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Meet the Faith & Family bloggers. We invite you to join us in encouraging and helping the Faith & Family community grow in faith!

Danielle Bean

Danielle Bean
Danielle Bean, a mother of eight, is Editorial Director of Faith & Family. She is author of My Cup of Tea, Mom to Mom, Day to Day, and most recently Small Steps for Catholic Moms. Though she once struggled to separate her life and her work, the two …
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Rachel Balducci

Rachel Balducci
Rachel Balducci is married to Paul and they are the parents of five lively boys and one precious baby girl. She is the author of How Do You Tuck In A Superhero?, and is a newspaper columnist for the Diocese of Savannah, Georgia. For the past four years, she has …
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Lisa Hendey

Lisa Hendey
Lisa Hendey is the founder and editor of CatholicMom.com, a Catholic web site focusing on the Catholic faith, Catholic parenting and family life, and Catholic cultural topics. Most recently she has authored The Handbook for Catholic Moms. Lisa is also employed as webmaster for her parish web sites. …
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Arwen Mosher

Arwen Mosher
Arwen Mosher lives in southeastern Michigan with her husband Bryan and their young children Camilla and Blaise. She has a bachelor's degree in theology. She dreads laundry, craves sleep, loves to read novels and do logic puzzles, and can't live without tea. Her personal blog site is ABC Family. …
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Rebecca Teti

Rebecca Teti
Rebecca Teti is married to Dennis and has four children (3 boys, 1 girl) who -- like yours no doubt -- are pious and kind, gorgeous, and can spin flax into gold. A Washington, DC, native, she converted to Catholicism while an undergrad at the U. Dallas, where she double-majored in …
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Robyn Lee

Robyn Lee
Robyn Lee is the managing editor of Faith & Family magazine. She is (yikes!) an almost 30 year-old, single lady, living in Connecticut with her two cousins in a small bungalow-style kit house built by her great uncle in the 1950s. She also conveniently lives next door to her sister, brother-in-law …
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Hallie Lord

Hallie Lord
Hallie Lord married her dashing husband, Dan, in the fall of 2001 (the same year, coincidentally, that she joyfully converted to the Catholic faith). They now happily reside in the deep South with their two energetic boys and two very sassy girls. In her *ample* spare time, Hallie enjoys cheap wine, …
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Fr. John Bartunek, LC

Fr. John Bartunek, LC

Fr John Bartunek, LC, STL, received his BA in History from Stanford University in 1990, graduating Phi Beta Kappa. He comes from an evangelical Christian background and became a member of the Catholic Church in 1991. After college he worked as a high school history teacher, drama director, and …
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Guest Bloggers

Kate Lloyd

Kate Lloyd
Kate Lloyd is a rising senior, and a political science major at Thomas More College of Liberal Arts in New Hampshire. While not in school, she lives in Whitehall PA, with her mom, dad, five sisters and little brother. She needs someone to write a piece about how it's possible to …
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Elizabeth Foss

Elizabeth Foss
Elizabeth Foss, an award winning columnist for the Arlington Catholic Herald, published her first book, Real Learning: Education in the Heart of My Home in 2003. The book is now in its third printing. Her popular blog, In the Heart of My Home is a source of inspiration and support for Catholic women …
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Jesse Tree Craft Swap

A Jesse Tree For The Craft-Daft Like Me

Since the lovely tradition of the Jesse tree has come up in two recent posts, I thought I’d point out that the resources for organizing a Jesse Tree Craft Swap are available at the National Catholic Register’s Resources page.

Faith & Family magazine subscribers may recall the feature I did in last year’s Advent edition. The premise is a solution for those who like the Jesse Tree devotion but are not that interested in the “craft” dimension. Recruit some families from among your parish or homeschool group and do a craft swap. Each family makes multiple editions of the same one ornament, then you gather on a given day to trade.

Everyone goes home with a complete set of Jesse Tree ornaments, reusable from year to year.

Every family does Advent differently, of course, but we put our tree up the first Sunday of Advent, undecorated. The first ornaments on the tree are those for the Jesse Tree, with the rest going up only right before Christmas (the precise day varying according to when the extended family is due in town).

My friend Jolene, from whom I cribbed this idea, and who created the resources linked at NCR, makes new Jesse Tree ornament sets each year to give as gifts.(Sometimes, elves will make your ornaments for you!)

Last year, the article inspired some of our readers to do Jesse Tree craft swaps with their online communities. Here’s a post about that. And even better, here’s a post with photos of some of the results. And more photos from a different blogger here.

Of course, nothing says you have to do a Jesse Tree if it doesn’t work for your family. But we like it.


Comments

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Since I lack floor/table space, I am planning on doing a Jesse Tree wall hanging this year.  Can anyone recommend a book or website with nice patterns for the symbols that accompany the daily readings?  Thanks!

 

Lisa R, I highly recommend the Jesse Tree Banner Kit from Leaflet Missal ( leafletonline.com ITEM #12782 $21.00) Everything you need is there, just cut out everything & glue. If your children are old enough they could help out making it, too.

Rebecca, I *love* the idea of a Jesse Tree Craft Swap. I’ll have to try joining one next year. I really enjoy crafting (knitting, sewing, paper crafts) & swapping so that would be a perfect project for me. We actually don’t do a Christmas tree, we only have a Jesse Tree (the banner type mentioned above), our children look forward to all the Bible reading & Bible stories that go along with it every night during Advent.

 

http://www.pauline.org/store/moreinfo/0819839868.html

How about this one?

 

Lisa,
ScriptureTree.com has lovely Jesse Tree felt ornaments to use as a banner against a wall.  It does take cutting and assembly but all the directions and felt come included in the kit.


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