About Us

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The us’ behind Little Flowers Family Press

I’m ‘Rita’, the name behind all those blog posts you read, all those email replies you get back when inquiring, and all those orders you get packed with so much care. (until we find someone to work in our shipping department!) Its an understatement, but I live, eat and breathe the Catholic faith!

I am author of Immodesty Satan’s Virtue, and How to Start a Catholic Home Altar, due soon.

Along with my ever patient husband, Mark, I founded Little Flowers Family Press in 1996.

We are a traditional Catholic homeschooling family with 7 children. Our three oldest are off on their own, and we have 4 boys left at home now. Three of them are disabled with autism, so life gets busy here. A lot has happened in 16 years and many who have stayed with us have followed our story. From my old writings in “Full of Grace” newsletter, to the “Catholic Health Letter” I edited for 7 years and the “Family News 2” that we published a few years.

One October day in 1996, with our last $200 as our previous business failed, I started Little Flowers Family Press. It was a real leap of faith, as time would tell. A new chapter in our life.

Growing up with a self employed father and eight years previous experience with a natural environmental catalogue, this experience prepared me to start up LFFA. With a phD in Natural Health, behind me, (and Hairdressing & Make up License, and Art degree) my first publication was “the Catholic Health Letter” in hopes of helping families understand alternatives to health issues.

As my own children started studying for First Holy Communion, my little world of faith blossomed. I returned to the Sacraments after a 15 year absence with my oldest’s First Confession! Deo Gratias!

In the beginning…

Starting LFFA we were thrust into such overwhelming poverty that it often brought us many tears and sleepless nights (and still does).We found our rosaries and our knees and a religious friend encouraged us in prayer for God’s providence and helped us accept this journey of poverty God seemed to be calling us too.

Believe me I fought tooth and nail against this, worrying and complaining. Then came the proof of God’s watchful care, through supporters who appreciated our work and felt called to offer help. Donations started coming in. Support came in the form of comforting letters, bags of used clothing dropped at our door, meals dropped off, extra food sent out way, donated labour to build our first website, and years of donated curricula so we could continue homeschooling. We once were housebound for 5 months, (in the country!) with no vehicle, when a supporter finally sent us funds to purchase a needed vehicle (which by itself was a miracle too!). This is our St. Philomena story.

Our first fax machine was a donation. Large donations came in just in time, to cover our small mortgage that had bounced. A last minute donation helped us print and mail a new catalogue one year and each year brings us new challenges and new stories of God’s providence that we are honored to share with you.

All these things came and do come JUST when we need it and not a day earlier. Other items we were forced, to discern God did not want us to have, since we just couldn’t keep it. Like the three washing machines we went through in one year, before we finally resorted to hand-washing for four full years. A donated hand ringer went a long way to helping us wash all our laundry by hand. This taught us a lot, as things like this can. How Our Lady must have washed Our Lords laundry. How her hands must have hurt to wring them out by hand, but she didn’t mind at all. We finally had a new washer from the kindness of another benefactor, and when it arrived it was covered in blue and white, just like Our Lady, on the Feast of the Assumption too!

Or the time, our three TV stations that used to get knocked out, over and over, until the antennae finally fell down sealing that fate. The bread machine that someone gave us, that worked for a dozen loaves before quitting and leaving us knead bread by hand for years.

The cramped 800sq foot house we lived, worked and grew with 6 children in that small space. There seemed to solution to our shortage of space, until God finally had pity on us, and directed us to this new place and the means to buy it. Another miracle to move us where we are now.

And so our family lives and works.

What do we do all day?

Besides homeschooling and family needs, and our apostolate needs, we struggle to keep up with it. All the time involved in researching, writing and publishing the free content on my blog is a joy! If only there was more time in a day! Re-writing my Modesty book and new Home Altar book keeps me busy. Much time is taken in researching new books, typesetting and laying out new publications. Plus the creative design work I put into all our Children’s Kits and new ideas that come into my head all the time, it barely lets me rest. 🙂 We realized early on, that we could not accomplish all of this and have outside work, so it was then we put ourselves on the mercy of God and his generosity. He takes are of the least of His little ones, and as we continue our work, we beg God to provide for our needs and continue to show us the path He wishes us to travel.

Putting our Trust in God…

A few years back, as the apostolate was deep in debt, and the debt was literally strangling us, we pleaded with God for months. The waiting was excruciating. We begged St. Philomena and finally we saw a glimmer of hope. Little did we know then, through St. Philomena’s help, God would send us a benefactor that paid for all our debts that year! We were lead to understand that God saved us at this time to show us that He wanted us to continue.

We beg all our friends, new and old, (yes, everyone who comes to our website, purchases and donates are our ‘friends’.) We ask you to pray for us and our continuing spiritual and temporal needs. That God will inspire souls He wishes to use as His hands to help us, since He has no other hands to help us except those who respond to His call.

