Wednesday, May 30, 2007

Laugh of the day...

A mother took her five-year-old son with her to the bank on a busy lunchtime.

They got behind a very fat woman wearing a business suit complete with
pager. As they waited patiently, the little boy said loudly, "Gee, she's fat!"

The mother bent down and whispered in the little boys' ear to be quiet.

A couple of minutes passed by and the little boy spread his hands as far as they
would go and announced; "I'll bet her butt is this wide!"

The fat woman turns around and glares at the little boy. The mother gave him a good
telling off, and told him to be quiet.

After a brief lull, the large woman reached the front of the line.
Just then her pager begins to emit a beep, beep, beep.


The little boy yells out, "Run for your life, she's backing up!"

HT: Uncle Gus

Monday, May 28, 2007

Firsts.

Happy Birthday to the church and God's blessings to the many men and women in our armed forces.

There were many first during the three day weekend!

1. Henry had his first experience in a olympic sized pool and loved it.
2. Jack plunged (feet first) off the 20 foot diving board.
3. Gus took his first real strokes as a serious swimmer.

But the most amazing "first" of the day was having Henry sleep in a full size crib for the first time in his eight months here on this planet. Up to this point, he's been sleeping in a port-a-crib which is small in comparison. As Henry grew, the space in the port-a-crib became smaller and smaller. It became more and more evident as time wore on, that the "big baby" crib would have to come out and the other placed in storage. Bringing up the old crib, which held my other four babies, was a sight to behold. It was dusty, broken, old food crusted in the cracks, and faded. I never imagined at the time of storage, busy with four children under the age of 8, that I would even think of ever having another baby. I thought we should simply keep it in case we had company or for another family in need. Never did I dream that my family would be the family in need. And I'm so thankful that I am.

Sweet dreams, Henry. A long history of love has lived in that crib. May you always sleep peacefully.

Wednesday, May 23, 2007

Quote of the day.

I have many times been driven to my knees by the utter conviction that I had nowhere else to go.

Abraham Lincoln

Tuesday, May 22, 2007

Henry is 8 months old!








I can crawl
I can feed myself Cheerios
I can babble
I can sit up


Time flies when you are having FUN!

Friday, May 18, 2007

Youth Convention

My daughter Rebecca and I are off to our annual Diocesan Youth Covention in Greenville, NC. The theme of the weekend is "Ascention Convention: Live, Laugh, Love". I'll be doing two talks for the youth on the topic of marriage....a good friend, Fr. Scott McCue will be speaking with me. Please pray that the over 1000 young people in attendance will sincerely learn how to Live a life with Christ, Laugh at the devil, and Love with the strength and power that Jesus loves us. See you all on Sunday!

Monday, May 14, 2007

These girls are radical!

You want to be radical? Different? Stand out in a crowd? Go Countercultural?

Good.

Put away your green hair dye, your emo-look, and your goth like persona and be really radical.


Nuns are back!!

HT:Danielle Bean

Thursday, May 10, 2007

I knew it was going to be one of those days...

My husband: You can't put that on the blog.

Me: Oh, yes I can. It's real life!

Here's the story he preferred me to keep a secret:

Today I experienced a "first" in the world of childrearing. You would think something like this had happened to me before. Considering the fact that I have five children and considering the fact that I have experienced many gross incidences of diaper changes, this one took the cake.

As I changed Henry this morning, bleary eyed and tired, I discovered that not only had he "tinkled" a huge amount, but he had also inserted a large "package" of poop as well. Barely able to see what I was doing in the early morning dawn, I wiped up his massive mess and removed his diaper. I stumbled across the bedroom floor to get him a change of clothes and a new diaper but did not notice that Henry's "used up" diaper had fallen to the floor. Unbound, open and well, very stinky. As I walked back to where Henry lay, I felt something warm and gushy on my foot...(ewh, ewh ewh...yes, you all guessed right) It was, in all its glory...Henry's poo poo. In a large green mass on the arch of my foot.(This may be too much for the reader with the weak stomach, but I just had to share this perilous moment of motherhood.) Totally awake at the realization that I had indeed stepped in something totally nasty, I just stood there, foot raised high, yelling, " Oh please, NO! This is nasty, nasty, nasty!!" Problem was, the baby wipes were on the other side of the room since I had just run out of wipes cleaning up Mr. Gross! So I hopped to the wipes and hurriedly cleaned up my foot.

