Hear ye! Hear ye! All of the All Saints artist trading cards were mailed out to their new recipients on Monday!
We spent our Thanksgiving break sorting and swapping and packaging up all the cards. We finally finished on Saturday at 5 o'clock, and as I prepared to dash out the door with them all, my dear husband informed me the post office closed at 4. So Monday was the big day!
Are you ready for the number? We had a grand total of 1, 460 cards! That's a lot of artwork! That's a lot of saints! That's lots and lots of artist who love our dear friends in heaven, the Church Triumphant, the Saints!
So while it was an arduous task sorting them all out, we were all so very blessed and encouraged and privileged to see all of the cards made by so very many creative hands!
We had cards from the littlest two year old artists-
to the four year olds - I think this little artist is definitely a kindred spirit of Kateri-(that's our beloved St. Elizabeth of Hungary in case you can't read four-year-old-ese)
to the dear little boys who love to draw ever so many St. Sebastians and St. Georges and St. Martins. Any every single sword, arrow and dragon laden card so precious and unique from all the others.
To the beautiful cards lovingly drawn by young girls, such as this artist who chose to draw five different Saints Theresa.
To the more than forty adult artists who did such beautiful, inspiring work - you could just see the love and devotion and Faith portrayed in the artwork. It was so edifying to contemplate all of the artists and their relationships to their dear favorite saints.
As I already explained, we received many pieces of mail placed under the guidance of good St. Anthony -
We actually had quite a few envelopes arrive ripped or damaged in some way, including one that sadly had all of its contents lost. When reluctantly I wrote to tell the mother that her family's cards were lost she replied that 'perhaps the cards were meant to go to a mail carrier or some other person'. Isn't that a most beautiful thought?! Those precious saint cards drawn by young hands bearing witness somewhere -exactly where God wanted them to be. (and don't worry - we sent the family some new cards anyways)
So we thought we should entrust all of our outgoing mail to the care and guidance of dear St. Anthony,
and we stamped every one of the 174 envelopes before they went on their way.
Josiah was tickled to get some 'fan mail' -
and I was delighted to read all of the many kind notes sent along from the mothers. We had cards from all across the United States, Canada, the UK, Germany and Norway. As one mother put it, she said it made her feel like she was part of a cross country homeschool group.
Here are the cards we made - Josiah's:
Eliza's St. Agnes, St. Therese, St. Peter, St.Helen and St. George:
Kateri's:
Anna's:
Mary Rose's:
and Lydia's:
Here are the cards we received:
Josiah got St.Francis de Sales with St. Jane de Chantal, St. Edmond Campion, St. Pierre Julian Eymard, St. Barbara and St. Maximillian Kolbe, his patron.
Lydia received Sy. Maximillian as well, St. Lucy, St. Maria Goretti, St. Agnes, and our beloved St. Anthony.
Anna received St. Katherine Drexel, St. Lucy, Our Lady of the Brown Scapular, Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha, and St. Francis of Assisi.
Mary Rose got St. Elizabeth of Hungary, St. St. Cecilia, another St. Anthony, St. Gregory the Great, and Our Lady, Queen of all Saints.
Eliza received Our Lady of the Rosary, St. Brigid, St. Maximillian Kolbe, St. Therese and St. Rose of Lima.
Kateri got St.Elizabeth of Hungary, Holy Mary, St. Gianna, St. Nicholas, and St Brendan.
I ended up with just two cards but I love them so - St. Rose of Lima and a quote from St. Francis de Sales.
And here is a Mr. Linky so you can post links to your own cards if you post about them. Thank you so much once again to everyone who made this swap such a grand success, and also to my family for all their help in sorting and swapping and my children who made a couple dozen extra cards to help out in celebrating All Saints!
