This year, we’re going to bake a crown of thorns – it’s a new tradition in which you bake a crown (from dough), add thorns (toothpicks), and remove one thorn each time you do a good dead.
An important component of Lent is about self-sacrifice so that we can prepare ourselves for Easter Sunday. There are so many ways each day we can sacrifice…we can put the $3.50 we were going to spend at Starbucks into the collection basket (almsgiving), cut out a favorite food (self-denial), say the rosary weekly with our family (prayer)…the list goes on and on.
This activity focuses on the sacrifices we make, and is perfect for doing together as a family.
WHAT YOU NEED
- 4 cups of flour (any kind)
- 1 cup of salt
- warm water (or, coffee) to moisten dough
HOW TO MAKE
- Combine the flour and salt in a large bowl
- Add enough water/coffee to make the dough tacky as shown in the photo below
- Mold the clay into three strands of dough
- Braid the dough
- Bake in the oven at 350-degrees for 35-35min (or until hard and dry)
- Remove from oven, allow to cool
- Place “thorns” (toothpicks) in crown
- Place crown in a central location in your home
Once the crown is in your home, you can begin removing a crown each time a significant sacrifice is made. This is a great way to teach your children – depending on their age – what a sacrifice is and why we make them.
Just for fun…this post links up at these great Catholic and quilting sites.
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Hi Jen, what a great idea for replacing the thorn with a purple flower when you make a sacrifice. Have you linked this post up over at Jennifer's blog? Catholic Inspired. It would be a great addition to her link up. I saw yours over at RAnn's Sunday Snippets. God bless!
Thanks, Noreen! I hadn't posted this up at Catholic Inspired – I'll definitely reach out to Jennifer. As for the purple flower, they are working out great. We've replaced only one so far, but I can already see how beautiful the crown will become (as a result of our "sacrifices")!