Coffee and Crayons: FREE St. Teresa of Calcutta Quote Coloring Page

I had an inspiration for a monthly post called Coffee & Crayons about coloring and prayer, because I know mammas out there love to color too! I'll post a FREE inspirational coloring page you can use to color in and reflect upon while you sip your morning coffee or tea. I bet some of the older kids would enjoy this reflection too.

How many of the saints have taught us the importance of silence in our lives as a way of connecting to our Lord? St. Teresa of Calcutta has quite a few quotes floating out there on the subject. Even scripture is littered with little tidbits about the importance of silence from the old Testament through the new. 
  
          “For thus said the Lord GOD,

            the Holy One of Israel:

            By waiting and by calm you shall be saved,

            in quiet and in trust shall be your strength.

            But this you did not will." Isaiah 30:15 NAB 

          “Be still, and know that I am God.

            I will be exalted among the nations,

            I will be exalted on the earth!” Psalm 46:11 NAB

We are often quick to judge, complain, or just keep gabbing. What if silence could give us a new perspective in life situations. If we really think about a situation and apply a thoughtful Christ centered quite contemplation on the matter, I bet out perspective and outlook will change.

Jesus is waiting for us in the silence and that is where we can find His gentle whispers to our soul. How can we hear anything he has to say if we don't let Him get in a word edgewise. We have all been party I am sure to a conversation where the gabber is relentless and we may have something wonderful to say or interject but never get the opportunity. It's quite a frustrating experience. I am sure we can see how Jesus feels when He can't get a word in to us though the constant noise of our modern life: T.V., phones, music, conversation, and the list goes on. 

I am going to give a wee little challenge: How long can you sit quietly before our Lord in Adoration or even in quiet praise after Mass? Try it this week or month and see if you can hear Jesus whisper to you in the silence.

There is a whole set of St. Teresa of Calcutta quote coloring pages available in the shop

Some other awesome blogs sharing great ideas on coloring and prayer time for grownups:

Prayer Wine Chocolate: 7 Reasons Why it's ok for Mommy to Color
Women of Grace: Are Adult Coloring Books OK? (Insightful, especially for those like me that get freaked out by things I see in the store...it's nice to have a strong Catholic perspective on some modern trends!)

A Marian Giveaway and Introduction to Our New Saint Quote Coloring pages

I was thinking that for our Blessed Mother a lovely Marian Giveaway is in order! I have put together a cute little package including a beautiful book: The Imitation of Mary, Marian add-a-bead bracelet, and a set of pretty coloring pages: Quotes From the Saints about the Blessed Virgin Mary (digital download). One winner will receive all of the goodies and then I will select 5 additional recipients for a set of the digital download Marian Saint Quote coloring pages. The Giveaway will end on September 8th. You can enter the Giveaway at the bottom of the page through the raffle copter widget!
                           

I have a lovely new series of inspirational adult coloring pages out now in pretty floral and patterned designs with quotes from the saints. The first listed set is for the soon to be St. Teresa of Calcutta. I also have a children's coloring page set out for St. Teresa of Calcutta too! You can find them in the shop.

   

Here is a quick look at the children's coloring set. It includes holy cards, a coloring page, and full page poster of the Saint!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

The Perks of Home Education

 This. I just love! One of the fantastic perks of  Home Education. When the weather is lovely we take our lessons outside and soak up that beautiful sunshine our Good God made for us. We can also bring to life what we are learning about. I just love the Builders of the Old World, it's one of our read aloud

books. In the chapter we were reading, we discovered the first paintings and had the perfect chance to make some prehistoric art ourselves with some charred leftovers from our fire pit!

This copy is from my childhood. I am not sure where to get it now. My dear mother saved so many of the books she loved from our homeschool days and passed them along to me! I am so grateful because of the fond memories I have from the times she taught us. I hope my children have wonderful memories too someday.    

There is just something so cute about tiny little toes...

