St. Joseph's Day

yes, i realize my posting is a week late but, better late than never right? so anyway, we celebrated St. Joseph's feast day last friday in grand array over here. my in-laws were in town for their yearly visit so that made it even better to have a couple of more people to celebrate. it made it even more festive considering my the italian heritage of my husband's family and that his father's name is joseph. we had always wanted to celebrate the feast of St. Joseph with a grand altar and such ever since we spent the first year of our marriage living close to new orleans. our parish while we were there had the most magnificent St. Joseph's altar decked out with breads shaped like turtles, lobsters, crabs and all other sorts of creatures. they also liberally covered it with fava beans painted with various catholic symbols or italian flags. the entire parish joined in praying the novena to St. Joseph for the nine days leading up to his feast and then on the feast everyone joined for a beautiful mass which was followed by a feast of grand proportion featuring all kinds of pasta, seafood and treats. i still remember that this was the first time i had tried crawfish pizza. and the funny thing was...it came from dominos. they certainly don't offer that as a topping here in the northeast. :) so anyway, my husband whipped up a pretty nice altar if i do say so myself and we feasted. we had pasta with a tomato cream sauce that was loaded with sauteed mushrooms, sundried tomatoes and grilled chicken, a big ol' salad, whole wheat bread with melted cheese and some mock vino (sparkling grape juice). the kids also made shapes to represent St. Joseph out of crescent dough. then for dessert we had homemade cream puffs and homemade chocolate pizzeles. mmmm, yummy. i hope you had a most blessed feast day.