Hey remember long rambling blog posts? Those were my JAM, y’all, back in the good old days of blogging. Let’s go old school.

But, because I know your attention span isn’t what it used to be, here’s what we’re going to talk about. Feel free to scroll to what interests you.

1. The New Seasonal Mega Box & Improvements to CAY Memberships and Subscription Boxes
2. Introducing the Catholic All Year Team
3. A Tierney Family Update & Prayer Request

The New Seasonal Mega Box & Improvements to CAY Memberships and Subscription Boxes

It’s been a year now of Catholic All Year Memberships and Subscription Boxes. It’s been a joy and challenge and a learning experience. I keep telling our team that there is no group of people that would have been so understanding as you guys have been as we’ve gone through the process of ironing out the kinks in what turns out to be a very complicated process. But also, I don’t think anyone could have worked harder than Emily and I have for you this year!

Overall it’s been a great success! We want to keep doing it! Going into year two, we’ve made some changes that we hope will make things go a bit more smoothly in the future. I love the liturgical seasons–you guys know I do–but the seasonally-based boxes meant no one really knew when they were going to get charged or receive a box. And since (A) many of the things contained in the seasonal subscription boxes can be used year after year, and (B) we have twice as many subscribers as we did when we sent the first box for Lent last year . . . we had to figure out a way to send boxes that would be useful to new subscribers and old.

So we’ve got a new MONTHLY subscription box that has all the creative liturgical living resources you’ve come to expect from Catholic All Year, but now with a more predictable schedule and content. You’ll get charged each month. You’ll get a box each month. The box will have fun and useful items to help you celebrate three feast days that month in your home.

The first new box is our Liturgical Living Starter Kit, featuring a feast day prep squad apron and three special days candle. It will ship out to arrive in mid-February.

Also available for individual purchase here.

Then comes the March Liturgical Living Box . . .

With resources for the feast of Saints Felicity & Perpetua, Saint Patrick, and the Annunciation.

But what about Lent? That’s bundled with resources for the Triduum and Easter in our seasonal mega box.

Three seasons in one box.

For people who did not receive last year’s Lent, Triduum, and Easter boxes, you’ll get all the most popular items in those boxes. For people who did receive those boxes, you’ll find replacements for last year’s consumable items, improved versions of some popular inclusions, and all new items like a Lenten Bean Jar Set, and a Colorized Stations of the Cross Banner Set with clips, string, and wooden crosses for each station. And if you order before February 1, you’ll also receive the bonus Mardi Gras set.

Memberships are changing up a little as well.

Monthly membership resources are now available right from the CAY Membership Library. No more having to find listings and go through the check out process! Recipes are available in PDF and scalable online formats, and won’t disappear at the end of the month. We’ve added monthly hymns to the calendars, saint summaries, posters, and recipes previously included. And members now get 50-100% off digital products, 10% off physical products, and free shipping on everything in the shop. And, coming soon, a CAY online community where you’ll get a chance to interact with me, the CAY team, and each other.

Current members who have an active subscription on February 1, and all new members will receive a welcome envelope in February, full of items to help you use and organize the liturgical living resources you receive each month.

For those of you who prefer to receive your resources in print form, we’ve really improved our monthly envelopes going forward with professionally printed 5 x 7 recipe cards and perfect-bound monthly prayer booklets.

Our Benefactors members choose to give a bit extra for their membership each month to help us cover the costs of the free resources we provide via email and social media to tens of thousands of Catholics each month. As a special thank you, Benefactors will also receive this exclusive debossed Prayer for Patience notebook. (Pen not included.)

I think that’s everything new on the subscription and membership fronts! If you’ve been a part of one or both of those, thank you for your patience and your feedback and your enthusiasm, and we look forward to continuing to be a part of your domestic church. If you haven’t been, now is a great time to join us!

The Catholic All Year Team

I’ve been meaning to re-introduce the team for a while now. Most of you already know Grace Brown, who has been helping with emails and customer service for a couple years now, and is also working on our liturgical living hymns. She lives in Florida with her husband and darling baby girl. When you email us at helpdesk@catholicallyear.com, you’ll usually get to Grace first. She solves problems, and sends things along to me as needed.

Emily Tate is the CAY Manager, and my partner in craziness for the subscription boxes. She does our warehousing and shipping from her home in rural Virginia, where she lives with her high-school-sweetheart-husband and three little kids. She manages the Catholic All Year marketplace Instagram account @CAYmarketplace.

Our newest team member is Sophia Lebano, a student at Franciscan University! She is the CAY website manager and jill of all trades. She’s working on all the backend stuff that I don’t understand, formatting membership resources, helping send the Saint of the Day and Liturgical Living Heads Up emails and social media posts, and just doing a lot of stuff that needs doing around here! She manages the @catholicallyear Insta and backs up the helpdesk.

I’m Kendra Tierney. I started all this. I live in Los Angeles with my husband and ten kids. Nine years into the Catholic All Year journey, I am still involved in everything that arrives on your doorstep or inbox from us. It’s me on the @kendra_tierney Instagram. A lot of you still have my email address from the old days. But for a quicker response on technical or customer service issues, I suggest trying the helpdesk@catholicallyear.com email first.

A Tierney Family Update & Prayer Request

Don’t know what this is about? Start here.

Overall, things are going well, health-wise and all-other-wise, for our family. However, after a solid year of no news is good news, we’ve had an eventful month.

You can get caught up on all the latest news here. The last four posts, starting with “After a Long Pause” will get you current with the latest.

When you’re dealing with stuff like this, good people always want to know what they can do to help. My dear friend Micaela Darr has fired up the Eucharistic Adoration Meal Train again. If you are able to offer some time before the Blessed Sacrament for us, we would be very grateful!

I like to tell anyone who will listen that the point of prayer is not to get what we want. The point of prayer is to change what we want to be what God wants. It sure is nice when it turns out that what we want and what God wants are, for the moment, well-aligned. We have felt very supported by your prayers, and the difference between scans from one to the next after we asked people to pray felt pretty miraculous.

Okay, that’s it. You made it to the end. Consider yourself updated!