Shamrock Shepherd’s Pie for St. Patrick’s Day {and a linky!}

March 1, 2012 By

I thought for today’s First Friday link-up, it would be fun to have a St. Patrick’s day theme! Scroll to the bottom of this post to see everyone’s ideas and add your own links.

As many of you already know, I have a St. Patrick’s day article out in Catholic Digest this month. I was really excited about the projects I got to share! There are directions in the article for making a shepherd’s pie with a green pepper shamrock on top, but they didn’t end up using my pictures- they used stock photos. I felt like that project really missed it’s punch without the photos, so I wanted to share them with all of you.

The reason why I made a shepherd’s pie is because St. Patrick worked as a shepherd boy when he was a slave. The shamrock embellishes the top at St. Patrick’s symbol for the Trinity- one clover, 3 leaves!

You have to be choosy when selecting a green pepper for this project! You need a green pepper with only 3 bulbs- not 4! If you get one with 4, when you slice it, it will look like a 4 leaf clover, not a shamrock. A 3 petaled shamrock is a great symbol for the Trinity. A 4 leaf clover is a good luck charm carried by Leprechauns and adorns rainbows and pots of gold.

 
Ingredients needed:
•    1 pound ground beef
•    Salt and pepper
•    1 cup frozen peas
•    1 cup frozen carrots
•    1 cup beef broth
•    2 ½ cups mashed potatoes
•    1 green pepper (with three lobes)

Brown the ground beef and add the broth, then salt and pepper to taste. Mix in the peas and carrots, and then put the ground beef mixture into a pie or casserole dish. Arrange the mashed potatoes on top however you’d like. Slice the green pepper crossways to get a shamrock shape, and add another sliver to make the stem. You’ll get the best shamrock shape from a slice close to the end of the pepper. Add this “shamrock” on top of the mashed potatoes to garnish the pie. Bake at 350 until the pie is warm throughout, and the mashed potatoes start to brown on the edges.

We got fancy and piped on the mashed potatoes with an icing tip. :-) You could just make the top swirly with a  fork if you’re looking to make it easier.

I think this is a really fun dinner to serve up for St. Patrick’s day! What are your plans for celebrating this great feast day?  Share your links below!

Read the link-up rules here before adding your link. Feel free to join in the St. Patrick’s day theme, but you are welcome to share other Catholic posts for March as well. :-)

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Filed Under: 03 March, Fun Food, Liturgical Year, My Kitchen Creations, Saints, St. Patrick 7 Comments

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How to Make a St. Brigid’s Cross with Kids

January 26, 2012 By

I have wanted to try making a St. Brigid’s cross for years, but never got around to it until now. It wasn’t as hard as I thought it would be, and we had a lot of fun! St. Brigid’s feast day is on February 1, but St. Patrick’s day is an equally great time to make this fun craft!

I decided to experiment with several materials to see what made the best cross. Here are a few I made out of colored raffia.

While the raffia crosses are adorable, the raffia was harder to work with than the pipe cleaners. Next, I tried making some crosses out of plastic string. It didn’t go well. In fact, it went so un-well that I don’t even have any pictures to share. It was a total craft fail. Therefore, I’m going to recommend using pipe cleaners for this project! (If you’d like to try your hand at making some St. Brigid’s Crosses out of raffia, I’m going to suggest learning first with pipe cleaners and then moving to the raffia.)

I also experimented with different sizes of St. Brigid’s crosses. With both the raffia and the pipe cleaners, I thought the smaller ones were easier to handle, and very cute!

So after our many experiments, I’m going to recommend making these out of pipe cleaners with kids (and quite possibly, half-length pipe cleaners.)

You need 15 pipe cleaners to make 1 full sized St. Brigid’s cross, and about half that many for a smaller one. Whatever size you decide to make, you’ll want all of your pipe cleaners to be the same length when you start. You’ll need one that’s straight, and the rest of them should be bent in half. It’s easiest to do this before you start.

How to Weave St. Brigid’s Cross: a picture tutorial

Start with 1 straight pipe cleaner. Place a folded pipe cleaner over it. Rotate it once to the left, and add another pipe cleaner. Rotate it once to the left, and add another pipe cleaner. Rotate it once to the left, and …. well, I think you’re starting to understand. It’s actually very easy once you get going! Ever time you add a pipe cleaner, you put it over all of the pieces sticking up. Then rotate and repeat.

When the cross has gotten to your desired size, cut some small sections of pipe cleaner, and twist the ends together. We made this one using the colors of the Irish flag!

My 5 year old was able to weave a St. Brigid’s cross (with a little help) and she was very proud! I’m going to recommend this craft for everyone ages 5 and up! (Lydia’s is on the left, and mine is on the right. I think it made it easier than we used the same colors as we went so I could say things like “now we need the yellow one to point up.”)

I think the smaller ones were a little easier to handle because it was easier to keep the pieces of pipe cleaner straight. Once you get the hang of it with pipe cleaners, give the raffia a try! I used about 3 strands of raffia at a time. The directions I found said to soak the raffia in warm water before beginning, but I skipped that step and it seemed to work just fine.

I strongly recommend trying your hand at these! They’re super fun to make, and so cute when they’re finished!

