Baby Steps

I was talking to a friend yesterday who is just starting to feast with her family. We talked about the importance of starting with baby steps. I would never desire someone to become exhausted by trying to accomplish everything at once. I did that at first. After a few months of on and off, stressful feasting, we stopped.After a conversation I had a conversation with Nancy Wilson she encouraged me to try again, and focus on making it special for the children. Her philosophy is that it is all about the children developing a love for the day. Do not stress right away about starting traditions. They come naturally. Do not stress about finding new recipes. Start with one a week. I always make sure there is something on the table that everyone loves. My kids are not picky eaters, so this is not difficult. If yours are than make their favorite dessert. We do not fuss with the kids about cleaning their plates on this night. They do not realize it, but if they just wanted bread and dessert I would probably let that happen. Just don't tell them! Do not feel the pressure to immediately have guests every week. I still do not do that. I think I have said before that some weeks we prefer to celebrate with just our family. Develop a routine and over time things will just fall into place. Remember it is about developing a love for the Sabbath. Do not put so much pressure on yourself that you come to dread the day.

Julie

How to make it Special

I have been reading and talking to others about ways to make feasting in general special.Many who have been doing this longer than I, say that making your weekday meals more simple is one way. I have posted on this a little before. For us we did this because financially we could not swing big meals 6 nights a week and then added to that a feast. As I also said before, I needed to free up some time in the week to prepare for Saturday night. Today I will be cooking my side dishes for tomorrow, therefore we are eating leftovers from last night. I usually cook one pot of soup or chili once a week. We can get two meals out of those. Someone said to me"you spend your entire week making sacrifices and planning for one meal". Yes, I do, but I see it as more than a meal. That meal is the start of the day that my family and I look forward to the whole week. That meal makes us stop and forget everything else, to focus on worshipping our savior. That meal encourages conversations with my children that would not normally happen. Preparing the entire week for the Sabbath has made it a very special day in our home. A day to look forward to, just as you do Christmas or Thanksgiving. If you are new to this, give it time. It took us a good year to get in the groove. Now that we are, I would not change it. Seeing my children's love of the Sabbath makes everything worth the sacrifices and work. I would recommend the book A Return to Sunday Dinner. It is not about Sabbath feasting, but the same principles apply.

Is it hard for your family to decide what standard to set for feasting? We have never really struggled, because my husband is not one to think he has to do what everyone else is doing. I do know families that struggle with this. When you fellowship with a community that feasts regularly this is not as hard because you have others to learn from. If you decide that the same"rules" apply for Sabbath feasting that apply to Sunday worship, then you have a good starting place. We did this knowing this meant we would be offering our best. We have always believed we offer Christ our best when we worship Him. AS I have said before this meant creative budgeting for us. I think we should all remember that our "best" is different for each household. I love to cook. I cook a hot home cooked meal most every night. To make it special on Saturday takes a little work. I have friends who do not cook. When they do cook on Saturday, their feast is different than mine. I have been touched to be invited to feast with a family that lives this way. I knew the food she prepared took hours of thought and labor because it did not come naturally. Those who love to do this, because it is gift God has given them, need to not be quick to judge those who may not have the same gift. They have many that I do not have, and prayed that I did. I will say this often, because I truly believe it. Feasting is about bringing a love of celebrating the Sabbath to your home. You may do it differently than I, as long as the end goal is the same.

Julie

Week night Meals

I have become even more convinced that cutting costs on week night meals is the way to go if you are looking for ways to add feasting into your weekly budget. Sometimes I have gone a bit far. Making 10:00pm trips to Taco Bell because my husband is starving, kind of defeats the point. It is hard to cut back and fill up the boys. If anyone has any filling but cheap recipes please share.

Julie

When Does it All Get Done?

So, I have been trying to figure out how to not have my entire Saturday Taken up with feast preparations.Sometimes I have other things to do. Like this Saturday coming up. My husband gave me a couple of gift cards for Christmas. This is the first "free" weekend we have had since then. I would like to go shopping without a time limit and just enjoy pretending like there is nothing else to do. I have carefully planned my Sabbath feast accordingly. I will make my side dishes Friday. I can do my glaze for the ham on Thursday. Dessert will more than likely be ice cream.(The children love it!!)The children can set the table while I am gone.(With assistance from Dad of course.) This all sounds great, but what about the everyday things that will need to be done on the days I am preparing for Saturday? There are some things I have started to do to help out in this area. I was once expressing concern that I could not handle the very stressful"witching hours". From 4:00 to 6:00 everyone in my home turns evil. My friend suggested that I put dinner together earlier in the day. I try to this as I am either getting lunch together or cleaning up breakfast. The children are not exhausted yet from the day. We are not in a frantic panic because Daddy will be home soon and it looks like a hurricane has been through every room. When it comes time for dinner I can just stick in the oven. While I am doing this early preparation I will usually do something having to do with our feast. I am not sure about you, but with me after an incredibly stressful week I cannot think about putting a huge meal on the table and possibly entertaining. I just want to go somewhere that i cannot hear or see anything that has to do with keeping a home, potty training, or anything that means I have to keep it together and be the wife and mother God has called me to be. Therefore for me it has been helpful to find little ways through out the week to keep things less stressful so I will have the energy to pull the feast off, and it allows the time to do other personal and family activities on Saturday. I'll let you know how it works this week.

