Feast of All Saints 2015

Today we enjoyed such a festive celebration of the feast of All Saints!

My two oldest children are just old enough to help me with the great amount of work that needs to be done to attend the party. I haven't had time to sew costumes for the last couple of years, so I asked the children to assemble their own costumes from what we had on hand, which they mostly did.

Mary helping me decorate the sign for our party game

Joseph (2) was St. Martin of Tours and Mary (6) was St. Kateri Tekekwitha.

Margaret (4) was a lion from Noah's Ark.

John (8) was St. Thomas More.

We had new leadership organizing the party this year and they really changed things up, making several lovely improvements! The party was moved from the eve of All Saints to the actual feast day. For the first time in as along as we've attended (about six years), this event was a potluck meal party, and the feast was great. The ladies decorated everything so very beautifully!

Much more food was laid out after I snapped my photo!

The prizes table for the end of the party

The welcome table

The dining tables, with real lit candles!

After our delicious meal, we sang the Litany of the Saints.

Singing the Litany of the Saints

Then we played Guess the Saint up on stage, with partygoers voting for their favorite costumes within each age category, using handy voting cards provided.

Mama on stage directing the 0-5 years group

Mary on stage

Children were then loosed to play the many party games. In past years, each child got candy at each game. This led to kids eating the whole night through, perhaps exposing themselves to allergies or candies that weren't age-appropriate (for toddlers), and certainly eating more candy than their parents wanted in one fell swoop. This year, the children were given bags and they received stickers on them (decorating the bags) at each game station. At the conclusion, they took their bags to the prize table to get candy (or stickers, pencils, holy cards, toys) for stickers . . . although in truth kids were given the green light to fill their bags to their hearts' content! This new system let parents control which candy, if any, the kids received (for families with special diets), and controlled how much they could eat at one time.

Mary blowing St. Raymond's boat around the obstacles

The cake walk (done in age groups) is always highly popular! The baked goods received have prayer requests for the dearly departed souls attached to them.

The evening concluded with a group prayer, then a mad dash for the prize table, and all the families helping to clean up.

Prize glasses Mary won