It's late. I'm tired. We will be on our way back to the competition by the time this posts in the morning. Karoline dances her solo first thing.Prayers are much appreciated.
So, before we close our eyes tonight, we're uploading this one is for Katie's daddy, whom we really, really miss. She sure danced with her whole heart.
::noticing God's glory
We are at the beach this week, noticing flowers that look like great peppermint candies, and magnificent sunsets over the bay, and horseshoe crabs that are "stuck together."
::listening to
Ann Voskamp's blog. Did you read her note to Kate, Duchess of Cambridge? I wandered over there to read it and decided to hang out in the neighborhood and enjoy the music?
::clothing myself in
PJs. It's actually fairly early Monday evening, but we've been going and going and going all day and we have to be up and out the door tomorrow at 6:45 to start a new day of dance.
::talking with my children about these books
I only packed two books for bedtime read-alouds this week. Karoline is determined we will read every story in The Complete Tales of Beatrix Potter and Katie is happily choosing at least a story a night from the Random House Book of Humor for Children.
::thinking and thinking
about the value of homemaking. It really does amaze me that an art so vital to the health and welfare of every one of us is given so little thought. We do a deplorable job of training young women to makes homes. Instead, they come of age in a state of cultural confusion over the value of such things as cooking, cleaning, or even the thoughtful rearing of children. And it shows. I wonder if we aren't a generation or two away from "home" being a quaint concept one reads about in old stories.
::pondering prayerfully
"When your ordinary work or business is not specially engrossing, let your heart be fixed more on God than on it; and if the work be such as to require your undivided attention, then pause from time to time and look to God, even as navigators who make for the haven they would attain, by looking up at the heavens rather than down upon the deeps on which they sail. So doing, God will work with you, in you, and for you, and your work will be blessed. " ~St. Francis de Sales
::carefully cultivating rhythm
There's that careful balance of relaxed vacation time and competition time and just plain eating/sleeping/living time. I'm trying to maintain some rhythm while still getting the girls to the stage on time for a week's worth of dance performances. We're squeezing in every minute of outside time we can!
::creating by hand
I planned to bring some knitting along, but I think I left the bag at home in my sewing room. I did bring a wee bit of embroidery. I have plans for an embroidered headband...
::learning lessons in
traveling without my big boys. So strange to be here without my veteran travelers! I miss them terribly. And I am reminding myself all the time to soak up the wonder that is these six still left at home. Such a different rhythm when the majority is female.
::encouraging learning
Ah, those podcasts. What a great little conference I designed for myself:-)
Several of you asked for links to good listening. Lately, I've been listening to Andrew Pudewa:
Teaching Boys & Other Children Who Would Rather Make Forts All Day
Nurturing Competent Communicators
Fairytales and the Moral Imagination
::begging prayers
Recently, three people very close to me have confronted a cancer diagnosis. I've told you a little about Shawn. And my friend Carmen is recovering from a double mastectomy. The third one I'm holding very close for now.. Please, please pray for all!
::living the liturgy
The end of the July truly is the liturgical celebration of homemakers. This year, we began with the gospel story of Martha and Mary. Then we shall celebrate the feast of St. Anne on July 26 and the Feast of St. Martha on July 29. Lots of notes on those here in this post (along with some wonderful St. Francis de Sales wisdom). Sarah Annie is very happily looking forward to her name day celebration!
::keeping house
This week, we are sharing a condo with another family. Housekeeping is so different at the beach. It's always fun to play house in a new neighborhood! Still, I really need to do laundry tomorrow.
::crafting in the kitchen
I brought my blender, so smoothies are still happening every day. I cooked ahead last week and brought most of our main dishes out here frozen. And we stopped at a produce stand on the way to the shore and stocked up so that we have plenty of fresh fruits and veggies. Well, plenty enough to get to Wednesday, at least. After that, we may be a little on the less green side because fresh fruits and veggies at the grocery store here are outrageously overpriced.
::loving the moments
when she swims to me!
::giving thanks
for safe travels.
::planning for the week ahead
Swim, sun, dance, eat, sleep. Repeat.
The internet is a formidable force for bringing the comfort and consolation and hope of the Lord to all of us. It can be an incredibily powerful medium for community. There is an unfathomable resource for prayer here. We have on the 'net the privilege of praying for people and of being witness to the miracles brought forth when fervent, faith-filled people pray for one another.
Let's be that community of hope and faith for one another.
How about this idea? What if I pop in here every weekend, share Sunday's gospel and talk a wee bit about how we can live it and pray it in our homes? And then you tell me how we can pray for you that week? Deal?
{And please, do return and let us know how prayer is bearing fruit.}
Jesus entered a village
where a woman whose name was Martha welcomed him.
She had a sister named Mary
who sat beside the Lord at his feet listening to him speak.
Martha, burdened with much serving, came to him and said,
“Lord, do you not care
that my sister has left me by myself to do the serving?
Tell her to help me.”
The Lord said to her in reply,
“Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things.
There is need of only one thing.
Mary has chosen the better part
and it will not be taken from her.”
