We did this activity for many years with our children. During Lent small acts of extra prayer, service, alms giving, or sacrifices are offered up. For each one a leaf is added to a poster of the bare tree. By Easter the tree is bursting with new life.

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The three page PDF file linked below includes a poster of the tree, a list of suggested sacrifices and a page of leaves. The tree image can be tiled on four pieces of letter sized paper and taped together to make a large poster or you can print it poster sized at your local copy shop. There is also a page of suggested sacrifices which were tailored for our family. You can customize one to work for your home. The third page contains a pile of leaves that can be cut out and taped or pasted to the tree. We kept ours in a small brass bowl next to the poster. I also pulled off several small strips of tape and lined them up along the edge of the frame so they would be ready to go when one of the children wanted to add a leaf.