Cottage Blessings

Mantel in Miniature

For years now, it has been a dream of mine to decorate a dollhouse for Christmas. The scene is set in my mind's eye--miniature presents wrapped in foil, lights twinkling in every window, infinitesimally small wax tapers, a beribboned tree teeming with angels shading thimble-sized nativity, and, of course, a table set extravagantly for a doll's Christmas feast.

Now, given the fact that we barely put up the life-size tree this year, you can just imagine how the dollhouse fared. Still, it occurred to me a while back that I could perhaps manage a piece of the dream, something to make the children smile and let the dolls know they have not been forgotten--a miniature Christmas hearth.

We started with an unpainted wooden doll's mantel, available in the dollhouse aisle at the craft store:

One coat of Folk Art paint in "parchment" added a bit of depth:

The stockings--created by ten-year-old Margaret with the greatest enthusiasm imaginable--were hung by the chimney with care glue:

I love Margaret's attention to detail. Each one is slightly different:

We added a beautiful miniature triptych, purchased a while back at our local Catholic store (this could easily be replaced by a cut out from a Christmas card or small nativity scene):

I can't resist showing you what the back of the triptych looks like:

Greens from the tree and red ribbon add a crowning touch:

Just for fun, we put the miniature mantel on the floor beside our real mantel for scale (it's too bad our fire had already burned to ashes, or this would have been a lovely picture):

Our mantel makes a timely display for the Feast of Mary, Mother of God:

An old friend of ours hopped right off the tree to check her stocking:

We are hoping to keep our minuscule mantel decorated for a while, adding new embellishments for Candlemas, Lent, Easter and May. [I say "hoping" because the things we strive for and the things we actually do are often quite different!] Another fine addition would be a miniature fireplace screen. Perhaps I will ask the production crew to work on one tomorrow.

Happy New Year's Eve, dear friends!

California Mission in Miniature

Last week, we made miniature Wayside Shrines similar to the ones I loved in Ireland as a little girl. After our summer in San Francisco, there is no doubt the California Missions made a similar impression on my children. We were blessed to visit four of them during our stay--Mission San Rafael, Mission Dolores (San Francisco de Assis), Mission San Luis Obispo, and Mission Carmel, the burial place of Blessed Junipero Serra.

With the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe right around the corner, this seemed a good time to create our own miniature mission shrine, using elements inspired by the four beautiful missions we remember so well. We began with a double sided wooden frame from the craft store. The tiled roof made us think of the missions:

The photo of Mission Carmel below gives a glimpse of the terracotta tiles so common in mission churches:

Eight-year-old Marie enjoyed painting the tiles of our "mission":

Mission San Rafael is creamy beige with crosses on top and two topiaries gracing the front:

The first side of our shrine, representing the outside of the missions, has a similar look:

Monuments to Father Junipero Serra, here shown in the garden at Carmel, may be found all over California:

If you look closely at the side of the church in Carmel, you will notice graves adorned with sea shells:

A holy card image of Blessed Serra, along with a small seashell, complete the first side:

For the interior, we drew inspiration from the freestyle flower borders of Mission San Luis Obispo:

We all loved the way this simple border echoed the ones we remember:

This wall of statues from Mission Dolores in San Francisco is typical of the missions--there are always many statues and images to inspire:

We adorned our mission "interior" using saints' images from a broken bracelet and a holy card of Our Lady of Guadalupe:

After the summer we had, it seems appropriate to have this reminder of the California Missions displayed prominently on our Advent table. It will also make a double-sided centerpiece for our Guadalupe Tea next week.

Blessed Junipero Serra, pray for us!

Our Lady of Guadalupe, pray for us!

Wayside Shrines in Miniature

And oh, when the heart faints with longing,
He is there, though our eyes cannot see;
The Compassionate One, bending o'er us,
Stoops to hear the heart's sigh, "Pray for me!"

--from The Wayside Shrine by Martha Elvira Pettus

When I was a small child, I fell in love with the roadside shrines of Ireland. It makes me smile to think back upon one afternoon in particular: As my father cast a hopeful line over the River Blackwater in County Cork, I piled wildflowers at the foot of a shrine to Our Lady.

In hopes of recreating this sweet and simple memory, we spent the weekend fashioning miniature wayside shrines small enough to grace a pot of pansies, but so lovely they just might remain in my children's hearts forever.

Several months ago, I purchased these church-shaped wooden garden stakes at the craft store for fifty cents each:

We began by painting a base coat in acrylics:

We added moss, silk flowers, small statues and crucifixes, and other embellishments.

Here are a few of the shrines we made so far:

Our Lady of Mount Carmel (spring theme):

Roadside Crucifix (winter theme, complete with a touch of artificial snow):

St. Anthony (summer theme):

Agnes' St. Jude (Agnes is taking "Judith" for Confirmation this year):

Marie's St. Joseph (a gift for Grandma):

Margaret's Advent-themed Shrine (front):

Margaret's Shrine (back view, with Divine Mercy image taken from a broken bracelet):

Margaret's adaptation--Holy Water Font:

Holy Water Font (rear view, with Infant of Prague):

Theresa's Our Lady of Grace shrine:

Marie's Crucifix in the Rhododendrons:

Three-year-old Maureen's pink Sacred Heart shrine:

Here's a pretty mess--I couldn't resist this shot of some of the production crew hard at work behind the scenes. (Also, it occurs to me for the first time that the walls inside just about match the carpet of golden maple leaves outside.)

