SOCIAL MEDIA

Saturday, May 7, 2011

Ode to My Mom


1. For telling me angel stories.
2. For teaching me what truth, beauty, and goodness are.
3. For stopping to "visit Jesus" with me every time we passed a Catholic parish.
4. For teaching me the importance of prayer. 
5. For being my biggest fan.
6. For fighting to guard me from scandal when I was a child.
7. For praying her heart out. and then some.
8. For being an example of truly loving the poor, forgotten, and unloved.
9. For being my best friend.
10. For giving her heart out. and then some.
11. For raising me on Christian music.
12. For giving me my Faith.
13. For having a servant's heart.
14. For rocking my first child in the wee hours of the morning so I could sleep.
15. For carrying me through childhood and motherhood.
16. For being a silent, strong, praying presence through every birth.
17. For teaching me about submission.
18. For laughing with me.
19. For crying with me.
20. For being the best grandmommy EVER to my children.
21. For more than I could ever list........

Happy Mother's Day, Mom!
Monday, May 2, 2011

Just an average day...

I have tried to establish "exercise time" about 30 minutes before lunch when we are home, but the activity is usually up to them. I just require that they are breathing hard, working up a sweat, and are continually doing it. So today, they set up an obstacle course in the den, and I stopped making lunch to get a few action shots. They began by getting a running start from our bedroom and jumping over the ottoman for starters:
Then Princess demonstrated the 2nd phase for me:
But they saved the real action for when daddy got home. It started when JI came downstairs in the middle of dinner with a helmet on and a sword. Then everybody asked if they could go upstairs and "get something". Now, I have to explain something. The playroom/schoolroom is upstairs, at least that was the plan. But, I still have 2 children that nap during the day, their bedrooms being upstairs and naps being in the morning and afternoon. And homeschooling and not being near the kitchen and laundry room is not practical. Nor does naptime and playtime mix well. So, we really play downstairs most of the time and school downstairs, much to my husband's dismay. And it is pretty chaotic downstairs because of all the activity. But so that there is one less room to clean up, guess what room I try to keep cleaned up as often as possible, besides my bedroom? The schoolroom/playroom upstairs. "This is crazy!" My poor husband declares. My response is when every other room in the house is a trainwreck I can go upstairs and look in there with a sigh of relief and shut the door again. I know, it's wrong, but it is part of the way my mixed up head deals with it. So as I said, everyone wanted to go upstairs to "get something" and I reluctantly allowed it. They all went upstairs to select a persona from the costume box. JI declared he wanted to be "a cow who hurts people" lightsaber in hand. For some reason, he needed pink sunglasses to complete the look.

 Princess, though unable to find anything girly in the upstairs dress-up box came down in a blue car racing costume assuring us she was still a girl, just a car repair man and proceeded to prance around flipping her hair here and there.

 JI's big brother, I think, tends to let out his repressed feelings of resentment over his lego creations continually being destroyed at times like this. See how the light saber is positioned just so?

Actually, I have noticed it in family pictures too.

Hmmm. Perhaps I should be concerned. Well, I guess that's about all the chaotic disturbedness I have to share with you. Have a peaceful...something. We prefer our chaotic disturbedness. It is much more amusing.  
Sunday, May 1, 2011

Divine Mercy Sunday


Today is a beautiful feast day in the church, Divine Mercy Sunday in which we celebrate in a special way, you guessed it, the Divine Mercy. This is particularly near to my heart as my 3rd child was named in honor of this feast and the saint who Jesus gave the mission to spread the devotion to his Divine Mercy in the visions she received. The painting of Jesus with the 2 rays flowing out, the blue representing the waters from his heart and the red being the blood, is a specific image he described to her and asked that at the bottom the phrase "Jesus, I trust in you." be printed and shared with the whole world. I would sit here and discuss all my thoughts on the subject but really it would sound like a bunch of rubbish compared to this so, here are a few quotes from some of the words Jesus spoke to her:

In the Old Covenant I sent prophets wielding thunderbolds to My people. Today I am sending you with My mercy to the people of the whole world. I do not want to punish aching mankind, but I desire to heal it, pressing it to My Merciful Heart. (1588)
It's a sign for the end times; after it will come the day of justice. While there is still time, let them have recourse to the fount of My mercy; let them profit from the Blood and Water which gushed forth for them. (848) Before I come as a just Judge, I first open wide the doors of My mercy. He who refuses to pass through the doors of My mercy must pass through the doors of My justice... (1146)

  "Let no soul fear to draw near to Me, even though its sins be as scarlet. My mercy is so great that no mind, be it of man or of angel, will be able to fathom it throughout all eternity. The feast of Mercy emerged from my very depths of tenderness. It is my desire that it be solemnly celebrated on the first Sunday after Easter. Mankind will not have peace until it turns to the Fount of My Mercy."

Oh blood and water which gushed forth from the heart of Jesus as a fount of mercy for us, I trust in you. Saint Faustina, pray for us.

Happy Divine Mercy Sunday!