Tuesday, February 2, 2010

Nightly Devotions during Great Lent


As Lent approaches, I have been trying to make a plan for nightly devotions with my children. My children love doing this during Advent, and so I've been looking for resources to continue this practice. As much as I love handmade, creative ideas, my life is not conducive to creating right now! It's either beautiful, handmade crafts or school work and a clean house!

Thankfully, I've been able to find some easy ways to incorporate nightly readings, and hands-on activities that will capture the interest of my children. Here are a few ideas:

Paidea Classics sells a wonderful Lenten calendar. It has numbered doors for each Sunday of the Triodion, and then each day during Great Lent. It also comes with a booklet that contains short readings for each day.

We will also be using our Advent wreath, just redecorated! There are 7 Sundays in Lent, so we have 7 purple candles, plus a white candle for Pascha.

The highlight of our nightly devotions during Advent was our Jesse Tree. Paidea also sells shrink plastic ornaments for Lent! There is a pack for the seven Sundays in Lent, and another that has an ornament for each day of Holy Week. We will be using our Jesse Tree, with a spring-time tree skirt.

I'm so happy that with just a few clicks we have something tangible for our family to embrace Great Lent at home!