Christmas crafts can heal

Origami crane my daughter crafted with paper she
decorated with markers. A cheap option for the expensive
paper you find in stores.

We have to think of the children. No matter if economic woes, natural disasters, and the madness of the Sandy Hook tragedy is finding us crawling, rather than leaping toward Christmas. We have to carve out time to engage the young in something that will turn their minds to something seasonal and beautiful. Crafting can turn our minds from tragedy -- and toward how we might be a gift to others. And handcrafted items can not only be more thoughtful and healing for those both making and receiving them, these items ease the burden on families, costing just pennies to make. 

Making something beautiful out of nearly nothing can be a virtue. My Grandma stowed old buttons, wrapping paper, fabric remnants, etc, and turned out gifts of necklaces, gift tags and cheerful bedroom slippers. Depression and World War II generations knew not to throw useful scraps away they could use later. Austerity mixed with creativity can yield great results.

1)   Clothespin crucifix. Fine crucifixes are expensive, but children can create a nice crucifix for their or a loved one's room by gluing the wood parts of hinged clothespins to cardboard. For more color, decorate pins with crayons and markers.
2)   Paper Chain garlands. Contact paper or gift wrapper strips make great paper chains, but kids could even use crayons, markers or paint to color newspaper strips to get the same effect. Hang garlands around thresholds or on the tree.

My daughter taught me to fold these 

cranes, which make great 

ornaments strung on thread. 

Challenging but fun.

      3)   Jesse Tree ornaments. See post below and find a link here for designs that could be drawn on a paper circle or felt to make colorful ornaments.

      4)   Origami ornaments. Even adults and older teens love this one. My daughter makes her own origami paper by using watercolors or markers to decorate white paper with Asian-inspired designs. Origami designs can be found at the library or online.   

   5)   Wallpaper crafts. Ask for castoff sample books at wallpaper stores for an endless supply of high-quality craft paper. Make outfits for hand-drawn paper dolls, glue to cardboard to make picture frames, cover cans for pencil holders, and make book and binder covers.

Wallpaper-covered binder.

   6)   Pressed flowers. Ten days of pressing between paper layers yields spectacular patterns from common flowers and foliage. Even early December in my Chicago-area climate, I was still finding usable leaves and ferns to press. Use boards and layers of cardboard and paper. Screws tighten the layers through the week. Or, sandwich flowers between paper layers and tuck them in a telephone book or dictionary. Use plenty of weight. Use flower pressings for simple gift tags and cards. Glue on flowers, then add a layer of glue or “Mod Podge” on top to seal the design.

Gift tags out of hand-pressed foliage,
even in December.

Pressed flower card.

Handmade gifts are often best! Leave a comment with your own crafting ideas for Christmas.

Jesse Trees Help Define Advent

Making these Jesse Tree Ornaments with friends set me up
for decades of future Advent seasons.
Photo by Marianna Bartholomew

At an Opus Dei woman’s night of reflection at a parish west of Chicago, the priest took a good, long time counseling each penitent. The line stretched along the back of the church and out into the narthex. One woman toward the end was around 30 years old and tall, with abundant, curly dark hair. Her face was calm, but something about the way she stood had me whispering to her, asking if everything was ok. That’s how I found out she had just had back surgery and been released from the hospital. Her first time out, she had headed to Confession.

My husband and dog Maestro by the Jesse Tree.
The ornament top right symbolizes Creation.

Honestly? At the time, all I could think was that my first destination after being cooped up from surgery probably would not be a Confessional line.

The woman admitted she was in pain, and finally went to lie down on a long bench against the wall. I called her over when her time for Confession came.

Several days later, a friend from a town nearly half an hour away told me about a new lady from church who was moving with her husband from an apartment into a little home. The woman had several children, and was in back pain from a recent surgery. My friend and the lady were going to start a special Jesse Tree project. I had heard of Jesse Trees, but wondered why these two were thinking of Christmas, months out of season.