Sts. Joachim & Anne Pray for Families Desiring Children

The journey of infertility and secondary infertility is a long and hard one. When my husband and I were married we really wanted to start a family right away and it was so discouraging that we could not get pregnant or stay pregnant. Finally, a couple years into our marriage we were blessed with a beautiful baby girl! Then ensued 3 years of secondary infertility. I am not sure which was worse the first round or the second round! So many mixed feeling about why did it happen before and it's not happening now, what's wrong with my body, why can't I do this! The stretch of infertility grew this third time around reaching nearly 4 years, but we are due in October with our first baby boy! We get the comments from people: wow you spaced that out great or perfectly. But no! That wasn't our choice! This ultimately reminds me that God is definitely in control and not us. When I was little about 12-13 years old,  I used to just pour over the old testament especially Proverbs and the Psalms and here is a verse that pops out so perfect for this and any other situation where we have all these ideas about how stuff is going to work out. “Many are the plans of the human heart,
but it is the decision of the LORD that endures.” -Proverbs 19:21

A perfect couple to turn to are the holy parents of our Blessed Mother Mary, Sts. Joachim and Anne! They were good God fearing people who deeply loved our Lord and prayed fervently for His will to be done. Back in their day it was shameful not to be able to have children and people even looked upon you like it was completely your fault and some side effect of personal sin if you were barren. What an awful trial to endure with such love and devotion to our Lord and people still scorned you just because of something not in your control! I can't even imagine.

Little is known or revealed about their lives, but they were finally granted in their very old age the blessing of a beautiful child, St. Mary who would become the Mother of God! One of my favorite books is titled the Mystical City of God by venerable Mary of Agreda a 17th century Spanish nun who this work was revealed to by Our Lady. It gives a wee bit of insight into the lives of these two great saints. You can find part of it in Audio and e-book for FREE at Mystical City of God.org Volume one (the Conception of Mary) contains quite a bit of information on the life of Sts. Anne & Joachim. Mostly how they lived in love for God and each other. It is a beautiful example that any married couple can follow and not just those suffering from infertility.

One of my favorite books and this was my grandmother's copy that she gave to me...

Sts. Joachim and Anne, lift up to our Lord the petitions of families desiring the blessing of children. You waited so patiently and long for an answer to your prayers, please ask for others suffering like you for the Grace to endure and accept God's decision in their lives. Amen

The Struggle is Real, but Rejoice in the Lord!

I doubt whether there are many perfect model mammas out there in the world. I certainly am not one of them, but if you are I am really happy for you and would hope maybe you could share some words of wisdom for the rest of us completely human ones! I strive and try my best to be that super mommy, but at the end of the day I still have laundry to do and maybe dishes too. I also have more than likely lost my cool a few times and get discouraged that after a great job cleaning my beautiful children have undone what took me a good while to accomplish in just minutes. At the end of the day we say our family prayers and I sink into bed asking Jesus to help me do a better job tomorrow!

All this week I wanted to get to daily Mass and it just didn't happen. I have one night owl todler that just wont sleep resulting in a real challenge to wake come morning, another older challenging one, and a baby on the way that is making getting things accomplished even more difficult. I am reminded by an old testament verse to rejoice because I serve a good and loving God! That wonderful God gave me my little blessings and when I look and see the simple joy in their smiling faces all the struggling and imperfection in my vocation melts away.

         "Do not be saddened this day, for rejoicing in the LORD is your strength!”– Nehemiah 8:10

So if you feel the struggle is REAL too just remember that rejoicing in the Lord is our strength. A smile is contagious and so is a cheerful heart and even thru our struggles we can choose to be cheerful. Jesus came to show us the way and that way was paved with struggles. Don't beat yourself up if you are not the perfect super mom, because our Lord loves you and will carry you through your struggling imperfect day and even give you the all Grace you need to try and do better tomorrow!


                                                                                                                             

Children's Scapulars & FREE Coloring Page

I just finished up illustrating a cute saint image of Our Lady of Mt. Carmel and started thinking about how cute it would be to make it into a children's scapular. I like tiny scapulars for kids but most of them don't hold up very well for long, so I set out to make a sturdy one.

The strings are sturdy para cord at about 12 inches, just the perfect size for little ones. I have sewn around them 2x with a straight stitch ensuring the strings are well attached and then added a decorative blanket stitch in different color choices. You can find them in our shop  on Etsy at SaongJai

And here is a FREE coloring page for OL Mt. Carmel! You can find the whole collection of FREE coloring pages here!

Catholic Preschool Printables SALE

 

So how many of us out there wish there were awesome Catholic letter practice pages for our little ones? I know that I was one, but searching I found there were limited cute Catholic products on the market. You can find this amazing printable on sale right now over at www.etsy.com/shop/saongjai or by clicking on the SALE picture.

 

This amazing printable set of over 60 pages is on super sale right now until May 6th 2016! A-Z letter practice, numbers, colors, and coloring pages are included. The best part is that unlike a workbook where you only have one page for the letter being practiced the printable allows you to print as many of that letter that you want. There is still more greatness about this because a limited home use license is granted to you so you can print it out for as many kids and as many years as you need it.