All posts filed under: children

Building Family Culture and Making Music

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The Baughams are a Christ the King family  who are always blessing our church through their musical talents. Pam, the mother, is a part of Sweet Betsy, a local folk duo, and David (David Baugham Music ) won several large Dayton competitions that included a cd recording and release party (as pictured above. Photo Credit: Jessie Evanhoe). As we considered this series on family culture, the Baughams were one of the first families to come to mind because they seem to have a very distinct family culture and everyone identifies them with music. We are grateful that they agreed to answer a few of our questions together. If there were a “Baugham Family Band,” how would you introduce each one of you?   Andy, “Ace the Poet/Rapper” Anna, “The Songbird on Uke” David,”Lead guitarist, creative Instrumentalist” Ben, “Self taught ocarinist, author and illustrator” Pam, “The Muse” (Beymomce) Jeff, “Manager/ Roadie”   Has playing/singing music always been something that you’ve done together? If so, what did that look like when the kids were little?    Our kids have always …

Building Family Culture: Reading Aloud

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My husband and I both come from homes where our mothers read to us, where we were shaped permanently by the power of good stories read aloud. Reading aloud means living through stories together. And, I think that knits a family together in shared experience beyond mundane life.  This also plants the seeds for corporate make-believe that goes past the imagination of the individual child. And, it’s life-giving for more than just children. I didn’t anticipate the joy of reading aloud to be so pivotal in our first year of marriage. We married a month after graduating college and moved to the Chicago area so that my husband could start seminary. Due to the random jobs I found as a seminary wife, I ended up having to wake up a majority of mornings around 3:30am. So, I would try to fall asleep around 8:30pm in order to get the sleep I needed, but I would find this difficult. Gradually, my husband started reading me to sleep. In that first year of marriage, we reread books like The Hobbit and …

Building Family Culture: Vacations

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Thank you to Sandy McNamara for contributing to our series on Family Culture. Sandy is the wife of our priest, Fr. Wayne McNamara, the mother of four, and a grandmother of four. She is an art historian and an educator and a founder of Dominion Academy of Dayton.   It took root in my own childhood.  My dad is still a history “buff.”  At the age of 85, he’s still reliving the Russian Revolution through the books he’s immersed himself in.  This love of history took our family to places like Washington, D.C., Appomattox Court House, Colonial Williamsburg, and  the battlefields of Gettysburg.  It brought history alive for me. Thus, when we started having our own kids we made vacation destinations one of the top priorities of our family’s year and we structured our life to save for them. When we moved to Dayton in 1986, we bought an old farmhouse (in the city), built in 1875 – its inner city location made its purchase incredibly inexpensive.  We had a used VW “Rabbit” – purchased from …

Family Culture and Sunday Tea

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Our eldest child is seven now, which doesn’t seem so old, but in today’s society means he will soon be noticing more about the culture, asking us possibly difficult questions, paying more attention to his peers, and seeing how our family is different from others.  The teen years are looming, in the not so distant future, and I have been thinking that now is the time to focus on building a “family culture” to provide a buffer between our family and society at large. What is a “family culture”?  No, it’s not a bad joke about the sharing of bacteria in your house.  A family culture is, simply, how your family differs from every other family.  I appreciate this post from Catholic All Year on this topic. A family culture mostly has to do with preferences: What does your family like?  And matters of discipline: What will you allow/not allow in your home?  And other fun stuff: How do you like to recreate together?  How do you find rest and relaxation together?  Your family is like …

Rogation Prayer Bunting

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Amanda had the idea for a prayer bunting to hang in your home, or around your garden, as a way to celebrate the Rogation days in your family.  The first page has a few prayers already included on the flags, and the remaining two pages have room to write your own prayers, and for children of non-writing age to draw their prayers.  Just another visible reminder of our responsibility to pray always for our neighbors, communities, and society at large. Cut the flags and fold them and secure with tape over some kind of string.  Kabob skewers work well to hold the flags in the ground.  We would love to see some of your Rogation buntings as well!  Tag us on Instagram @thehomelyhours. RogationFlags

Baking Bread for Maundy Thursday

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On Holy Wednesday, we gathered with our young children to prepare for the rest of Holy Week, through baking bread that would be used for our communion service on Maundy Thursday and hearing a Godly Play lesson. The children listened to the account of the Twelve gathering with Jesus in the Upper Room. Then, we went to the church kitchen to bake bread. We used the recipe from Bethany at a Spoon Full of Yum that we posted yesterday. We ended up with these artfully formed, practically unmouthed (oh, toddlers) rolls of dough! Here is our bread before some of the older children processed to present it to our priest during the offertory. It was special for them to be able to participate so integrally in our Maundy Thursday service! Disclaimer to those who partook: All little hands were washed in the making of this bread and the oven was at 500 degrees.  

Homely Moments: Children and Holy Week

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We thought it would be fun to launch an inspirational blog link up this week at The Homely Hours.  If you would like to share pictures or ideas of your family celebrating Holy Week, please add your link below.  It will be fun to see how others celebrate!  Alternatively, tag your photos on Instagram or Facebook with #homelyworship.  The invitation to add your link is open through Easter Sunday.  Have a blessed Holy Week. The Triumphal Entry in godly play.  

Prayer Beads for Kids

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One of my goals this Lent is to spend more time in prayer.  My husband gifted me a beautiful set of Anglican prayer beads for Christmas, and the practice of using the beads and ages old prayers, in a rhythmic, defined manner, has made prayer more accessible to me.  And so I am much more inclined to spend time doing it! As I’ve been keeping them around on my desk areas for use, my charming and curious children have asked me what they are for, and so I decided to make them some of their own.  I was somewhat surprised that they were interested, but we ran with it, and came up with these simple circlets for their use. These can be made out of anything, and would be a fun Lenten family activity, or perhaps a surprise in their Easter basket?  Use what you have on hand; plastic pony beads in two colors on a piece of yarn would work just fine. The important thing is to place your beads in this form: For …

A Simple Easter Garden

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Have you ever heard of the tradition of creating an Easter Garden?  This has become a well-loved custom in our home, that begins on Palm Sunday, and we observe through the difficult Holy Week, to its climax on Easter. It is a lovely and symbolic way to mark the events of Holy Week for children, and the adults quite enjoy it too! Here are some simple steps to create your own Easter Garden: Gather your materials: You will need a container to hold your garden; it is helpful if this container can drain so your garden does not get water-logged.  And of course, a tray to catch the draining water.  Use what you have on hand; ours is a large take-out container with holes poked in the bottom and its plastic lid to catch the drainage. a small terra-cotta pot for the tomb.  This should be relative in size to your container, ours is the smallest size pot you can buy. a large rock to cover your tomb.  Send your children outside to find one! …

Children in Worship, or The Mortification of the Parents

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It seems fitting during this penitential season to talk a bit about taking our children to worship.  There are no greater instruments of joy and humility in my life than our five charming and curious children.  More often than not over our 7 years of child rearing and church going, have I sat in the pew, translating references in the liturgy to “the flesh,” to, “the mortification of the flesh.” Oh, the embarrassment! Oh, the travails! (You mean your family doesn’t look just like this in church?) Our parish has a beautiful statement on our website about this: “Children are lovingly invited to our services to participate in the rhythms of the liturgy. In practice, this means that the sounds of children – ranging from laughter to cries – are viewed not as distractions, but reminders that we as a church are all called to be as little children. We do not consider our children future members in training, but rather full members in the present: embraced, accepted, and joyfully welcomed into our corporate worship. …