A small silk butterfly alights atop the spring-themed shrine to Our Lady of Mount Carmel:

Materials and Ways to Improvise

I found the wooden church stakes in A.C. Moore craft store. They were made by Nicole Crafts, reference number WOD 1204. It is often difficult to find specific craft items online, and your local store may not stock these. Any paintable wooden garden stake might be used or adapted (we used flat heart-shaped stakes to make an entire set of the Stations of the Cross years ago--we also made Sacred and Immaculate Heart shrines from heart-shaped stakes a while back). If you are unable to find stakes, small wooden churches or birdhouses would work quite well, as you can see from the rear view of last year's St. Francis birdhouse craft. I often challenge the children to figure out ways to bring ideas to life from natural materials found outside. These shrines would be beautiful created from pieces of wood, bark, moss, acorns and stones gathered in the backyard--or perhaps items you might otherwise discard, like clementine crates. Can you imagine a little shrine tucked away in the knot of a tree?

The possibilities for embellishment are endless, and religious images may be taken from paper holy cards, catalogues, broken bracelets, pins, or rosaries. DiscountCatholicStore.com sells mini-pocket saint statues (3/4 inch) for $1.55.

May the saints bless you on your way, now and always!

Totus Tuus!

Today is the feast the Blessed Virgin Mary's indefatigable servant and champion, St. Louis Marie Grignion de Montfort, founder, missionary, and author of the treatise, True Devotion to Mary.

St. Louis' teachings on Our Blessed Mother are so penetrating that, at the beginning of his papacy, our beloved Marian Pope, John Paul II, took for his motto, "Totus Tuus," later writing:

"The motto is of course inspired by the teaching of Saint Louis Marie Grignion de Montfort, who explained in the following words Mary's role in the process of our configuration to Christ: 'Our entire perfection consists in being conformed, united and consecrated to Jesus Christ. Hence the most perfect of all devotions is undoubtedly that which conforms, unites and consecrates us most perfectly to Jesus Christ. Now since Mary is of all creatures the one most conformed to Jesus Christ, it follows that among all devotions that which most consecrates and conforms a soul to our Lord is devotion to Mary, his Holy Mother, and that the more a soul is consecrated to her the more will it be consecrated to Jesus Christ.'"

--Pope John Paul II, Rosarium Virginis Mariae, quoting "True Devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary" by St. Louis de Montfort (emphasis in original).

St. Louis was so faithfully devoted to Our Lady that I cannot help but think of his late April feast as her special favor to him, bestowing upon him the honor of heralding the glorious month of May! St. Louis reminds us that now is the time to freshen up our favorite tablecloths, take down vases, decorate pillar candles, and choose our most beautiful Marian statues to create a family May altar in time for Our Lady's blessed month. In the meantime, the young ones in our homes will enjoy creating personal May altars to grace their rooms during this Marian season and always.

Miniature May Altars

Materials:

Small wooden hangable shelves from the craft store
Assorted acrylic paints and paintbrushes
Optional: decoupage tissue, white glue, and a sponge brush

The children began by decorating inexpensive wooden shelves in pastel colors. Agnes chose to adorn hers with roses, lilies, an an "M" wreathed in twelve stars, before decoupaging a flower-flecked "altar cloth" on top. The decoupage was done simply, by applying watered-down white glue to tissue with a sponge brush. "Mod Podge" decoupage medium could have been used to add a glossy coat to the decoupage, but we opted for the simple approach.

This photo below shows what the girls' four projects looked like after painting. (Back row: Theresa (age 10), Margaret (age 8); Front row: Agnes (age 12), Marie (age 6))

The next group shows what each painted shelf looked like once adorned with a Marian statue, holy water bottle, crucifix, rosaries, and scapular (or, in Marie's case, a bouquet of flowers). These photos were taken in our dining room, but, each of the girls will have a May altar mounted over her bed from now on. We usually say our family Rosary at night, so the beads will have a handy home, as will their scapulars. I am glad to think of my girls looking at the Crucifix and Our Lady of Guadalupe at eye level as they doze off to sleep, perhaps after a blessing of holy water from each individual bottle. It is difficult to make out from the picture, but each girl chose a distinct holy water bottle with images of the cross, Our Lady of Guadalupe, Our Lady of Grace, or Our Lady of Lourdes.

Agnes':

Theresa's:

Margaret's:

Marie's:

_____________

Cost per project: 97 cents without paint and other decorations; about $1.50 each with paint, brushes, glue, and special decoupage tissue. The adornments for the altar may be found around the house. If you do not have a small statue of Our Lady, a holy card mounted on cardboard would work every bit as well.

Other ways to improvise: If you do not have time to run to the craft store for small paintable shelves, use something on hand to create a similar effect. Even an upturned shoe box will look beautiful when covered with a piece of pretty fabric, statue, flowers, and a bowl of holy water. The main joy of the project for my girls seems to be that each one has an altar all her own right near her bed. Six-year-old Marie looks forward to keeping hers adorned with fresh spring flowers, and, for a setting so small, an empty film canister would make the perfect little vase!