I’m thrilled to announce that my son, Blake, received his First Holy Communion and Confirmation! As his mother, I couldn’t be more proud.

In case you don’t know, these sacraments are part of the Catholic religion. According to 1 Corinthians 11:23-26 Jesus instructed his followers to use bread and wine to remember his sacrifice. In other words, it is a time for Catholic families to recognize Jesus and thank God for all he’s done.

While confirmed my son had to choose a confirmation saint and a sponsor. He chose St. Michael the Archangel and he chose my mom (abuela) to be his sponsor.


I wanted to honor the event with a craft and a gift for each of them, and when my crafting partner thought of an escapulario (scapular) I was overjoyed.

I remember being a little girl and seeing my grandma wear an escapulario to mass. She was very religious and often wore one under her clothing as a badge of religious devotion.

Hers was a traditional brown scapular with small pieces of brown wool, joined by a brown satin ribbon. The two images depicted on her escapulario were the Sacred Heart of Jesus and Our Lady of Mount Carmel.

With the traditional escapulario in mind we wanted to customize it with saints that were special to both my mom and my son.

We chose the Virgen de Guadalupe because my mom is a member of Las Guadalupanas, a woman’s organization dedicated to the service and devotion to the Blessed Mother under the title of Our Lady of Guadalupe.

The other saint we chose for the escapulario is St. Michael the Archangel, my son’s confirmation saint.

As we were thinking about artwork for this project I reached out to my dear friend Sean Wells. You can find her beautiful artwork on Etsy. She specializes in traditional retablo saints and day of the dead art.

I told her all about my idea of having her artwork on an escapulario and she loved the idea.

And guess what? Not only is her rendition of saints for my mother and son, but she also designed a downloadable page with a variety of other saints that you can download and print as an 8”x10” at your local photo lab.

Please respect this free artwork and only print at 100% for this DIY project. Do not use for commercial or resale.

Supplies:

  • Photo printer (recommend photo lab for best quality)
  • Felt
  • Ribbon
  • Leather Straps
  • Beads
  • Scissors
  • Hot glue gun

Select two images, one to wear in front and one in back. Print the images on photo paper or at a photo lab.

Carefully cutout the images you want to include. When designing, think about how you would like to best frame and embellish the image. We found it easiest to glue the image and embellishments to a large piece of felt, cutting out the entire design after it has dried.

Cut a strip of felt to fold and hang. Use hot glue to secure to the top, back of your design.

Thread with leather or ribbon.

Wear with pride displaying your devotion.

Photography: Jenna Sparks & Thrifty Rehab  / DIY: Thrifty Rehab