All Davises (so they say) trace their ancestry back to the first Welshmen so named to honor the great King St. David of Wales! Which gives us an opportunity the first of March to shake off the winter doldrums for a day with a look back at our Welsh history, a little conversation about the lessons of St. David, and an opportunity to, indeed, feast a little!
It is a big feast day for us, as you can imagine, and we like to "do it proper" -- but within reason, considering the time of year. Since "Dewey San Day" always falls during Lent, we suspend our voluntary Lenten sacrifices for the day (on St. Patrick's Day, too), and remember the feast with a special (though appropriately subdued) celebration. Which means food. Naturally!
The traditional fare for this Welsh holiday is actually somewhat Lenten, anyway: potato leek soup. This year, for a change of pace (and because Dan's tummy doesn't like potatoes), we made cauliflower leek soup (it was great! Recipe here.), served with bacon crumbles, fried ham, and bread sticks (since this was our main meal and meat was permitted). For dessert we finished off the end of Cathy's chocolate éclair pie from Sunday. (Scrumptious! A
facsimile of Cathy's recipe here -- except she made the frosting and pudding from scratch and omitted the Cool Whip.)
We give up movie/tv viewing for Lent, but on behalf of the day, we borrowed a documentary about Wales from the library to watch. And we spent the afternoon decorating with yellows and greens, imitating the traditional Dewey San symbol, the daffodil. Everything looked festive and the food was all good! A very nice mini-break near the middle of Lent!For some posts on the feast day, including the biography-in-a-nutshell of King St. David, a multitude of links and coloring pages, and craft ideas, click here.
King St. David, pray for us!
Some photos of our day:
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| The table, with the potted daffodils and the heavenly-smelling hyacinth. |
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| We made these "saint wheels" last week out of the brie cheese "boxes" we've been saving forever. I could never throw them away; they're just so nifty.... But we finally came up with a craft project we liked for them! Each child let his or her creativity run wild, decorating both sides with images and quotations of the saints -- and we turned them into a mobile where our snowflakes used to hang. |
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| We made these pinwheel daffodils on Dewey San Day to fill out our second mobile. |
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| Anna |
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| Gabe and William |
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| Theresa |
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| Cathy |
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| The breadsticks Cathy whipped up with Anna's help, while Theresa entertained us all with Celtic airs on the piano... |
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| And the chalkboard art, also by Cathy, quoting King St. David's final words of advice for his people. Pay attention to the little details! |
God is in the details!
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