Choosing Life...

I would like to share a link to a very special post - written by a mother who has walked the talk - not just talked. Her post says it all - so I will not say another word but just send you right over to her post.

Hope to be back posting regularly soon. We are s l o w l y settling in. Thanks to you to all who have been praying for us - a move is so stressful, along with a new job. My back is continuing to trouble me and I can not get a referral to my chiropractor as my family doctor I have recently learned does not believe in Chiropractic care of any kind... so please keep that in your prayers.

I also need prayers for courage please as I have to go see a dermatologist to have three biopsies done and will have to go alone. It is a one hour drive one way - due to our move... please keep me in your prayers. I dislike driving to new places intensely and am not particularly fond of doctors and especially dislike meeting new ones... Thank you again for all of your prayers!
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Where did mum2twelve - now a bakers dozen dissapear to?

Well - after washing all that laundry at my friends house - mother nature saw fit to wash our beautiful earth and in the process knocked our Internet connection out. At the same time my husbands cell phone took a dying breath gasped and gave up the ghost - literally. All of his contacts went with it... (As in they were on a card that was readable on his phone....)

We were waiting patiently for his new phone and once it arrived... we needed the INTERNET to activate the phone and we needed the phone to call the IT guy about the Internet... took a while but we got this vicious cycle beat and here I am!

But I'm just too busy to blog today - so a quick hello to you all! I will be back with an important link - tomorrow. Now I am off the run errands, errands and more errands!


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Many thanks to...

...to Good Remedy for allowing us all to hang at her house ALL day and for a good portion of the evening so we could roll out load after load of clean laundry! We currently do not have a washer and dryer hook up so lets look at the math:

(nine kids + two adults) X (no laundry facilities) = countless baskets of laundry

Peggy - what would I do without you ?


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Prayer request

My good friend Dorry is in GHANA with her family. Dorry and I have been friends since we moved to the US twelve and half years ago. Her son, Charles, was one of my second daughter's best friends and was in her wedding party.

This is a once in a life time opportunity for Dorry and her family. Please keep them in their prayers as they travel and enjoy the country of her husband's origins. Pray for peace (we all know how stressful traveling can be - heck sometimes I have a nervous breakdown shepherding everyone to the library - never mind flying halfway across the world!) safety and good health. After all who wants a summer cold on the trip of a life time. Tony and Dorry both work full time, while raising their large family and really deserve this lovely vacation.

How moving it must be for Tony to show his children his birth place. I am sitting here listening to a Ghana radio station to get a feel for what the kids and Dorry are experiencing - sound wise. However, the Internet has not yet come up with a way for one to experience the smells or climate of a foreign country. So I am depending on photos and my imagination to participate vicariously in my friends' journey to the other side of the earth.

Jenny and Charles, after she tied the knot with John!

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Quote of the day

Elsa (4) "Daddy, can I help wash the dishes? There are plenty of them to wash..."
The 'plenty of them ' was added in an emphatic tone as if to convince him to share his sacred toy with her.

Question of the day - will she still be asking that in her teens?

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what is our newest addition doing these days

• pointing at everything with her index finger, carefully checking it out before then grasping the object and stuffing it in her mouth.

• staring intently at any and all food as it leaves our plates and enters our mouths, often grabbing at the food.

• practicing with the intensity of a soldier under heavy fire - the combat crawl. Occasionally her bottom wags up in the air and she steadies herself for one or two 'steps' forward on her knees and hands and then her bottom wiggles wildly and she topples over and continues to 'soldier' on to her goal.

• grabbing 9 year old Nataniel red hair and pulingl it with all her might, as often as she can. She seems to love Elsa's red locks with the same intensity. Both deserves medals for their patience with her for this 'lovin' she heaps on them whenever they are in grabbing distance.

• has one little tooth peeking out of her tiny pink gums on the bottom.

• when not chewing on her toes, she is chewing on her fingers and sometimes concentrating on her thumb - naughty girl!

• is the object of the intense love of all her siblings, especially those at home who are enjoying her goofy grins, shining blue eyes that follow you with love and the energy that radiates from her as she concentrates on picking something up and then gumming it to death.
  

We are all so grateful for this lovely little addition to our family who is just a little over six months old. Thank you Jesus for our little darling baby and all of my other twelve blessings!

