Jesse Tea for First Day of Advent

 I was looking for something different and fun for my family to do for the first day of Advent when I ran across this article on Catholic Cuisine. It suggests holding a tea party for Advent, based on the figures and symbols in the Jesse Tree.  Because I'm doing a couple of "Jesse tree" themed activities this holiday season, this fit in perfectly with my plans. 

So my daughter and I will be doing some light cooking and food prepping while my husband and son are at a soccer game tomorrow.  When they come home, they will be treated to a "Jesse Tree Feast!" 

We will be using some of the ideas from the Catholic Cuisine article above, in addition to those on the Cottage Blessings website. 

I'll post more information and photos in a couple of days.  But I wanted to share a printable that I've been working on today:  little signs that we will use to mark our various food items.  I've uploaded the basic printable on Google Docs, in case anyone else would like to use them for their own Jesse Tea!  You can print these out on cardstock and attach them to a skewer.  I'll be attaching mine to some old manila folders to create table tents. (I have some old manila folders that need to be repurposed.)

These are basic little signs with just words.  As you will see when I post photos later, each of my signs also has a symbol on it, which matches the symbol of our Jesse tree ornament.  We use Anne E. Neuberger's Advent Stories and Activities: Meeting Jesus Through The Jesse Tree book to tell our Advent stories each night, and our symbols are copies of those in the book.  But I would suggest that you use copies of  the symbols on your own Jesse tree.  It helps reinforce the concepts better if you consistently use the same symbols to represent Abraham, Moses, Elizabeth and the other figures in the Jesse Tree. (Hope that makes sense!)

I am finishing another project related to our Jesse Tree--a project that would be perfect both for families and catechism classes. I'll be posting that hopefully in the next couple of days.