Where we are today…

As we continue to serve families, we still rely entirely on God’s providence for our daily cares. All while we work to provide families with tools needed to teach the faith to their children. In 2004, after much prayer, we made the decision to purchase our own printing equipment. This so we could start publishing our own titles in house in smaller batches, to keep costs down. We wanted to avoid the dangers other Catholic publishers were facing closing down or being bought out today. The climate today is every changing in publishing and even in the Church. Even though we own a Catholic apostolate, we have to run it like a business and try to keep up with it. That means we will have to deal with the world today, and suffer at its hands. This happened in 2007, when our last batch of print equipment caused us much sorrow and loss of money, when they arrived broken. After much frustration and, later a court case, left us with no resolution and more debt. The broken equipment was now ours to fix.

God really tested our patience with this one, as we struggled to keep the business going and pay double bills to repair equipment. Many times we had to rethink if this is really what God wants us to do. Always God reminds us to keep doing what we are doing, by making some obvious reminder like a friend calling and telling us exactly what we need to hear. Like God spoke right through them to us!

Today…

We realize that families are tired, worn out from the rising secular culture we live in. They need tried and tested materials they know they can trust with their children without overseeing every page. The confusion grows every day.

We strive to provide items you can trust. Trust with a capital “T”. Whether an inspiring reprint, or a new creation, we strive to make them always aligned with our truly Catholic faith. We are one of the original traditional Catholic publishers, who have never edited the books we reprint. We have exact replicas of the originals we reprint.

We seen how other publishers can edit books, with families unaware. Copyright laws are grey today, and intellectual works no longer have the protection they once did. I am saddened, that people today, even Catholics, seem to be ‘helping themselves’ to other Catholic works, not realizing this is outright – stealing. God will not be mocked. And so the confusion grows…

Crosses…

Recently, we have watched our own children grow up and leave the faith and this has been the heaviest cross we have carried yet. So we know first hand the dangers that are out there for our children growing up. You simply can never do enough for their faith.

I hear the same stories from so many families with children gone astray. The world today has a great grip on tempting our children away from the truths of the faith.

I am only one person in this big world; reaching out to bring some balance, some education, even some humor, if needed, to families today. Yes, there are many other valuable Catholic websites out there. I only hope that our message is unique and you will find something of lasting value for your family and your faith when you visit here.

Who are you?

Are you are tired of the mundane Catholic literature out there for children?

Are you are seeking rich, spiritual books to enrich your weary soul?

Do you want safe material to use in your homeschooling?

Are you are looking for unique resources to educate yourself about the faith?

Are you are looking for traditional Catholic modesty resources?

Are you tired of weeding through the lies and confusion about modesty?

Are you looking for answers to your many questions about the faith?

Do you want to support a traditional Catholic family with your purchases?

If you answered Yes, to even half these questions, you are in the right place.

So where to go from here?

Want to read some soul-enriching articles about the faith?

Visit my blog where I provide lots of free advice to help you with your family and your faith. Have a question of your own? Go to my Contact page and send it to me. I might answer it on an upcoming blog post.

www.littleflowersfamilypress.com/blog

Wanting to browse the many unique titles you keep hearing about?

The most common comment we hear is, “I want to buy one of everything!”

Visit our web-store now: www.littleflowersfamilypress.com

You know all about me, now I want to learn about you!

So, join my Facebook page, where you can interact with me live, each day, and tell me about yourself! I want to hear from YOU!

www.facebook.com/RitaDavidsonLFFA

A Final note…

We are a Traditional Catholic publisher; but we are not limited to books. Because we have the desire to serve you, you can expect to find all kinds of things from us. Books, articles, leaflets, activity kits, stickers, video’s and more. Most importantly, you can trust the materials are safe for your faith and your children, since we use all these same materials in our own family. That is why we do not carry ‘everything’ Catholic. If they are good enough for my children, only then, will I share them with your children.

We are not in business to succeed, we are in business to save souls!

Today more than ever we must make the faith REAL in the hearts of your children. We only have them for a short time. The world is a ravening wolf, seeking whom it can devour. Don’t let it be your children.

From our family to yours,

God bless and keep you and your families,

Rita & Mark Davidson

P.S.

Last, but never least, The patrons behind our apostolate. Those heavenly souls that surround us with the graces we need to carry on.

St. Therese, the first inspiration for Little Flowers and the constant inspiration for our simple life. In our 10th year we found out we are uniquely related to her.

St. Francis of Assisi, who has been a great comfort and inspiration in our having to sacrifice so much for our work

St. Raphael, who is patron of health and patron of The Catholic Health Letter

St. Maria Goretti, patron of youth and purity and so patron of OLLMPC which we founded in 1999.

St. Maximillian Kolbe, patron of all our publishing efforts, as he believed in using whatever technology needed to accomplish, his publishing efforts and so we too, use whatever God will provide us to reach out into the darkness

St. Philomena, patron of our financial needs, and was so effective in obtaining the funds we need four our apostolate each year.

St. Michael, who is the great defender of God, and patron of all our work since we went online in 2003. Our first website was uploaded on his feast day and we pray to him for constant protection of our family and our work and his ever watchful guidance and care as we seek to do God’s will.

 

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