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day dreaming

A girl can dream, can't she?

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Bleary eyed...

...tired and too fatigued to even think of a post worthy of my audience taking the time to read so I will just wish you all abundant blessings on this day!

I'll be back as soon as I can muster the energy. Maybe I should go look for my vitamins. I'm sure they're in a box somewhere around here....

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Today we

...walked to Mass and were not late!

This afternoon we visited with new neighbors, walked to the library which was closed - but that was okay because today I learned what one of my favorite trees is called and got to know my neighbor just a little better. Old friends and fellow parishioners stopped by - all with a helping hand extended.

Some children went to a movie while another won a water fight deemed a "war" so proclaimed by the loser! (Sorry Peg!) Yet another family came to dinner bringing homemade lemonade with them.

Tonight we have little ones tucked in bed, while the adults and older children enjoy steaming hot mugs of tea and delicious thick slices of pound cake that the same neighbor brought over for us.

Never have we ever felt so welcome! Life is good and God is gracious....


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moving update

Last night I thought I was going to lose it and either I called Peggy or Peggy called me... and she asked if I would like her to pick up pizza for dinner. TOTALLY!

Today she passed by twice and the last time gave me the hug I badly needed. Earlier she dropped off clothes for Cecilia who is rapidly growing out of hers. She then took away laundry with her. 'Peggy you totally ROCK!' (I promise not to give away your email address as I am sure many of my readers are thinking 'I need a Peggy in my life!')

Somehow, between God's graces (thank you to all of you who are praying) and Peggy's cheerful smile as she looks at the towering mess and assures me that we are making progress, I am holding it together.

Sad to say - the piano is still safely tucked away .... in the OLD HOUSE! We simply did not have enough man power to try and move it and we absolutely don't want anyone getting hurt in the process. I tell you though - it was the but of many a joke throughout the day as we all pondered how to haul it over here. My washer and dryer are taking a well deserved vacation - also in the old house... and even once they are moved over here... they might still be in hiatus for a while as, GASP, there does not appear to be a washer and dryer hook up. This might be easily remedied and then again - it might not. Feel free to pray... please!

In addition to these important members of our household... there are all kinds of odds and ends still tucked away that must be dug out, boxed and brought... home. That has a nice ring to it. It is starting to feel like home.

And now I must toddle away to bed where I will say a few prayers, thanking God for the graces received, the friends He has brought our way, the lovely home He has provided and then I will ask for safety for all who are helping tomorrow as well as inspiration as how to move that dang pianer!


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About half way there

Today we make possibly the last push to our move... a number of people are coming today with trucks to help us move the larger items. We hope to move the washer, dryer fridge and GASP the P I A N O ! Please add your prayers to mine. The idea of moving the piano is frightening!

Pray for safety for all involved as we load, drive it 30 minutes to the new location and then unload it again. Anyone know a good piano tuner - I think we are going to need a tune up after this!

I think we will move Sam today, so please keep him in your prayers as well. Moving is very stressful to him! (Ha - who isn't stressed by a move, eh? Ask Cecilia about moving stress and she will tell you how its waking her up at 2 am and causing her to cry for half an hour before falling back to sleep in her parents' exhausted arms!)

As always - thank you in advance for your prayers. Look for pictures to come... eventually. I'm just a little disorganized right now.

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When someone else has ...

...said it so well - why say it all over again. Take heed mamas and maybe papas too. When you don't get sufficent beauty rest - suffice to say it is not just one's beauty that suffers but your mood can get kinda ugly too. Thanks Jennie for the link to this post by Dawn.

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Day dreaming...

Cecilia recently celebrated her 1/2 birthday and I am thinking of splurging on a gift for her and I to share. We are still using her boppy pillow and in fact if she is fussing for me and we tell her to get her boppy pillow she instantly starts smiling because then she knows she is going to get to sit with mummy and nurse. The cover on our current boppy is well... faded and becoming stained.

Tell me what you think of this lovely cover? While it only has three reviews they are very positive! I thought about making one - but by the time you pay for the pattern, buy the material and then actually find the time to make one - you really are no further ahead than if you just plopped down your 19.95 plus S&H, don't you think? And it seems I'm not the only blogging mama who likes her boppy to be pretty and comfortable. When I look at that tiny baby sleeping in his boppy pillow I have to wonder was Cecilia ever really that little that she was once able to do that too?
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A stroll down memroy's lane...

