7 Quick Takes

7 Quick Takes, hosted by Jen

~~1~~
I'm in the mood to create. I'm not sure if it's poetry, sewing (I have yet to learn to use the machine I got for my birthday in February!), art, dance, photography, or decorating. Well, it's probably all of those but I've got to choose where to start! I'd like to start journaling again, and I'd like to write some poetry for the blog. I'd love to find someone to teach me to sew and to photograph. The dance, well it's Zumba at the YMCA for now but I'd love to do some real dancing too. Then the decorating...I have several ideas in mind...the initial above our bed, painting the sewing room, painting the living room, finding some mini-canvases for the girls to paint, and making curtains...lots of curtains! Speaking of creating, here are the big canvases that the girls created and I finally hung up in the playroom today!

~~2~~
This little creativity inspiration was partially born of my reading of Angie's blog links to Ann and Anna. Oh it's been too long since I've read about their beautiful lives! Truly inspiring.

~~3~~
Now on to Michael Jackson :-) Doesn't quite go along with the blogs listed above, but you'll see where I'm going. I know lots of people have been complaining of the extensive Jackson coverage on television. Since we have no TV in our house, I can't speak for that. But I can speak for the fact that my husband has finally complained about the MJ coverage at our house! As a child of the 80s, his music was what I grew up with. All of his songs bring back memories, particularly memories of my dancing days. Whether it's "Ben" (my favorite), "I'll Be There", "Black or White", "Will You Be There", or "Thriller" I have very special memories to go with those songs. I've been singing them day and night and watching some of the video coverage on YouTube.

I am saddened of another famous life snuffed out, saddened for his children, sad to watch coverage of a life that appeared to be filled with misery. I have always been interested in famous children, and his own veiled trio have been a source of curiosity for me. I'm glad the veils have been lifted and pray that these children find peace in the midst of their suffering. The peace of Christ. And I pray for their father's soul too.

~~4~~
Steven Joseph screams. I'm not sure what's going on in his little world. I think a lot of it may have to do with being overtired, and possibly some of it may be related to teething. But my little man is not happy this week! He is waking up crying at night, fussing during the day. Oh the tears! I pray tonight is better, please God.

~~5~~
My job tonight was supposed to be loading the photos to the hard drive. But the hard drive icon is gone from my screen so I know not what to do! I'll just blog and read blogs instead, and look through adorable old pictures which had been hidden in the hard drive, like these:

(Mary Clare at age 2 and 3)

Ellie at 2mos and 6mos

Girls at ages 1 and 3

My they grow up so fast!

~~6~~
Aren't kids the sweetest when they're sleeping?

(black and white is best for this, especially when one of your children has orange around her mouth from the popsicle she ate before bed, oops! at least it was an "all natural no sugar added" fruit bar from HEB--yummy!

~~7~~
Since the girls had video coverage this week, I'll end with a cute bath video of Stevie (waist up, mind you!). I was letting him walk around the tub because he had a horrible diaper rash and couldn't sit down. His eye and nose lacerations are from falling into the train table (getting rid of that!) when I was chasing him down to get the mini screwdriver he was holding a few days ago. Used NewSkin glue and no ER visit needed.

You'll notice him use two of his words, right when it starts he says "Ah MEH" (oh, man!) and "aWAH" (water).

Small Successes

Decided to try the Small Success linky party today!



1. I've done some room clean-ups this week! Steven Joseph's "room" (he's never slept in there) is no longer a hoarding area for Ellie's toys. That took several days to do. The schoolroom is almost reorganized. I took out the bookshelf and moved it to the living room, since we almost always read stories in there anyway. I sorted through a whole basket of flashcards. They are sorted and put up on the hanging shoe wall thingy :) Slowly but surely!

Oh and you might notice the hanging clothes in the photo. Mary Clare has decided to continue the driveway sale today, including some clothing in the mix of toys and lemonade! We'll see how long she makes it in the heat today; yesterday it was about 15 minutes.

