Celebrating the (first!) Feast of Sts. Louis and Zelie Martin

A blessed (FIRST EVER!) feast of Sts. Louis (Loo-ee) and Zelie (Zeh-lee) Martin to you!  They were canonized last October, so this is their first ever feast day which is kind of thrilling (at least it is to me).  

This is a print that is on my Pinterest board wishlist...made by this talented lady at Portraits of Saints.

Need a little background and information?  Check out this neat blog post.  I love the picture--they remind me of Ma and Pa Ingalls (whom I also love), and the more I learn about them the more I love them.  I love that their feast day (they are the first married coupe canonized together) is their wedding anniversary.  So appropriate and romantic all at the same time.  Swoon. 

As you see from the story, both Louis and Zelie had actually pursued the religious life, but it didn't work out.  Eventually they realized that their vocation was marriage--to each other.  Their story isn't always one of hearts and flowers and romance, though I certainly see some of that in such a holy and loving couple.  Their story is also filled with heartache, suffering, loss, sickness, and death.  But it is a beautiful one and one that shows the true meaning of love in marriage. 

Here's some ways we are celebrating the feast of Sts. Louis and Zelie today.  

1. Wearing LACE

St. Zelie was a gifted lacemaker (yep, she was a mom but she also owned a business).  So we all pulled out dresses and outfits that had lace on them to celebrate her feast day today.  And goodness, little girls in lace--TOO cute!!

2. French food

Sts. Louis and Zelie were French, so of course, it's fitting to have some French fare for dinner (and dessert!).  Here are some yummy looking (and fairly simple) recipes I'd like to try in other years when I make more effort to meal plan during the week of their feast day). 

Main dishes:

Chicken Chasseur 

This looks amazing and totally easy to make. 

French Pork with Apple Cream Sauce

Even the name of it sounds yum

Ratatouille

I have been wanting to try to make one for awhile...maybe we'll go all out for St. Therese's feast this year and have a big French food feast....

But, because this girl 

is pregnant, tired, and disorganized this week....

We are making this REALLY simple main course of 

French Onion Chicken today.  Should be magnifique (as Fancy Nancy would say, that's French for magnificent.  French is so much more fancy than English, don't you think? ;)

And I'm thinking about these for 

side dishes:

French potato salad 

and  

French carrot salad

And that brings us to 

dessert:

This recipe for a Blueberry Clafouti looks really yummy and quite healthy too, and I'm sure I could make it gluten free pretty easily so that I can enjoy it too. 

I also love crepes and fruit and whipped cream.....and I always thought that the thinness of the French pancake had a bit of a lacy look to it at times, so I may just go with a simple Crepe recipe (this particular recipe is gluten free, but before my health stuff, I always used the basic recipe in the Betty Crocker cookbook and they were delicious).   We have fresh peaches that need to be used, plus blueberries and strawberries, so we could have all sorts of fun with this treat.  

**Update: We made the crepes.  I always add a little vanilla to my crepe recipe and I used butter instead of olive oil.  They were delish.  I might just go make myself another one. **

3. Clocks

St. Louis was a watchmaker, so it seemed like a great day to read this book about telling time that I'd picked up recently at the library.  We also busted out our fun shapes clock and had a little fun learning "hands on".  

The girls were quite fascinated to learn about the history of time and clocks.  

4.  Coloring Sheets

And because our girls love coloring, I had to find a coloring sheet for this feast day.  You can print some off here too.  Sts. Louis and Zelie coloring sheet

 

5. Prayers

I've been praying a Novena for marriages leading up to this feast day, but I also saw this beautiful Litany of Sts. Louis and Zelie that we hope to pray as a family together tonight.  

These are just a few of our own ideas, but you can check out some really great ideas over at Jessica's blog Shower of Roses.  She always has tons of great resources for feast days and today is no exception.  

Are you celebrating this new feast?

  I'd love to hear your ideas!