NItty Gritty Rhythm

This post is ridiculously long, but it answers lots of the nitty-gritty questions I get regarding how we juggle a really busy sports schedule, a traveling dad, and many kids over a big age span. If you hang in there and read, the answers are here. I wrote it several weeks ago and decided to hold it because there was too much detail about our daily whereabouts. Soccer season is coming to a close now, though, so it will all change.

Last summer, in the days before the feast of St. Anne, I offered a heartfelt (desperate?) novena. I so needed her intercession in the matter of my daily and weekly rhythm. Some of you might recall that when I wrote about the struggle I was having with burnout and exhaustion as a result of demands on my time, I offered no possible solutions. I didn’t even try. I crashed at the end of soccer season last spring and had no energy to figure anything out. Instead, I took comfort in the fact that summer would offer respite.

For as long as I’ve had children to ferry to and fro, my father-in-love has been willing and eager to help me whenever I had conflicts. Sadly, he is no longer well enough to play that role in our lives. He cannot pop over a pick up and deliver a child, cannot stay home with little ones if all the big ones have to be in different places. He cannot come fix this or that in my house when Mike is away or busy. He can’t do the late night or early morning run to the airport. He just can’t do it. When the day came last spring that that decision was made, I felt the rug yanked out from under me. All these years he’s been my go-to guy, the secret ingredient that made this crazy life more sane. I had no idea how much I depended on knowing there was a safety net until there wasn’t one. I struggled both with the fact that it rocked my world and with the intense sadness I felt for him and for us as we watch him decline.

When the time came to offer a novena in preparation for St. Anne’s feast, I recognized that the summer was half over and that very soon, I was going to have to revisit the dreaded SCHEDULE. No one on earth was going to rescue me. And I knew well that I could not figure this one out on my own.

I didn’t know how I was going to make the drive to where the boys play soccer in McLean (a good 45 minutes in traffic, a bad hour or more in heavy traffic) and get Mary Beth to ballet. I knew Christian would get himself where he needed to be, but that also meant he couldn’t help with anyone else. And when US Soccer plucked Patrick from the mix, that meant that it was a lot less likely that one teenager would remain home to care for little ones. It was going to be all of us driving, all the time. I worried that my little ones were lacking in play time and in time to make friends (particularly homeschooling friends). I worried I’d never have time to write. I just worried and worried.

And St. Anne heard it all. The plan presented itself to me in ways I could not imagine.

I get so many notes asking how to fit it all in, when to cook dinner, how to make sure family meals happen. This post is full of details and chances are your eyes will glaze over, but I offer it for the handful of people who are looking for just such details. More importantly, I offer it as a testimony to the power of prayer.

Let’s start on Monday morning. Dinner is prepped and put in the Dutch oven first thing. The day is going to lurch forward full speed ahead. If dinner isn’t ready to go before 10AM, we’re not going to eat. The rest of Monday morning is just the basics, school-wise (Reading, Bible and math), and then thorough cleaning of the house, with particular attention to the wood floors on the main level. Then we shove all the furniture out of the way to transform our home into a ballet studio.

When I could not figure a way to give ballet lessons (or any lessons) to my little girls because the times conflicted with everyone else and with retrieving Gracie from school and it was way too expensive, Mary Beth and her friend Mary Kate stepped in. Ballet is now in my dining room, sunroom, kitchen and family room, every Monday afternoon. It doesn’t cost me anything and there are 15 (18?—I’ve lost count)  other homeschooled girls to share the experience with Katie and Karoline. Now, my only problem is how to keep Katie from talking the whole time. So many friends, so little chat time.

While the girls dance, the boys play flag football with a whole bunch of other homeschooled boys. My friend and neighbor Mary Chris is the genius behind the very lowkey opportunity for good, old fashioned fun. Marisa comes out for football and ballet and she brings her little guy, my godson, Johnny. If you had told me in July that Marisa and I would have a chance to chat in person once a week, I would have been astonished. Also present for this golden hour is my friend Bonnie, with whom I used to walk for an hour every day. We go way back and I’m so blessed to be able to have time again on a regular basis to just bask in the warm glow of friendship.

