Wednesday, November 28, 2012

Our Jesse Tree

This is a repost from last year when I for some reason came up with rather complicated ornaments and undertook making the Jesse Tree that I had pictured in my head when I read about Jesse Trees for the very first time.

At the moment I'm trying to figure out exactly where to hang mine to keep Mae from ripping both the tree and the ornaments down off the wall every single days (ten times a day I would wager) and making the whole thing rather painful as I rehang the tree and ornaments, over and over again.  

Anyways... here it is.  The Jesse Tree Post:

Finally!  

After one month and around 70 hours of work my Jesse tree is starting to look finished!  I had bigger plans for the tree, with a border and pockets for the ornaments, but I think that will have to wait until next year.  I'd also really love to decorate the blue background with little felt angels, but again, with the beginning of the 24 days of the Jesse tree one day away, I'm going to be happy to get the velcro stuck on in time!   

For those of you who've never heard of a Jesse Tree, it's a fun, centuries old devotion.  The Jesse Tree's name is inspired by Isaiah 11:1, which reads: 
"But a shoot shall sprout from the stump of Jesse, and from his roots a bud shall blossom."

The ornaments on the Jesse Tree represent people in the Bible (mostly Old Testament until you get to the tip top of the tree) and are based on the traditional symbols that represent people in Jesus' family tree (according to the genealogy at the start of Matthew).  Other sites have other symbols, but I used the ones in my copy of The Catholic Home by Meredith Gould.  

Here's our Jesse Tree:


I made the tree itself last night.  As I began to cut it out I realized it had to be big to hold the gigantic ornaments I'd made.  When I made the pattern for the ornaments I traced a roll of duct tape on a piece of cardboard... so that's how big each ornament is (and they're each pretty thick too!).  Which meant that my Jesse Tree ended up being a tiny bit shorter than me (it's around five feet tall).  

Now I just need to find a place for it to hang!

And since I spent the vast majority of those 70 hours making ornaments I just had to give you a closer look!  Here they are, in order:

The World is Created (globe): Genesis 1:24-28
Adam and Eve (snake and apples): Genesis 3:1-34


Noah and the Flood (rainbow): Genesis 6:11-22
Abraham (camel): Genesis 12:1-7, 13:2-18, 18:1


Sarah (baby): Genesis 18:1-15, 21:1-7
Isaac (ram): Genesis 22:1-14


Jacob (ladder): Genesis 27:41-28:22
Joseph (multicolored coat): Genesis 37:1-36


Moses (burning bush): Exodus 3:1-10
Miriam (tambourine): Exodus 15:19-21
Samuel (lamp): 1 Samuel 3:1-21


Jesse (branch): Isaiah 11:1 (shown, apparently out of order, below... it's the green one...)
David (harp): 1 Samuel 16:14-23
Solomon (crown): 1 Kings 3:3-28


Isaiah (throne): Isaiah: 6:1-8 (Paul says the throne looks like an old truck...)
Jeremiah (tablets of law): Jeremiah 31:31-34


Angels (angel): Hebrews 1:1-14 (again, apparently out of order... this is what happens when I put something together at midnight...)
Malachi (trumpet): Malachi 3:1-4)
Zechariah and Elizabeth (dove): Luke 1:39-45


Mary (angel): Luke 1:26-35
John the Baptist (river): Matthew 3:1-6


Joseph (hammer and lily): Matthew 1:18-25
Bethlehem (star): Matthew 2:1-12


Birth of Christ (crib): Luke 2:1-7


And that is my Jesse Tree.  If you're interested in making your own Catholic Icing has a printable coloring set!

Now I'm just really hoping that I put these up out of order and that the felt numbers that I carefully stitched on the back of each ornament aren't out of order! 

1 comment:

  1. It looks wonderful. I just got done making ours, but it is laminated card stock with pictures I searched for individually on the internet. Then I cut a hole and strung ribbon through to hang them. We are planning to hang them on our regular Christmas tree, because we weren't going to decorate it (or even get it out until I came up with this idea) until the day before Christmas. I also included the O antiphons when making mine so I have a total of 32 (28 Jesse tree ornaments and 8 O antiphons). I can't wait to incorporate ours into our homeschool schedule once Advent starts. I think I have been a bit too ambitious with all my advent plans!

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