Julie

Traditions

I was asked if I would address staring traditions. This has been difficult for our family. We observed what others did and then we would try to implement them at our home. Most of the time it did not work. Every family has different dynamics. Therefore, what floats your boat may not float mine. We have found that the best traditions are the ones that just flow naturally. The most important thing is to make sure they are age appropriate. If you are starting this with teenagers be sure to not make this too corny. If you are starting with toddlers do not expect them to sit through long recitations and ceremony. They can be trained to obey, but not trained to love it. The key is teaching them to love it. I will run through our liturgy for sabbath feasting. The dinner begins with my husband reading scripture at the table. Usually what the pastor has e-mailed us for the sermon that week. During this time I am usually putting the food on the table. It is too tempting to put the food on the table and not let them partake. As they get older this will change. He then speaks a blessing on our family and toasts to our Sabbath. We then eat. We try to have fun engaging conversation. Maybe about what the sermon will be about the next day. But, let's face it with an 8 month old, 3 year old, 5 and 8 year old, we are usually cleaning up spills, laughing(or trying not to)or just enjoying the chaos. We then move to the living room for a family worship. We due this everyday so we wanted to make this on special. We did not know what to do, but again the kids came through. They see this as a night to celebrate and do we not have parties when we celebrate. They use this as a time to put on a show. They recite anything we are working on at the time. They have lots of fun with this as it is usually accompanied with much movement and laughter. They always have their favorite psalms or hymns to request. After this we will do family games or something else that is fun for everyone.I Tell you this just as a example. Not for you to copy. This has to have meaning for your home in order for your children to develop a love for it. You will also have to change things as your children get older. If you have a wide age range than consider letting the older ones be part of leading some things. One of my 8 year old's favorite parts is when he gets to read the scripture at the beginning of the meal. Be creative and do not stress. Let your traditions be a natural part of the Sabbath.

Julie

Counting the Cost

When we decided to celebrate the Sabbath with a feast every week we had to see how this fit in our budget.My husband is a Christian school teacher and we have four wonderful children. We knew something had to give to enable us to do this. The first thing was to revamp our weekly menus. I love to cook, therefore it has never been a chore to provide a home-cooked meal for my family. We decided to scale back a little. Instead of having a meat, a starch and two vegetables every night,we went to having a couple of vegetarian nights. We do beans and rice, mac-n-cheese,pasta, and anything else that is cheap and filling. Pots of soup are also great. A big pot can get us through 2 dinners and a lunch. I try to keep our week-night meals to about $7.00 a night. Sometimes a little more, sometimes a little less. The vegetarian meals are usually $5 and under.When we have planned on entertaining and the budget will not allow we will do brunch after church. Brunch foods are less expensive. I have also become a whiz at shopping sales. When hams were $1.99 a pound at Christmas I bought 2. Turkeys are always cheap at Thanksgiving. There is always something like a Manager's Special. This week it was Chuck Roast for 1.99 a pound. I found a great recipe in gourmet magazine for an Italian Roast. I will add maybe garlic mashed potatoes and a salad. Possibly homemade bread. This will be an inexpensive feast. I do not do this to be cheap. The reality is, is that the average family cannot feast weekly without finding ways to sacrifice and cut corners. These are just a few things we have done.

Why do we Feast?

My family is passionate about celebrating the Sabbath. For years we have always prepared ourselves for worship. It may be prayer and singing with the children or a quick "this is how you behave in church." My huband has always believed we should prepare our hearts and minds before entering into God's Holy sanctuary. We always wanted to do more, but did not know what to do. Then we heard about Sabbath feasting. That was it! Why not start this day with a great celebration. There are many thoughts on how to do this. My husband decided since we were celebrating Christ, than we would "go all out." We have grown has we have done this and have changed some things. This blog is meant to share this journey and ideas with you. Friends will often call me to get ideas. So, with the encouragement of these friends I am starting this blog. Please share your thoughts and ideas as we all have much to learn.

Julie