2. I did a few lessons with Mary Clare this week! I knew I wanted to take off in June, but have been wanting to start some schoolwork this month. She was more willing to work after being off for several weeks. My current homeschooling goals are lessons twice a week, daily reading practice, and for myself: to chose a new reading/phonics program and order a few other things for next year (Faith & Life, Math U See for Ellie, and maybe a few Classical Kids CDs).

3. Bills are paid. That is no small success.

Check out the other successes at Faith & Family Live!

What kind of parents

let their girls have a lemonade/toy-selling stand on the driveway in 100 degree heat?

at least they had a customer!

For your enjoyment

Hope this brings a little laughter to your day...
the girls' attempts at singing "Castle on a Cloud" from Les Miserables

Mary Clare has just shown an interest in singing, still needs some work :)
But I'm amazed that she learned the entire song watching other kids sing it on Youtube!


And Ellie is absolutely hilarious

A Fantastic Fourth!

ready for the parade!


The girls brought bags for their goodies this year!


Ellie holding up fans!
(at least she wasn't holding up the one someone gave her that said "Proud member of the Democratic party, LOL!)


SJ having fun!


Our All American Boy!


Over to Grampatti and BopBop's to continue the festivities
The Slip N Slide was a hit!


All the cousins, minus two of the triplets
(one is facing backwards next to SJ)


Pinata!


Popsicles!


Then we came back to our side of town for fireworks! A fabulous day!

The race

A few weeks ago, we had two diving incidents over the course of a few days. That Saturday we came back from our beach trip a few hours early so that Mary Clare could attend the final swim meet of the year. This divisional meet was held at the new indoor pool, the natatorium. (a quick aside: spellcheck doesn't like the word natatorium and wants me to change it to sanatorium, moratorium, crematorium...) There were about 6 different swim teams crammed underneath the football stadium bleachers. I thought our time would be spent indoors so we had dropped off all our beach gear, including the chairs. While Steven ran home to get them, the kids and I held our "place", which by the time he arrived ended up being about 4ft square next to the trash can to put 3 chairs and all our gear! I kept wondering why in the world we had left our vacation for this claustrophobic catastrophe that could not seem to get started. The YMCA playground pool was sounding more and more promising.

But finally it was time for the meet to start and after a few events, it was finally Mary Clare's turn for her one event: the 25 meter freestyle. She was pumped up and ready to swim her heart out. As the other kids slowly wandered to their starting blocks, she immediately climbed up and took her starting position. Right at that moment the buzzer went off for another race for the older kids. Mary Clare dove in right away and swam her heart out for at least half the length of the pool until she felt the "false start" rope that was released across the pool to stop her from swimming any further. She headed back to the blocks and was soon ready to try again. She swam well but I'm sure was so exhausted that it wasn't really her best swim. Steven and I felt so bad for her, but she really took it in stride.

Then a few nights later we took the kids to the nieghborhood pool for a late evening swim before bed. The girls were taking turns diving in to Steven in the deep end. All of a sudden I heard Ellie crying and Steven calling for me to help. Mary Clare had dove in before Ellie reached the edge of the pool, hitting Ellie's eye (goggles) with her hip, causing a big cut in Ellie's eyebrow that required a trip to the emergency room for some medical "superglue".

Tonight I've been thinking about Mary Clare's early dives and how they relate to my own spiritual experience of the past few years. As I've written about before, I have been a member of a lay movement for several years. I joined when Mary Clare was a toddler and I was deep in the throws of new motherhood and thrilled to find my own little "roadmap" for the spiritual life. I knew many families in "the movement" who I greatly admired and I had great hopes that this was the solution to maintaining my spiritual walk in my vocation as a wife and mother.

I fell in love with all the aspects of this group...the people, the prayer commitments, the retreats, the team life, the spiritual direction, and the writings. I tried to share it with all my friends and thought that it was the perfect means to holiness for young families.

I dove in with my whole heart.