I was totally disgusted. Henry was totally delighted with the entertainment.

The rest of the day did not go much better....but that's a posting for another day. Still, looking on the bright side of things...it was much better than stepping in dog poo poo. Not that I've ever done that.

A bit much?

I'm all for joyful praise and all, but I do believe this is going overboard. Sheesh!

Wednesday, May 09, 2007

Can someone please help me find.....

Henry's neck?




Photo Credit: Rebecca Clemens

A voice of reason in the wilderness

"Selfishness and fear are at the root of (pro-abortion) legislation," he said. "We in the Church have a great struggle to defend life...life is a gift not a threat."--Pope Benedict

"The Church says life is beautiful, it is not something to doubt but it is a gift even when it is lived in difficult circumstances. It is always a gift."--Pope Benedict

Read the whole article here.

Welcome Home Dr. Beckwith

“If you're going to do a thing, you should do it thoroughly. If you're going to be a Christian, you may as well be a Catholic.”

---- Muriel Spark

Dr. Francis Beckwith, president of the Evangelical Theological Society and professor at Baylor University in Waco, Texas has just converted back into the Catholic Church. You can read about his journey here and read some of the uncharitable remarks from our Protestant brothers and sisters regarding his move back to Rome. This brave man needs prayers from the entire Christian community, but could use some words of encouragement from those of us who are Catholic. Welcome this man and let him know that we are glad that he has come home. Visit his blog by clicking below:

Dr. Francis Beckwith

HT:
Edmund C.

Tuesday, May 08, 2007

Corporal Works of Mercy



One benefit of having a larger family is having enough siblings to practice the Corporal Works of Mercy. It is physically impossible for me to take care of every child's need at all times, so it may be necessary for a sibling to take over. Here, Jack helps with feeding his baby brother. Feeding the hungry as we are all called to do. Even the very young can help with that.

Friday, May 04, 2007

The Month of Mary



Be sure to pray the Rosary this month.

Hail Mary, Full of Grace
The Lord is with thee
Blessed art thou amongst women
And blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus
Holy Mary Mother of God
Pray for us sinners, now an at the hour of
our death.

Amen

and for fun....we cannot forget this famous classic

Spring Spruce Up

There comes a time in the life of a parent when something truly amazing happens. Something glorious. Something indescribable. Something more incredible than even a child's first words:

It's when your children are old enough to participate in "grown up jobs" like WEEDING, SPREADING MULCH, MOWING, AND PLANTING! And what used to take you days to complete is done in a mere four hours! Bad part is.... they still whine. It's OK though, they'll grow out of that later!



The weeding.

The mulching

And I even got paid to do it!!

Here is a short article of what I did last weekend (I'm in the picture on the right with my head down), in addition to:

1. Attended the play at Rebecca's High School, RagTime...quite a masterpiece!
2. Put the finishing touches on a talk on prayer (after midnight, of course)
3. Created an end of year slide show for youth ministry (after midnight, of course)
4. Fed, clothed, and cared for five children intermittently with the understanding help of my wonderful partner in crime
5. Spoke to 5th graders about continuing their faith development into middle school
6. Graduated 8th graders to high school confirmation
7. Recognized our sunday school volunteers for all their hard work during the faith development year
8. Organized an end of year ice cream social
9. Filled over 30 gift bags with prayer boxes and "100 Grand" chocolate bars as gifts for catechists
10. Enjoyed saying "see you in the Fall" to the over 200 youth and adults who participated in youth ministry events this year.

And guess what? I'm officially off for the next few months (unofficially I still have loose ends to tie up)but the best part is that I get my Sunday nights back to be with my wonderful family until September. Thanks be to God for a wonderful faith development year and for giving me more blessings than I could have ever imagined.

Tuesday, May 01, 2007

What was that again?

I was upstairs getting dressed this morning when I heard Gus yelling at Jack for not listening to his pleas for attention:

Gus: (impatiently) Jack, did you put your ears on this morning?