Easter 2021 💐🙏🏻🐰

“We are an Easter people and Alleluia is our song!” - Saint Pope John Paul II

Our family enjoyed a very blessed Easter Week!!

If you’d like to read more about JPII’s famous quote that I shared above, check out this article published last April: https://aleteia.org/2020/04/11/when-and-why-did-john-paul-ii-call-us-an-easter-people/

If you’d like to learn more about the blessing of the Easter basket - the food basket (not the ones from the bunny, although we had those hidden around the house :) & what the food items represent, check out this link: https://www.learnreligions.com/traditional-easter-basket-for-blessing-4161079

Enjoy our Easter pictures!

We hope you and your loved ones are filled with the Peace of our Risen Lord during this blessed Easter season!

Holy Week 2021 ✝️

Our family celebrated a very blessed holy week!

It’s wild to think that this was our second holy week in a strict lockdown due to the pandemic. However, we were not prohibited from going to any of the services at church. And it was nice to incorporate some of the “at home holy week“ traditions we learned last year!

The kids made a holy week video, all in one take! Here’s a link to the video: https://youtu.be/m4onoJCsKi0

Unfortunately, the Saint Joseph dog was excluded from the video.





I love that in Austria in place of palm branches, on Palm Sunday pussy willows branches are used.



The stillness of the church on Holy Thursday 





We learned this tradition last year, the washing of one another’s feet in the imitation of Christ washing the disciples feet on Holy Thursday 















Due to the gorgeous weather on Holy Thursday, we had our “last supper” in the backyard with some of our friends :) Technically meeting with any more than one person from another household is prohibited, but no one caught us!



This year I learned that it is a tradition in Austria on Good Friday to leave a flower at the cross after you venerate it. After mass we gathered up the flowers and put them in a vase at the foot of the cross.



Clare wanted to be lifted up on the wooden beams after the Good Friday service ;)





Holy Saturday we spent in waiting in preparation for Easter Sunday. The kids made a Paschal candle for the first time this year! We got our kit from Holy Heroes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yXeVHcmQvNU





And they decorated Easter eggs using the Easter egg wraps I got from Shining Light Dolls: https://shininglightdolls.com/products/titles-of-jesus-and-mary-easter-egg-wraps







It was a great, holy week!!

St. Patrick’s Day, Feast of St. Joseph & More Snow!

Our Lent has very good this year!

With the students still unable to be here due to the pandemic, we've had the Kartause "to ourselves" - with just a handful of faculty/staff members and their families in our community.  Fr. Nick, TOR, has been incredible.  We've had daily Mass, regular adoration and confession.  Every Saturday is "kids mass" and afterwards he does a catechism class for the children 5 years old & up.  Ellie and Francis have learned so much, especially about the Stations of the Cross.  Every Friday at 3pm we've gathered as a community for the Way of the Cross.  On the last Friday of Lent (before Good Friday) the children got to lead the Stations -- Francis led the 3rd Station, Ellie led the 8th & 9th Stations!  After our 3pm Way of the Cross, the "Kartause Ladies" have been meeting for Bible Study as pray lectio divina for the upcoming Sunday Gospel reading.  All of this has made for a very blessed Lent indeed!

Also, celebrating the Feast Days during Lent has been a lot of fun!  It's a nice way to break up the fasting (for the kids - a great excuse to eat dessert!)

Right in the middle of Lent - I (Courtney) flew to the USA to spend time with my mom who had open-heart surgery!  I was able to make the trip alone thanks to Brian holding down the fort at home (with the help of our lovely community)!

Enjoy the pictures of our fun!

St. Patrick's Day:

St. Joseph's Day:

Morning Brian drove me to Vienna so I could fly home - to our surprise we woke up to a foot of snow!

Airport in Vienna - you must have a negative covid test to fly:

At home with my mom and our Fiat mugs :) (we were both blessed to be in a Fiat90 group, which extended into this Lent):

Meanwhile, back in Gaming - SNOW!!

When I returned home one week later, the snow had melted!

I had to have a negative covid test to enter Austria.  Additionally, I had to quarantine (not leaving my house or backyard) for 5 days.  The police came to make sure I was in quarantine.  On the 5th day I was able to get another covid test (or I could have chosen to stay in quarantine for a total of 10 days).  Thankfully, my test came back negative!  That was Holy Thursday.  So I was able to resume going to Mass just in time for the Triduum!  Yes, it's been a very blessed Lent indeed!!

God bless!