Lest I Forget

Lent. It was long, and emotional. Our little world is about to be in some major upheaval as we pack up and make our way back to the states. We must begin to really look at the contents of this house and decide "Is this really necessary? Why are we clinging to these things? Will they be useful in our new house?" I think Lent is a lot like that, but with our souls. What things are hanging out in our souls that are taking up precious space that needs to be for Jesus? How can we clear out a space for Him? What is keeping us from doing so? On Holy Thursday, I was blessed to be able to spend time with Jesus in Adoration after Mass. I tell you, He can really hear your prayers when you are that close to Him, so be careful. What I asked of Him was given to me almost immediately. The question is, will I grow closer to my Lord, or will I let fear grip me and not rise to the challenge? Somewhere along the way, we started a tradition of putting littl...

I awoke to a cold, rainy Friday morning. Fitting, I thought, for such a day as this. All Heaven and earth are in mourning. In keeping with the solemnness of the day, I had in my mind that we would have a silence in our home and hearts from noon until 3:00. We would do the Stations of the Cross, pray the sorrowful mysteries, and at 3:00 we would start our Divine Mercy novena. As so often happens, my plans are not the Lord's. I was angry, that my way, which seemed so wonderful, was not to be. And I did not handle it with any sort of grace, I tell you. However, when we finally did begin the Stations of the Cross, the children made it the most meaningful of this Lenten season. When we went to the ones at our chapel, I had to keep little ones from becoming distractions for others and was not able to focus. But the tears came as I watched my kids take the peg dolls and move them through the city they had built. It came alive to me, at the hands of my children's play. How long wil...

As we make our way through Holy Week, looking forward to the glory of Easter Sunday, I thought I would share with you how I helped our children better understand exactly what Our Lord suffered for us, for our sinfulness. Realizing that my children benefit from visual, hands on learning, I turned to Catholic Icing and Holy Heroes for help. Honestly, we did not participate in the Lenten Adventure every day, but most days we at least did the coloring page and maybe the word searches. We also did the Stations of the Cross with our parish every Friday but one. After daily Mass a few weeks ago, (our homeschool community gathers every Friday for Mass) one of our priests gave the children a "tour" of the Stations of the Cross. He asked the children if any of them could name all 14 stations in order. There was silence. Then one small hand rose from the group. It was my Anna. Could she? She could! Believe me, I can not. My heart was filled with happiness listening to her tiny voice...

As I stand here in the kitchen waiting, waiting for the ham to finish cooking (failure), I thought I'd type up a little post. Silly me, I thought that things would go smoothly. Peter has finally decided that sleeping all night is a good thing and has done so successfully for nearly a week. Until last night. Really, though, I can't blame him. I will have to blame Anna. For reasons still very unclear, she awoke shortly after midnight, declared she couldn't sleep, and noisily started flipping pages of her book, with her light on. Her bunkmate, Therese, slept through this for a while, but inevitably her body woke to the bright lights and she then declared that she could not possibly sleep without a sippy cup of juice. She declared this not quietly. So, of course, in all the hub-bub, Peter awoke and joined the ranks of the not sleepers. Let us keep in mind at this point that the Easter Bunny has not visited our house. And he needs to. But children are awake and parents are ...