Enjoy a post I wrote - was it really four years ago? Where has the time gone? The child who was the baby of the family at the time is now four and is an aunt, as well as a big sister. In fact she is enjoying being a big sister so much she is hoping maybe we will have another baby - this time a boy. I made no promises but told her that before she knows it - she will have another niece or nephew. As much as she loves her little niece - she wasn't going for it.

Ah well - here is a post you might enjoy again - or for a first time - originally written way back in August of 2005.
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Freedom

"Freedom is not just something with which we are born; it is something we achieve. America did not receive a perpetual endowment of freedom; it has had to struggle and fight to preserve it. Freedom is not an heirloom or an antique; it is a life that must fight against the corrosive powers of death and nourish itself on the daily bread of goodness and virtue.",
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A must read ...

...for those of us who live in hurricane highway, tornado alley and anywhere else severe weather could leave you high and dry - sans food, drinking water, electricity etc. Jenni experienced something of the sort last winter just before the birth of her baby - and we were without electricity for five days when Emma was 2 months old - in the dead of winter after a severe ice storm. SO without further adieu I send you over to Jenni's so you can see what she has to say on the matter.
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Happy Independence Day

We ask the Patron Saint of the America's to pray for the U.S.A on its day of Independence.




Here are some of my favorite spots that we have visited over the past seven years while traveling for business.






Saint Augustine, Florida
(picture from here)

Columbus, Ohio - during the Christmas Season as we loved the block long nativity scene they put up every year!
(Picture from here)

Charleston, South Carolina
(Picture from Charleston Visitor Bureau)

And finally one of our most favorite spots is almost in our own back yard, about an hour and half away in the mountains.

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Small Successes

1) Hugo and I taught a successful seminar on the 30th (Tuesday of this week)

2) I finished my CD for the seminar and we successfully labeled and burned 30 copies of it.

3) Successfully packed ONE whole book shelf so that I have at least one that is completely empty. We have packed about 10 boxes of books, but so far only one bookshelf is completely empty. It is so restful to glance at one that is totally empty and know eventually they all will be empty.

4) And last, but not least, plugging on despite a ranging headache that just makes me want to cry. It is very tempting to give in and give up! But several boxes of clothes have joined the boxes of books... Like someone afraid of heights trying to climb a ladder or tree - I just simply must not look down, but look ahead! And PRAY! I must pray - quietly in my head all day "Lord - Help me, Mary - please pray for me!"

ignore that blamed darn read more that I can't figure out to get rid of.

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learning to sit

Sometimes we leaned too far back... with predictible results!

Ooops! This time we leaned too far forward!

This time we got it just right!

And sometimes when we got it just right we were able to enjoy such delights as a flower with our sister, Bethany!






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three good kids for sale...

I picked up an excellent bargain while in the mountains last week and, NO, I will not resell them for they are too priceless!





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Now we begin to pack....

This morning we begin to do some serious packing with me actually involved. I have tried not to stress out over the number of boxes being packed the past week with who knows what and stacked here and there through out the house. The plan is to begin moving a little into the house each day. Its going to be hot, hectic and hopefully fun too. We are all excited about moving to this new house. It needs some work but we are not afraid of work. This house is owned by our parish and they want to sell it to help add to the new building fund campaign so every little repair we make we will see as a gift to our parish.

Fellow parishioners will be helping us to move as well and everyone so far has been excited to hear we are moving to the same city as the church. I have not yet arranged for Internet at the new house and sadly the company we have been with for the past three years is not yet available in the area. So I am not sure what we will be doing for Internet. I might be blogging from the local library so in anticipation of that I will post some scheduled postings which due to time constraints will mostly be pictures from our recent trip to the mountains.

Stay tuned for Internet details....
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Happy Canada Day

We have often enjoyed watching the change of the guard as we lived in Ottawa for years.

One of my favorite views - from my dad and step mums back yard! They have a bread and breakfast in New Brunswick and it is a beautiful place to visit.

And here are a few links you can visit to see some pretty places I have either lived in or visited with Hugo, when we lived in Canada.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CANADA

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