After ballet and football, Becca, one of the moms whose son is on Nicholas’ soccer team, hustles the boys to practice. Christian takes Mary Beth to her dance class and goes on to his practice. I gather the girls, mine and Becca’s, and meet her at soccer practice a little while later. They all play in the park near the practice field. And I absolutely, positively luxuriate in lots and lots of conversation with a bright, faithful mother of many who also homeschools and is a fellow graduate of my alma mater. This is a rare blessing for which I am so very grateful. Now, I eagerly look forward to those Monday afternoons. (And we do it again on Thursdays, too.) My kids don’t whine about being dragged along to practice—instead they look forward to meeting their friends in the park. When it’s all over, we go home to dinner in the Dutch oven and I fall into bed in time for Monday Night Football. I’ve yet to make it past half time.

Tuesday is a bit more relaxed. Same long drive to practice, but this time I do it only with Stephen. Mary Beth and/or Christian are home with wee ones. I sit at the field with my laptop and write while he trains. There’s no wi-fi in the parking lot, but that’s a good thing. It’s writing time only; there’s no temptation to surf. Mary Beth and I prep dinner before I leave and she finishes off the cooking while I'm at training with Stephen. We eat when Stephen and I get home, which is just about when Mike gets home, too.

Wednesdays are crazy but again an unexpected blessing finds us. I make dinner really early on Wednesdays and pack two meals in bento boxes. I take both Stephen and Nick with me for the long drive (all these long drives are “read aloud” time and we are cranking through our reading list on audio).  I drop Nicky at his training and take Stephen with me to Starbucks. He eats his dinner, we chat, and then he reads and I write. Then, I take Stephen to practice, pick up Nick and repeat the process with a different child. At the end of the day, they’ve both had time alone with me. We’ve talked about books, maybe surfed a little together and just hung out a bit.

And on a recent Wednesday, when Nick’s training was canceled, but Stephen’s wasn’t, I discovered that I could drop Stephen a wee bit early and make it to a nearby (and beautiful) church for Adoration and confession.

Thursdays, both boys train again. Becca’s family arrives a little early for the practice time they share with Nick and they hang out with us during some of Stephen’s training, too. Have I mentioned how happy I am to have such good company? Thursday nights we eat dinner at the park. When Stephen is finished, I have just enough time to hustle to pick up Mary Beth. We get home really late and roll right into bed.

Fridays, we got nothin’. We stay home all day and love it.

Saturday mornings find me dropping Mary Beth at ballet and taking just the little girls grocery shopping. This is new for them. Ever since Michael learned to drive, I’ve avoided grocery shopping with little ones. When Michael was at home, he did with a very detailed list. Then, Christian did it for a while. Then, I’d drop Patrick off, let him do it and go back and pick him up after dropping girls at ballet.

Now, I actually look forward to the Saturday routine. I take my little girls to Whole Foods. We shop there and have breakfast.  We poke our way through the craft store. Then, we go to Costco and finish out our shopping. By that time, it’s time to pick up Mary Beth. It’s an unexpectedly happy thing. Who knew I’d ever like running errands? Not me

Just before Patrick left, we were shopping together. I bought a bag for my laptop and the boys dubbed it my “McLean office.” It’s true, that my work is only being done in fits and spurts in the car and at Starbucks while waiting out soccer practice in McLean. I have a schedule for meeting deadlines, but the reality is that there are fewer deadlines and much less writing because there is much less time to do it. But there is time to do it. God blesses the time there is.

Of course, as I write (in the car on a Tuesday), the light is waning quickly. I know that fading light this early in the evening means that all the times will shift soon and the schedule will change. I am not nearly as afraid of that as I once was.

It’s only time. In the end, God is in control of time. And when I hand it to Him, in all humility, He provides abundantly to meet my needs and to bless my diligence.

Family Litany of Saints

My children surprised me with this video last week. They decided to offer our litany this month to our family's special saints. This one's a keeper--those dear voices do me in every time. (Apparently, even Karoline's favorite doll has a patron saint.)

Blessed Feast to you all!

Inhale

 

Autumn is my favorite season.  The last few autumns have been stressful, strained, or just completely out of sync. I’ve wanted to embrace the fullness of the season, but I’ve been distracted. Not this year. This year, it is autumn and I am inhaling it for all its worth.

 

After a bit of a detour, we have settled into a comfortable learning cadence. I’m happy with our reading and writing choices. I’m even happy with math (well, as happy as I am able to be).  Our days have a predictable, if busy, rhythm. Mornings are well-protected from the din and demands of the outside world. Late afternoons are a social whirl. But the days are growing shorter and the darkness comes earlier and my home glows in the sweet anticipation of long stretches of time devoted to hearth and home.  Even the dizzying whirl will slow to a gentle waltz.

