Lenten Tea revisited

Thanks to a wonderful online friend, Alice over at Cottage Blessings, I was able to put together a second Lenten Tea that added a wonderful dimension to our Holy Week festivities.

We tweaked her tea a bit to make it hearty enough for Good Friday dinner. Here's what we did:

• The King's Crown -- softened cream cheese spread in a purple pyrex pie dish; Dorito's "scoops" around the edges for the tips of the crown
• Out of Envy -- bowl of guacamole to add to the cream cheese and Dorito's
• Purple Cloak -- took one can each of light and dark kidney beans (drained), added some chili powder and cumin, microwaved the beans for about two minutes. Then mashed with a fork. Made a low fat, refried bean-like mixture that was excellent with the earlier ingredients.
• Crown of Thorns -- odd accompaniment to the other menu items, but String Bean (who would live on peanut butter) thought the peanut-butter and pretzel covered Ritz were the best things she'd eaten in a long time!
• Golgotha Eggs -- what would a Lenten meal be without some hard-boiled eggs? These had skulls penciled on them, but the kids just thought that was pretty cool!
• Vinegar to drink -- as Alice suggested, gave each of the kids a taste of vinegar; Brikhead was the only one that thought it was good (guess he's finally maturing up!)
• Grape tomatoes cut in half (EXACTLY 100 piled on a plate with the smooth rounded helmets up), flavored with the Robbers' Herb (basil) and the Vinegar
• Tomb Rolls -- crescent rolls folded into 3-d rhombus to imitate the empty tomb. Drizzled honey in them as a reminder that the dark hours of Good Friday presage the sweetness of Easter Sunday when the tomb is found empty!

This was a great way to teach the kids the Good Friday story. Now they remember very clearly what "golgotha" means, how many men make a "century" and that poor Jesus being given a sip of vinegar was, in the words of Bam-Bam, "not nice, mommy!"

Thank you Alice for another wonderful living the liturgical year idea!