I was the ideal new member, full of vigor and zeal. I was ready to do whatever apostolate (ministry) I was asked to do. Although most of my friends weren't really interested, I swam on with my eyes focused on the goal: holiness. We moved towns for a time, and I was still on fire for it, trying to encourage more young moms in this college town to consider this movement. My prayer life was going well and the movement had become a true part of who I was.

We settled back in our home here and once again I was spending lots of my time in my involvement with the movement. But as I started officially homeschooling this year, and our weekly meetings moved locations, my zeal for it all was starting to wane. I was feeling frustrated and burnt out. I had always received wonderful guidance, and one of my spiritual directors had told me that my homeschooling vocation had to be a priority. I took that to heart and focused on my family this past year.

When the news of the horrible scandals of the founder of this movement came about in February, I was devastated. I had looked to the writings of this man and admired so much about him. I knew a family member of his personally, and to me her charity and holiness spoke volumes on the sanctity of her family and the founder. But now his persona was all a lie, a fraud, and my heart was, and still is, very hurt. We were also in the midst of Mary Clare's knee surgery and recovery, Steven Joseph's heart diagnosis, and some other family issues. So I took time during Lent to just step back and await further information on how things might continue.

That was the time of that rope being put before me, stopping me in my tracks and requiring me to turn back around and swim through all the memories and analyze just what this movement was for me. I don't think I'm finished swimming through that yet. I don't feel like the place I'm in right now allows me to discern fully where I want to go from here. My spiritual life feels like it has been turned upside-down and I feel a lot of confusion on how to proceed. My faith has been shaken, as can be imagined. When you put faith in people before faith in God, it's a given that your faith will be shaken when those people fail. Because people always fail.

But God does not fail. I'm so thankful to have a Father in Heaven who always looks out for my best interests, and who loves me even when my relationship with Him is lacking. I'm thankful to have a Church where the sacraments don't hinge on my belief in them, and where the Mass is the Mass even when my body is there without my heart. Yesterday I spent most of Mass in the Narthex of the Church with a young mom and her twin toddler girls. The girls and Stevie had quite a time running to and fro, and soaking in each other's smiles. I tried to remember that moment of joy and laughter. God was with us and giving us grace in our state of life in the Narthex, barely hearing the Mass going on inside the doors. And right now I'm trying to do the same; finding joy in the unknown state I feel like I'm living in, grasping for hope rather than despair, and looking to light before darkness.

I'm inching to climb back to those starting blocks again. Mary Clare was so ready to dive back in again for the race, and I yearn for that childlike faith. But I am where I am, and I think I have yet to climb out of the pool in order to try again. I'm taking in some deep breaths and resting my soul for the newest race, and trying not to be too anxious about what that race entails. It will come when it comes, and my faith (even without my heart and mind) rejoices in the fact that God is already there cheering me on and waiting for me at the finish line.

Ice Cream

Daddy/Daughter Dance

My little beauties ready for the Daddy/Daughter Dance for our homeschool group on Sunday night


Daddy/Daughters


All the daddies and daughters


Homeschoolers just wanna have fun!


Love this daddy/daughter shot!


Mary Clare had fun with all her friends!


Spinning


Stevie gets in on the action!


a Mommy/Daddy dance, but one little person wouldn't let us dance alone :)


A fun night was had by all.

I'm back!

with photos to share!

Let's start with the "First Communicant"
She's even got a certificate


Our friends have a great Mass kit and the kids had a blast playing together the other day! Here are both the girls after their "First Holy Communion!"


After the First Communion Mass, we had a wedding, and a newlywed visit to receive a "Papal" blessing!


Are they cute or what?

How you know you have a blog addiction

when you have a very vivid dream about meeting MckMama at a resale store, which turned into my backyard, which turned into my living room, then the visitor turned into cjane instead! I had visions of appearing on their "famous" blogs and even introduced the visitor (which at that time was cjane/Courtney) to Steven. What a hoot!