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Filed Under: 02 February, Crafts for Kids, Liturgical Year, My Crafts, Saints, St. Brigid, St. Patrick 9 Comments

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Sacred and Immaculate Heart Rosaries- A Fun Catholic Craft!

January 23, 2012 By

This craft would be great for celebrating the feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, or the feast of the Immacualte Heart of Mary. We made these in celebration of St. Valentine’s feast day. You know– National “Heart” Day. ;-)

You can either call these One Decade Rosaries, or you can call them Chaplets. Either way, they’re really fun and easy to make!

Supplies Needed:

Scissors

Pipe Cleaners

Beads

Sacred Heart Medal (optional)

Crucifix (optional) I have a pack of these crucifixes from Autom- they’re only 9 cents each! I love to let kids use them for crafts because they’re no good for regular rosaries. They’re not much more sturdy than aluminum foil.

 

You can get Saint medals really cheap at local Catholic Shops. If they’re out of Sacred Heart medals (because you know– it’s a popular one) then look for a Scapular Medal. He’s usually on the back of there. If you’re really lucky, you’ll find medals that have the Sacred heart of Jesus on the front and the Immaculate Heart of Mary on the back.

If you only have one medal, no problem! Check out this post to see how to make a mold and craft as many as you need! This is a lot of fun for kids of all ages. Lydia used a crucifix that she molded herself for the end of her rosary.

To make this craft, take your pipe cleaner and add 10 of your beads. Twist the pipe cleaner closed, and snip off a section at the end. Put your Sacred Heart medal along with your “Our Father” bead, then twist the extra piece of pipe cleaner on to make a cross shape for the end.  This will also hold your last bead on. If I were going to make these with a whole class, I’d probably go with a version kinda like this:

We used red for the Sacred heart, and pink for the Immaculate heart. The orange and yellow beads around the Sacred heart chaplet symbolize fire, and the white beads around the Immaculate heart symbolize the white roses that surround Out Lady’s heart. You can also twist on pieces of orange and yellow pipe cleaner to the top of the heart to add flames.

Sacred Heart Chaplet

Immaculate Heart Chaplet

I really liked the addition of some heart-shaped beads. Lydia (of course) used pretty much exclusively the heart shaped ones.

When it’s finished, it’s pretty easy to shape the pipe cleaner into a heart. Pair with some Valentines, or a Sacred Heart holy card. Now isn’t that a great craft for Catholics on St. Valentine’s Day?

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Filed Under: 02 February, 07 July, 08 August, Crafts for Kids, Immaculate Heart of Mary, Liturgical Year, Mary, My Crafts, Rosary, Sacred Heart of Jesus, Saints 11 Comments

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Choose a Patron Saint for the New Year

December 28, 2011 By

A few years ago online (I wish I could remember where) I read about a Catholic family’s New Year’s tradition to choose a new patron saint for their family each year. I thought this was a great idea!

Choose a saint that you feel would be a good fit for your family- something relative to you. We chose St. Anthony because my family is hopelessly disorganized, and we constantly loose things. I thought the patron saint of lost objects would be fitting for us.

I like to put a statue of our family’s patron saint by the door in our home. Keeping the statue there reminds me daily of our patron saint of the year.

Here are some ideas for celebrating the yearly patron saint of your family:

  • Put a statue of that saint in your home.
  • Give your children holy cards or inexpensive saint medals of the saint.
  • Do research and learn about your saint over the year.
  • Celebrate your saint’s feast day.
  • Make crafts and do activities with your children relating to your saint and his or her patronage.  (Search in my navigation bar for ideas under “saints”).
  • Do a quick google search to see if your saint has a prayer you can say together on New Year’s day, and put up somewhere in your home. Include this prayer in your bedtime prayer routine for the year.

Just so you know, buying Catholic stuff for your home doesn’t have to break the bank. I like to check out Catholic Deals for money saving ideas, but I’ve also found some good deals around town.

Looking for affordable saint statues? I have routinely found saint statues that stand a foot high at Ross for somewhere around $9 each, which is a great deal! And no, they’re not plastic. They’re not usually labeled, so you need to know who you’re looking at. It’s hit or miss, but worth checking out for sure! If they’re damaged at all, ask for a discount- they’ll always give it to you.

If you’re lucky enough to have a local Catholic shop, every Catholic store I’ve ever been in has a set of these drawers with cheap saint medals inside. They’re about 0.50 cents each. These are great for kids, and excellent for crafting!

 Some of my favorite things about having a new patron saint of our family each year:

  • We are exposed to more saints and learn about a new one each year.
  • Rather than choosing a New Year’s resolution, we can choose a saint with a positive aspect that we can work towards emulating for the year.
  • We have more saints that we feel “close” to, and are special to us. The number grows each year.
  • It gives us a new angle to work on ourselves spiritually, taking our new patron saint on as a spiritual inspiration.
  • It gives us a reason to celebrate a new saint feast day each year, and learn about the traditions that go along with that saint.

Here’s Julian proudly sporting his St. Anthony medal from last year. He loves it!

PS. Just wanted to make sure you all remember that New Year’s Day is indeed a holy day of obligation, so going to mass should be a part of your New Year’s tradition. ;-) What other traditions does your family have for celebrating the New Year’s?

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Filed Under: 01 January, New Year's, Saints, Tradition 12 Comments

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