I asked if I could crash their plans and arrived at the first gathering with my three children in tow. Sure enough, our hostess was the lady I had met in the Confession line. Again she was smiling – and in back pain. Our little ones rambled around the basement playing with a dollhouse and Legos while the three moms cut out pink and purple circles – the colors of Advent. We used fabric paints to depict scenes and write verses from Scripture:  For the First Friday of Advent we illustrated Isaac and the Ram, Genesis 22: 1-14. For the second Tuesday, we drew tablets with Roman Numerals for Moses and the Law, Exodus 20:1-17. I loved creating a little felt mission church for the story of Nehemiah the Builder and had to laugh when my camel resembled a dinosaur for the story of Abraham.

It was a new experience, making these Jesse Tree ornaments, which numbered 29: 28 days for Advent, and one for Christmas Day. We averaged just several ornaments each meeting, so this project gave our children many play dates rotating through three homes. Our sessions stretched through the Summer and into the Fall. Our hostess made her set as a gift -- I believe, for a couple of newlyweds. Out of simple felt and fabric paint, an amazing heirloom-type gift.

Jesse Tree patterns are easily found for free online and anyone can have fun with this project. Our ornaments are about the diameter of a bagel, but I’ve seen some as small as a quarter. People make them out of every material imaginable: wood, cardboard, construction paper and felt, using markers, crayons or paint. The ornaments hang on Christmas trees, over mantelpieces, on yarn strung around doorways, or from branches stuck into a vase. 

And the point of the Jesse Tree? Isaaiah chapter 11, versus 1-2 says:

"But a shoot shall sprout from the stump of Jesse,

and from his roots a bud shall blossom.

The spirit of the LORD shall rest upon him:
a spirit of wisdom and of understanding,

A spirit of counsel and of strength,

a spirit of knowledge and of fear of the LORD."

That image, of the ancestral tree of Jesus that shows his noble birth, has been shown in stained glass windows and in paintings, since ancient times.

In the 1100s, a monk named Hervaeus wrote, "The patriarch Jesse belonged to the royal family, that is why the root of Jesse signifies the lineage of kings. As to the rod, it symbolises Mary as the flower symbolises Jesus Christ.”

Lighting a candle after dinner, gathering the family to sing O Come Emmanuel, reading Scripture verses of the day and hanging the corresponding Jesse Tree ornament, is now a beautiful Advent tradition in our home. We hang the ornaments on our tree until Christmas Eve. We attend Mass, then exchange Jesse Tree ornaments for Christmas ornaments, while we enjoy eggnog and cookies.

We’ve done this for the past eight years or so, and I always think back to that first encounter of the woman who gave us the gift of the Jesse Tree. She first gave a strong testimony to me by simply bearing her pain and being patient in a Confessional line. 

After welcoming me, a stranger, into her home, she became a good friend. Our little Jesse Tree gatherings became a Bible Study group. Our children were friends for years.

Two years ago, at the start of Advent, she continued her testimony. I received an email from Katherine, that she had sent to people who had either made ornaments with her or received those ornaments: that email went to 18 recipients, all people touched by her little Jesse Tree ministry. She wrote:

“I remember fondly praying, studying, and crafting with you, in our old apartment, at your house, or in our basement of this house.  So many years, with great glue shared around many a newspaper covered table!”

She reminded us to take out our Jesse Trees, writing, “I hope your family life is drawn closer to the heart of God due to the love of Jesus, and growing through His Word through this simple devotion.  None of us gets it perfectly.  We just do as many days as we each can.  The goal is to pray with our family, and to spend time together.”

Then she went on to describe other Advent traditions in her family. This lady was chasing around one-year-old twins, caring for a daughter with heart defects that needed massive surgeries, had children ranging up to the teens, and I believe it was right around that time that repeated floods had destroyed her basement. Yet she took time to encourage 18 other people in their Advent journeys.

Katherine’s a graduate of Franciscan University in Steubenville, a great Catholic College, but it’s hidden in her home, surrounded by little ones, laundry and household duties, that she continues to be a powerful lay missionary, giving a testimony that enriches lives.

In her own words:

“Jesus being in our lives as the focus and center is key for every job we have to do.”

