If you have not yet been able to attend a Paraclesis service during the Dormition Fast, it is a beautiful and encouraging service asking for help from the Theotokos. Most parishes provide these services during the first two weeks of August, in preparation for the Dormition Fast.
If you live far from your parish, you could read the service and sing along.
At the very end of the service, we sing a song with some vivid metaphors:
a gold entwined tower
a twelve-walled city
a throne besprinkled with sunbeams
If you are looking for a rainy day afternoon activity for the kids, why not have them pick one of these images and draw it? My 6 year old boy much preferred coloring a page of the Dormition and a page of the Theotokos "with her arms raised in prayer" as he requested, like the Gigi Shadid song (that line is from song #8, but #3 is Feasts of Mary).
If you have been lighting a lot of candles at church this past week - or still have the light of the Transfiguration on your mind! - and need something to transition your children back into school, you might enjoy these 5 videos about candles. We are actually going to use those, in conjunction with the actual book, student activities download, and teacher guidelines download for part of our middle school science this year!
Finally, do you need an easy meal for one of these fasting nights? The Pioneer Woman's Chicken Tortillas Soup can easily be adapted for a crockpot and fasting by two substitution:
1) use veggie stock instead of chicken stock
2) use an extra can or two of pinto beans instead of chicken.
Looks like Christmas while you are sautéing the veggies. Yum!
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