Читать книгу Teach Us to Number Our Days - Barbara Dee Baumgarten - Страница 7

“The problem with the Advent calendar is that it rarely matches, in length, the Advent season. I challenge you to make a calendar to fit the actual days of Advent,” ventured my husband eighteen years ago.

The year of that challenge, I developed the junk-mail version of a liturgical Advent calendar, and over the years, it became a household tradition. Visitors, intrigued by the calendar, invariably asked how to make it, and many urged me to put instructions in writing. This book is dedicated foremost to my husband Bill and to all the folks who inspired its origins.

I will give you thanks for what you have done.

—Psalm 52:9

Around five years ago, I began to contemplate creating a permanent calendar that reflected the variable length of Advent and the season’s fixed dates. Barbara Brandeburg’s “Calendar Wall Quilt” (Cabbage Rose, 1995) spurred a flash of insight that led to the design of a fabric form complementing the desired function. My teaching others how to make the fabric calendar stimulated consistent calls for something written. My gratitude goes to all the folks who pushed and challenged me to frame in images and words my enduring affair with the season of Advent. I hope the contents of this book satisfy the need and are easy to follow.

I am indebted and grateful to God, who has impelled and guided this journey; to St. Francis of Assisi, Martin Luther and the German Lutherans who pioneered many of the traditions of Advent; to Michael Morris, O.P., who taught me a sound approach to iconography (the study of religious symbols); to Dora Crouch and Anne Thille, whose expert and honest reading of my manuscript was invaluable; to my editor at Morehouse, Debra Farrington, whose enthusiasm kept me going and whose, along with Val Gitting’s, keen editorial perception and Christine Finnegan’s technical expertise perfected this book; to my son Bennett, who let me know when my drawings were “no good” for coloring or cutting out; and most of all, to my husband Bill, whose challenge, support and love knows no bounds!