I’m finding joy in simple things and inhaling the rich aromas of the season. There is no smell more intoxicating to me than the smell of autumn in the air. “Sweet Shendandoah”—the scent of leaves and wood fires and perhaps a bit of mold on a serpentine wall. I love that smell.  With the leaves and the fires, layer the spicy sweetness of pumpkin bread and the honeyed headiness of beeswax and, soon, all the world is aglow in the loveliness of autumn.

 

We spent some late October afternoons recently bringing the season into our home. Inspired by Ginny’s lovely leaves, we gathered some of our own.

All of my children and I found quiet satisfaction in slowly lowering bright leaves into liquid beeswax and waiting for it to stop dripping before carefully placing it on wax paper.

We threaded it on a garland and hung it from the dining room light. 

I smell the sweetness and delight in the color as I sit at the dining room table, tutoring one child at a time. The others are in the sunroom, where all our “school stuff” resides. They can work independently in there. Then, one by one, they have their turn with me—to read or write or edit.

Sarah Annie and Karoline play nearby at the nature table, happy gnomes and felted fairies gladly giving inspiration to their imagination.

 

We didn’t stop with the garland. It was as if we could not get enough of the goodness of those leaves. We dipped another basket’s worth and they grace the nature table. From my “teacher spot,” my eye falls upon them frequently and I marvel at the unique, perfect beauty of each one.

God is so good! His gorgeous grandeur spills over into every corner of this house.

 

At the other end of the room is the couch where I began my day. Karoline likes to curl up there with me before everyone else is awake. She always wants me to read a preview of the day’s Bible story. I think she likes being a step ahead of the rest of the pack. All the Bible storybooks and several versions of Bibles reside in the tables on either side of the couch. They are read frequently here in this room, either silently or aloud together. 

Right near the couch, the desk stands open, bearing full testimony to the great cloud of witnesses who intercede for us all year, but are remembered particularly in this season.  Icons and dear little folk dolls glow in the candlelight.

Between visits from each child, I glance up from my "teacher spot." Inhale. Fill both lungs with the richness of this life of faith.  We are praying the novena to all saints as a family, and I am revisiting my particular friends in private prayer time. The desk full of images reminds me of their care and nurturing, just as the pictures of my family nearby evoke memories and whispered prayers.

I love this room.

I love this home.

I love this life.

Celebrating all the Saints (the long version;-)

~

I think it's easy, clicking around on the web, to get the idea that Catholic families are feasting almost all the time. It seems there is a "special" day weekly, if not more often. In reality, most families observe just a handful of days that are important in their particular homes. True, there are feast days and memorials nearly every day and we pray them with the Universal Church. But the cake and the finery? In most families, those are the exceptional days.

Many of our exceptional saints' celebrations are tied to our  name days or birthdays (or both). It's as if the feast finds us and is forever ours. So it is with All Saints Day. Beyond observing All Saints Day as a Holy Day of Obligation, the day really never stood out for me. I'm not a big fan of Halloween. (This isn't any kind of moral indictment. I dislike talking to strangers and I was never all that fond of candy. Dressing in a costume to ring doorbells and ask for candy was a nightmare of epic proportions to me as a child. And I've never really gotten into it as an adult, either, though it's more fun to dress my children than it was to dress myself.) All Saints Day was sort of The Day after Halloween for a long time. It was a day of incessant battles over the candy and dealing with fallout from sugar fatigue.

Then there was my Year of the Saints. That was the year that Sarah Annie came into our lives. All sorts of saints found us that year. And they found their way into my prayer book. I got to know them, to appreciate them, to love them. Some of them, we celebrate on their own feasts, but the others, well, they introduced me to All Saints Day. And like so many unbelievable blessings in my life, they came to me in a hospital bed.

The night that Sarah Anne was born began early in the morning, just a few ticks past midnight. I remember staring at the puddle of blood and thinking, "I hate Halloween. Can't we possibly wait?" Um, no. But then, there were the hospital miracles and what looked like a crash delivery in the wee hours turned into a peaceful delivery well into the vigil of All Saints. I delivered right at trick-or-treat time. And as soon as I was sure I was alive, I started planning a party. That was last year: Sarah Anne's first birthday.

All Saints Day was on a Sunday last year and fit right in with my party plans. And as soon as I swept up the mess and wrapped the last of the cake, I wondered what to do with her birthday this year. I didn't want to share it with Halloween. I didn't know how to meld it to All Saints Day.