Think
Therefore, my daughter, be careful and diligent in all your affairs; God, Who commits them to you, wills you to give them your best attention; but strive not to be anxious and solicitous, that is to say, do not set about your work with restlessness and excitement, and do not give way to bustle and eagerness in what you do;--every form of excitement affects both judgment and reason, and hinders a right performance of the very thing which excites us.
Our Lord, rebuking Martha, said, "Thou art careful and troubled about many things." If she had been simply careful, she would not have been troubled, but giving way to disquiet and anxiety, she grew eager and troubled, and for that our Lord reproved her. The rivers which flow gently through our plains bear barges of rich merchandise, and the gracious rains which fall softly on the land fertilise it to bear the fruits of the earth;--but when the rivers swell into torrents, they hinder commerce and devastate the country, and violent storms and tempests do the like.
~St. Francis de Sales
Pray
Please Lord, let me approach my daily round from a place of rest in you. Help me to be a diligent good steward while leaning upon you for grace and strength in all things.
Act
More from St. Francis de Sales:
Accept the duties which come upon you quietly, and try to fulfil them methodically, one after another. If you attempt to do everything at once, or with confusion, you will only cumber yourself with your own exertions, and by dint of perplexing your mind you will probably be overwhelmed and accomplish nothing.
In all your affairs lean solely on God's Providence, by means of which alone your plans can succeed. Meanwhile, on your part work on in quiet co-operation with Him, and then rest satisfied that if you have trusted entirely to Him you will always obtain such a measure of success as is most profitable for you, whether it seems so or not to your own individual judgment.
Imitate a little child, whom one sees holding tight with one hand to its father, while with the other it gathers strawberries or blackberries from the wayside hedge. Even so, while you gather and use this world's goods with one hand, always let the other be fast in your Heavenly Father's Hand, and look round from time to time to make sure that He is satisfied with what you are doing, at home or abroad. Beware of letting go, under the idea of making or receiving more--if He forsakes you, you will fall to the ground at the first step.
Blessed the husband of a good wife,
twice-lengthened are his days;
A worthy wife brings joy to her husband,
peaceful and full is his life.
A good wife is a generous gift
bestowed upon him who fears the LORD;
Be he rich or poor, his heart is content,
and a smile is ever on his face.
A gracious wife delights her husband,
her thoughtfulness puts flesh on his bones;
A gift from the LORD is her governed speech,
and her firm virtue is of surpassing worth.
Choicest of blessings is a modest wife,
priceless her chaste soul.
A holy and decent woman adds grace upon grace;
indeed, no price is worthy of her temperate soul.
Like the sun rising in the LORD's heavens,
the beauty of a virtuous wife in her well-ordered home.
-from the Book of Sirach
A Homemaker's Prayer
May I have the strength and the will to do the humble tasks, that make a house a fit abode for my loved ones. Clean floors, shining china, dainty curtains, clean sheets, good food, a cheery fire-may my willing hands make these things possible.
But Father, let me remember that man does not live by bread alone, that material things but make a proper setting for life's real treasures of mind and spirit. Give me patience and understanding and kindness and humor and love in abundance, and charity for all. May the spirit of happiness, of joys and sorrows shared, of unity, of the peace that passeth understanding linger here! Help me to keep the path to Thee open and easy to find for the little ones in my keeping. And let there be laughter here.
And last, dear Lord, help me to remember the stranger without the door. May there be warmth enough on our hearth to share with him.
Is this too much for one so weak, so full of faults as I, to ask? At least it can be a goal toward which to strive, and to Thee all things are possible. Amen
-Mrs. Howard Peet
Prayer to St. Anne for Homemakers
Dear St. Anne, we know nothing about you except your name. But you gave us the Mother of God who called herself handmaid of the Lord. In your home you raised the Queen of Heaven and are rightly the model of homemakers. In your womb came to dwell the new Eve uniquely conceived without sin. Intercede for us that we too may remain free from sin. Amen.
More Links to inspire your homemaking:
On Being Intentional and Making Lists
Why Bother with Cleaning? (But then, be sure to read this one and this one, too;-)
Homemaking Companion Notebook (with lots of forms to use, if you like)
More Home Management Notebook Links
Simplicity Parenting. A very thoughtful parenting book. It's not Catholic, but it's just good, plain common sense. Combine it with Lifeline, for a simple parenting library. Very simple;-).
CrazyBusy, Overstretched, Overbooked and About to Snap! This is lifestyle simplification for adults.
Simplifying Your Domestic Church a beautiful, thoroughly Catholic guide to bringing simplification principles to your environment.
Keep it Simple: The Busy Catholic's guide to growing closer to God. This is simplicity for your prayer life.
A Homemaking Library:
In the sewing world, we're still kind of crazy about headbands. I told Katie that I'm fairly certain that every female who has come through our door this week has left with a headband. And all my girls have at least two each. The headbands have inspired me to clean out my scrap basket. I had saved pretty much every scrap since I started sewing a couple years ago. Now, the only pieces in the box are pieces large enough to use for a headband or some other such project. I recognize that my days of piecing quilts from tiny scraps are too many years away to justify the mess those scraps make in my scrap basket.
Speaking of the tidying baskets, not much reading is happening here these days. I have been cleaning and organizing like crazy this week and listening instead of reading. Several of you asked for links to good listening. