Little Flowers: Love of Neighbor

My girls are members of a Little Flowers Club.  My friends Kristi and Jillian initiated the formation of the group.  There are ten mothers and fifteen girls, so we divided into two groups, Pink Roses and Red Roses, although we do our large group activities together (teas, field trips, etc.)  Each of the moms take turns teaching a lesson.  We began in January of last year, and I was able to simply observe several of the lessons last year, because Maria was due to arrive in February.  This year, I finally taught my first lesson.  For each lesson, there is a saint, a color, a memory verse, and a virtue. 

This lesson's virtue is Love of Neighbor.  The saint featured is Saint Jane Frances de Chantal.  The color is light red.  The Memory Verse is 1 John 4:12, No one has ever seen God.  Yet if we love one another God dwells in us, and his love is brought to perfection in us. 

We read the story of Saint Jane Frances de Chantal.  We made the notebook page pictured below.  The craft that we did was to make a bracelet (with beads ordered from Oriental Trading Company) featuring a glass rose bead, which is meant to remind the girls not only of this lesson--Love of Neighbor--but of our wonderful patron, Saint Therese of Lisieux.  My friend Kristi made lovely fondant roses which topped the pink cupcakes.  The girls had fun!

Monsignor, who is very supportive of our Little Flowers group, gave the girls a blessing to open the new school year.  I love that every mom in the picture is holding a baby (I was too, while taking a picture!).  Even Staci is holding a baby, which is due to arrive within a month.

The girls enjoyed their snacks after the meeting.

This is the notebook page we made.

This is a picture of Morgan's bracelet, but the rose can't be seen.  I'll have to get a better picture later.