, the game is a great way to teach children who are preparing for First Communion about the way the Eucharist is treated during and after the mass.  Sometimes, we can all use a reminder about reverence for the Eucharist, so these images can also reinforce that.

Also, the images of the places in the church are a good way to discuss the structure of the mass with children, explaining what happens in the sacramentary, at the lectionary, etc.  Personally, I was really happy to learn the names for the vestments, as I have never known what to call any of the clothing except for the generic robe.  

I recommend Catholic Lingo Bingo to any family looking for resources to educate children about the mass, the Eucharist, or liturgical objects.  Who doesn’t like to play bingo?  Learning about the faith and having fun at the same time couldn’t be easier.

You can purchase the PDF version in English or Spanish for $10 at the Arma Dei Shoppe.  Printed versions are also available for $2 more plus shipping.  You can find a list of all the reviews for Arma Dei products (including other reviews of the bingo games) here.

Also Arma Dei is currently running a Back to School Special: purchase three PDFs and get $10 off.  Details here (offer ends September 14^th).  Monica is also organizing a Giveaway this month; I will post the details here soon, or look for them at Equipping Catholic Families.

Disclosure: I received free copies of Catholic Lingo Bingo and Lingo Bingo Católico in exchange for this review.  You can read more about my Review Policies here.

At Training Happy Hearts, I have joined Martianne’s weekly link up about Faith Formation in Young Children.

 

You will always find me linked at The Catholic Bloggers Network Monthly Round up.

 

Karri at My Life’s a Treasure hosts a weekly My Favorite Things Link up, and I am linking this post there.