Care to hop down a rabbit trail with me?

I had a very recent conversation with a friend. She commented that in my daybook this week, I had a Julian of Norwich quote and a picture of Sarah Anne with Nutella. She said how cool that was, what with the hazelnut being a symbol of Blessed Julian and all. I wish I could claim such seamless ingenuity, but this was all news to me. So I did a little research.

In her book Showing of Love, Julian of Norwich writes about how God showed her the magnitude of His love:

And in this he showed me a little thing, the quantity of a hazelnut , lying in the palm of my hand, as it seemed. And it was as round as any ball. I looked upon it with the eye of my understanding, and thought, 'What may this be?' And it was answered generally thus, "It is all that is made."' I marvelled how it might last, for I thought it might suddenly have fallen to nought for littleness. And I was answered in my understanding:It lasts and ever shall for God loves it.   And so have all things their beginning by the love of God.

       In this little thing I saw three properties. The first is that God made it. The second that he loves it. And the third, that God keeps it. But what is this to me? Truly, the Creator, the Keeper, the Lover. For until I am substantially oned to him, I may never have full rest nor true bliss. That is to say, until I be so fastened to him that there is nothing that is made between my God and me.

      This little thing that is made, I thought it might have fallen to nought for littleness. Of this we need to have knowledge that it is like to nought, all things that are made. For to love and have God that is unmade.

      For this is the cause why we are not at ease in heart and soul, for we seek rest here, in this thing that is so little where there is no rest, and knowing not our God who is all mighty, all wise and all good. For he is true rest. God will be known, and he likes us to rest in him. For all that is beneath him cannot suffice us. And this is the cause why no soul is rested, until it is noughted of all that is made. And when he wills to be noughted for love, to have him who is all, then he is able to receive spiritual rest.

In the same coversation, but on an entirely different tangent, my friend and I talked about those wooden saints dolls that we've come love so in this house. We call that basket the "All My Saints basket." And then it hit me. I had already established an All Saints tradition. Just like Michael always has a Devil's Food cake (spiked heavily with Kahlua) on his Michaelmas Birthday and Patrick has angel food cake on his Guardian Angel Birthday, Sarah Anne will continue to have a hazelnut cake with all her saints. We'll do it again. And again. We already know she's a hazelnut fan. A tradition is born.

So there's the dessert part. Recipe at the end of the mega post.

To prepare for the feast, we'll pray the litany of All Saints, beginning October 23 (which is happily Mary Beth's birthday). The litany is quite long. You can find it here. This is an ambitious prayer undertaking for a family with lots of small children, but we'll give it a go and see where it leads. That litany will be follwed by this novena prayer:

My heavenly brothers and sisters, from those most renowned to those of greatest obscurity, I come before you now in all humility and commend myself, and all who are dear to me, to your intercession.

Pray for us always, that we may awake each day with a burning desire for the Lord whose Face you behold, that we will maintain an intimate personal relationship with Jesus, our Savior and Head, and that we will not hesitate to proclaim God’s greatness to others, and love them as the Lord loves us.

As you offer your continual praise before the throne of God,   I raise my heart to you now to implore your powerful intercession for these special needs:  (………).

I am confident that your prayers on our behalf will be graciously heard by our loving and merciful Lord.  By his grace, may we someday join you in the glory of the Father’s house.

If necessary, we can do the litany at one time and the novena at another.

Our family icon wall has lots of saints on it and the children all have icons of their name saints in their rooms. Usually, I put the saint of the feast on the desk in front of the wall, like it is above, pictured on the Feast of St. Therese. I think for the Feast of All Saints, I'm going to gather them from all over the house, open the desk and prop them all up there. Then, we'll take all the statues and put them on the nearby piano (we may need to temporarily move the Emmy to make room.)

So that's the plan. The Novena Starts Saturday, on Mary Beth's birthday, and finishes on October 31st, Sarah Anne's birthday. I love it when things work out just so!

This recipe came to me from Stephen's Godmother, who is an extraordinary baker. Anything less than extraordinary in this version is my embellishment, but I can't remember what's mine and what's hers.

