Friday, October 31, 2008

Last Day of the Month of Mary

And here are some nice musings about the rosary one can read to close out the month Of Mary with. To read CLICK HERE & HERE.



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Jesse Tree posts....

I am currently preparing a series of posts for each day of Advent which will have the Jesse Tree reading for the day and an explanation of what the symbol is for that day.

In preparing this, I looked at the various Jesse Tree websites I had chosen for for my Advent Links page and was surprised to realize that more than one was Protestant based. Obviously there will be a some different interpretations of readings and choice of symbols. For instance we sometimes think of Mary as an Ark as she carried the Word of God Incarnate within... This is not a viewpoint that all Protestant religions would necessarily take.

Hence I have revised my favorite link and replaced it with the Domestic Church, a Catholic website. This is the site that I will be using as my guide for the Jesse Tree. I have left the Protestant sites as they have interesting symbols and more of them have nice clear ones for children to cut out and colour. I am using one of these sites to create symbols for our Advent Calendar chain.

I am really looking forward to Advent and the younger children and I have begun to colour our symbols already for this chain so that on the first Sunday of Advent we can simply assemble the chain - and this alone will take some time. It will be a wonderful start to our Advent, I think.

I am also putting together a little contest for a Christmas gift giveaway. Stay tuned for details. I am hoping for this to become a regular event, first as a monthly thing and then hopefully more frequently - if it becomes as popular as I hope it will.


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Moving Out

A few weeks ago, it was decided that it was time for Elsa to make the move - out of our room into her big sisters' bedroom. That is - the little girls as they are referred to so as to differentiate them from the older girls - who are in their teens. That Saturday morning we spent hours cleaning and rearranging the bedroom to accommodate three children and their belongings as opposed to only two. Even though it is a large bedroom - it took a little planning and a lot of work. Finally the transition was complete and Elsa was proudly installed in the little girls' room. She spent a good part of the day playing in there with her only heart club dolls with Emma.

While she was busy doing that, I was busy filling the upper drawers of her old dresser with the new baby's things. You see her old dresser is a metal sliding drawer contraption so that you can see everything in it. And it was empty... and looked rather lonely. I arranged a few things in a pretty fashion in the top sliding section and then moved onto other chores.

Shortly after Elsa popped in to visit me and stopped short. She made her way over to "her" dresser and lovingly rubbed her hand along the top rail. I heard a heavy sigh as she stared at the new baby towels, a few stuffed toys and burp clothes. "I guess," she sighed, "I guess, this is "???"'s room now."

Oh, oh! Stupidly I had not anticipated that - but with 25 years of mothering experience, I should have. I assured her that she was still welcome in my room and then helped her focus on the happy experience of moving in with the little girls. She left more cheerful than she came in but apparently it was still on her mind.

The next day being Sunday, her older sister Gabriela was helping her dress for Mass and as her dresses are in my closet, they were in my room. While Elsa sat on the end of bed, facing the offending dresser, she called Gabriela over from the closet.
"Look," she said jabbing her little finger at the dresser. There are "???"'s things. I am just so mad, I mean SAD!"

However, when Gabriela repeated the story to me, she added that Elsa did not really sound mad or sad - just matter of fact. And she has not brought it up since. I think she is dealing just fine with it and is often tucking herself into her bed with her sisters at night, and is often the first asleep.

Children really are quite resilient, especially when surrounded by the tons of love that Elsa is surrounded with.




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Novena Reminder from Father Corapi

DAY FIVE

I strongly urge every one of you to make a Novena and pray the Rosary to Our Lady of Victory between October 27th and Election Day, November 4th. Pray that God’s will be done and the most innocent and utterly vulnerable of our brothers and sisters will be protected from this barbaric and grossly sinful blight on society that is abortion. No woman, and no man, has the right to choose to murder an innocent human being.


May God grant us the wisdom, knowledge, understanding, and counsel to form our conscience in accordance with authentic Catholic teaching, and then vote that well-formed Catholic conscience.

God Bless You

Fr. John Corapi


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It's 5:27 AM

I have to get up in 33 minutes - at 6 am.... but it is 5:27 and I am up. I have been awake since 4:30, up since just before five because my tummy was growling and last week I tried unsuccessfully to go back to sleep when that happened at the same time of morning.

So I figured I would get up and get dressed and throw together a pineapple bread recipe. No go - too tired. Ate a slice of bread and decided to mess around on the computer while I waited for the 25 minute swash cycle to finish.

So now I am about 5 minutes away from the wash finishing, hungry again and very, very tired and trying to decide if the heartburn is worth another slice of (homemade) bread and butter - or if I should just go back to bed (still dressed, I am not struggling out of these maternity pants and then back into them again in a 30 minute period!) and toss and turn until 6 - about 30 minutes from now....

What would you do?




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