May your Advent be blessed.


Photos by Marianna Bartholomew

Taking Techie Breaks for Old-Fashioned Domesticity

Photo by Daniel Bartholomew

How to balance high-tech living and a contemplative spirit amidst modern family life? Here's a project from last week that instilled a little bliss and peace into my otherwise crazy schedule. I decided to stop fighting my overflow of beloved cookbooks, take them out of the jammed cupboard and display them, covered decoratively so their dogeared covers wouldn't be an eyesore. That way, this collection I treasure is available, ready to use and even adds a style element to the room.

I've been too busy for crafts lately. But the idea of a sanity break, doing something out of the ordinary and just for pleasure, and something uplifting to the whole family, appealed. My Grandmother might have done a similar project, back when scraps of material and paper were salvaged, treasured, and turned into something useful and attractive. 


I remember stories of Grandma saving and ironing old gift wrap to reuse. I still have some of her gift tags, cut with decorative scissors from greeting cards she received. People during WWII learned to be the ultimate recyclers. My family inherited a footstool Grandma had made out of quart-sized tomato juice cans covered with fabric. As a newlywed, I reupholstered the "hassock" and presented it to my Mom. It's a surprisingly classy-looking stool, and you would never guess its humble origins. 

But it's been awhile since I've stepped away from the daily grind, let the world spin on without me for a bit, and did something crafty and home-beautifying. 

We have a galley kitchen in a 1950's ranch-style house. I love cooking and baking, which makes for  too many fun gadgets for the space (like the grain grinder on the middle shelf above and my bean crock on the lower) -- plus a food processor, blender, a juicer, myriads of baking tins and stoneware, etc! To call the area cozy is being polite. I frequently pray for organization in our home. Grandma and Grandpa (God rest their souls) managed tidily with nine people sharing a two bedroom Chicago bungalow, back when front porches turned into sleeping chambers through sultry summers. In comparison, it seems ridiculous to admit that three children, aged pre-teen and up, and two adults, in a three-bedroom home, feels like a tight fit. 


However, a new floor plan and way of using that kitchen space came to me so strongly the other day, it felt like a Holy Spirit moment and an answer to my organization prayers. I jettisoned an extra piece of furniture out of the kitchen, leading to a grand reorganizing: a drop-leaf table dragged before the shelves, and a coffee and toast center set up on a squat, vintage dresser nearby. On a day jammed with way too many other things to do, I cleared my mind of worries, donned an apron and reveled in domesticity for a while. My cluttered, unappealing shelves, suddenly bore a new, cheerful aspect. The minuscule table usually used in the corner for overflow produce and miscellany (we usually eat in the dining room), took center stage and became usable, even offering an alluring snack and reading nook.

Photo by Daniel Bartholomew

No sooner had I taken out a couple of old wallpaper sample books to find some good scraps for covers to complete the effect, when my 17-year-old daughter perked up, and sat cross-legged nearby to work out some great calligraphy and art.

We all love the result. Over the weekend, we found ourselves gathering in the kitchen over coffee in a space that finally works well for that purpose -- making even a galley kitchen the "heart of the home." 


I'll think of my girl and that shared time being creative, every time I grab a cookbook embellished with her designs. We were definitely in "flow" together on this project. There is something soothing about paging through fine wallpaper...the colors and textures are satisfying. If you have never gone to your local wallpaper store and asked if they have books of retired samples you can take, then consider doing so, especially if you still have children at home. It's fun just paging through the samples, and we've used the paper for everything from homemade coffee can banks and pencil containers, to greeting cards and paper doll clothing.

Anyway, in this age of hi-tech everything, I loved this project that brightened and made useable an otherwise cramped and unattractive spot in our kitchen -- and carved some pure pleasure into an overly-busy day. Bill-paying, doctor's appointments, school and sports activities, endless dishes and cleaning, and time spent on computers, iPhones, vocations and careers -- that's daily fare. But how often do we remember to call even a short recess, put our burdens and gadgets aside, and experience the sheer pleasure of crafting something beautiful to make our house more a home?