Hazelnut Cake
2 large eggs
2/3 cup sour cream
1 teaspoon Frangelico (I used more, probably a Tablespoon or so.)
1/4 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/4 cup sifted cake flour
3/4 cup hazelnut flour (get from Trader Joe's)
1 cup sugar
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
12 TBSP (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter (or use regular butter and omit the salt), SOFTENED

•     Trace your 9" round springform pan onto parchment or waxed paper & cut it out. Grease pan, put in paper, then grease and flour.
•     In a medium bowl lightly combine the eggs, 1/4 of the sour cream, and the extract.
•     In a large mixing bowl combine the dry ingredients and mix on low speed for 30 seconds to blend. Add the butter and remaining sour cream. Mix on low speed until the dry ingredients are moistened. Increase to medium speed (high speed if using a hand mixer) and beat for 1 1/2 minutes to aerate and develop the cake's structure. Scrape down the sides. Gradually add the egg mixture in 3 batches, beating for 20 seconds after each addition to incorporate the ingredients and strengthen the structure. Scrape down the sides.
•     Scrape the batter into the prepared pan and smooth the surface with a spatula. Bake 35 to 45 minutes or until a wire cake tester inserted in the center comes out clean and the cake springs back when pressed lightly in the center. The cake should start to shrink from the sides of the pan only after removal from the oven.
•     Let the cake cool in the pan on a rack for 10 minutes. Loosen the sides with a small metal spatula and unmold or remove the sides of the springform pan. Allow to cool completely before wrapping airtight.

I made four times this recipe to make a 12 inch, two layer cake.

Filling

The filling was chocolate ganache. You can also use raspberry jam and chocolate ganache. Mike doesn't like fruit with his chocolate, so we don't mess with jam. BUt if you're jam fan, just spread a thin layer of seedless raspberry jam on the bottom layer. Make the ganache by heating whipping cream almost to boiling, then adding an equal volume of chocolate (I used Trader Joe's brand chips) and stirring until melted (1/2 cup each is probably enough for one cake, but if you make more and it's too much, it freezes well--or you can eat it plain the next day; that's what we do!). When the ganache is cool enough (it thickens a bit as it cools), spread or drizzle it over the jam and refrigerate a bit before putting on the top layer. Alternatively, spread Nutella (hazelnut/chocolate spread) between the layers.

French Buttercream Frosting

So worth the effort!

It is rich rather than sweet. It sounds like a lot of work, but it really just takes planning. Do the cooking part in the morning and the beating part at a later, convenient time. One batch makes about two cups, enough to cover the 9" cake. 2 batches covers the 12" cake to a substantive thickness.

French Buttercream
2/3 cup sugar
1/4 cup flour
3/4 cup milk (any kind)
2 sticks of butter--one salted and one unsalted
1 tsp vanilla or Frangelico (hazelnut liquer) I used WAYYY more Frangelico, to taste

•     Combine sugar and flour in saucepan.
•     Stir in milk. Cook over medium heat and stir constantly with a whisk until very thick. Remove from heat and pour into your mixing bowl. Cool to room temp (I cover w/ waxed paper).
•     Cut butter into several pieces and add to mixer as it's beating. Add vanilla or Frangelico. Beat at medium-high speed until smooth. It will be scary if you watch to closely, because it will appear to curdle and you'll think it will never get smooth--don't worry! Check for smoothness by tasting--it's the only way to detect butter lumps.
•     This icing is soft, so spread soon after mixing. Cake should be stored in fridge if made in advance, but take it out at least two hours before serving or the icing will be as hard as ... butter. :-)

Balancing Academics with the Rest of Life

This is a question from 2007. It came from Kendra the Amazing of Preschoolers and Peace. She wanted me to do an online interview. I agreed and never got back to her. I'm really bad like that. I do apologize, Kendra, but I'd like to answer this particular question now, if I may.

How do you think moms can better maintain a balance between academic excellence and the nurturing of relationships with their children?  Are they mutually exclusive?

This has been very much on my mind in the past few weeks. When Patrick left suddenly for Florida, we had four days to prepare. Usually, I use high school to get my kids ready for school away from home in college. Academically, we do things like learning to write research papers, taking notes from a lecture, managing time, integrating book work with lecture work. They take classes at the community college and I'm right there at their elbows to ease them into it and teach as we go. And, usually, they have completed what I consider to be an academically rich curriculum before they leave. Also, I have learned that 13 to 14-year-old boys are very very hard to motivate. That school year is not so productive. After Michael, I learned not to freak out about it. They catch up when they figure out that they need it. No big deal.

Except when they figure out they need it four days before shipping off to what's supposed to be the "best school in Florida."

I can't tell you the sleep I missed worrying that our program was not going to fly under these conditions.

Our academic program has always been literature intensive. It's also delight-driven within limits. That is, my kids get choices about what to study within a certain parameter. Every once in awhile, I look at something known for its rigor (like The Well Trained Mind in its entirety or Tapestry of Grace or Robinson) and I think about how much I want that kind of excellence. I love school. I'm a total library person. I would have taken any one of those curricula as a child and absolutely loved it. But it doesn't suit my household.

Remember the priority thing? I'm one parent. There is another. He is brilliant. But he's not the bookish sort. He brings the rest of the world into our home. He orchestrates opportunities to pursue athletic excellence. He drives the late shift home from dance. He works late at night and so he likes to hang out and have a big pajama party on our bed in the morning, keeping everyone from the designated chores and school for the hour. He doesn't hesitate to whisk someone away on an airplane for some adventure, regardless of the lessons planned. And sometimes I {silently} question his wisdom.

I definitely worried about it when Patrick left. Hold that thought.

The other area of balance in our house is that of home management and child care. While, I definitely don't delegate it all out while I sit idly by, I definitely do enlist their help while I work alongside them. I don't think it can all get done any other way. While Patrick may have slacked about school when he was 14, he wasn't given the opportunity to give up kitchen duties and he wasn't allowed to be anything but kind to his younger siblings. His cooperation was to cruical to the family mission. He cooked. He cleaned. He gardened. He loved on babies and he might have even braided blond curls on occasion. Hold that thought.

I ordered Tapestry of Grace just before I left for Florida. Someone had been throwing up all week. Laundry and disinfecting were in high gear but academics were taking a backseat. In hindsight, I think the anxiety of going to Paddy's "perfect school" and meeting all his teachers and hearing how hard he was having to work to keep up made me grasp for the most intense, well laid out, well credentialed curriculum I could find. I wasn't going to get into the position ever again. When I got home, I was going to make sure we were all about reaching the maximum intellectual heights.

I found Patrick happy and well. Every coach, dorm supervisor, and trainer we talked to commented on how extraordinarily well he could handle the stuff of life. They told us how he is a leader among peers, a natural big brother type. When given three hour's notice before flying internationally, he can get his ducks in a row. His shirts are clean and his belts match his shoes. He knows where his equipment is and he knows how to get it all from Point A to Point B. He manages his money just fine; he gives himself and everyone else haircuts; he organized the bus to Church (and routinely brings a bunch of non-Catholics with him). He's homesick and it's obvious, but he has set about making the most of the real life opportunities in front of him.

Then we went to the school. Every single teacher sought us out to comment on how beautifully he's doing. I looked at the curriculum and saw holes all over the place (much to my chagrin). It's a beautiful building and they are good, well meaning people doing the best they can with a really odd situation. If he were home, frankly, it would be a better designed, better tailored program. But he's not home.

And he left home well prepared in the important places.

He knows where home is and he knows he's supported.

So, all the rowdy mornings, all those "daddy trips," all the baby love, the cooking and laundry--all of it has mattered just as much as academics. We had those things covered so well that it didn't matter that he had four days to prepare to leave.

And the academics? Apparently they were good enough to succeed. His geometry teacher wishes he were better at timed tests. I guess they can work on that.

I came home to that rigorous curriculum. I tried my level best to make it work. It doesn't in my house. The housekeeping suffered as I spent hours with my head in the Teacher's Manual and my kids spent too much time at the table. I used way too much ink printing worksheets. I was a crazed taskmaster, trying desperately to keep even one child from falling behind, since we're all supposed to be in the same place. It wasn't pretty. My first hint that it wasn't going to work was when I couldn't fit it into the CM Organizer. The one created by Simply Charlotte Mason? This new plan was anything but simple. Sure, it came with instructions to winnow to fit, but by the time I read it all to know where I wanted to winnow and then winnowed some more to make it appropriate for Catholic children, then added the stories of the heroes of the Church, it was all too complicated for me.

Serendipity works in my house. It's books that inspire us; it's relationships between the people reading the books and the people in the books. There is an emphasis on writing--my children seem to write before they walk. Baskets of books, art supplies in abundance, time to think and to write.  It's who we are. Yes, if there is a lack of balance, it's because we lean towards relationships. The academics happen and they flourish in an atsmosphere of relationships. Maybe that atmosphere makes up for what might be lacking in intellectual rigor. I'm good with that. I really am.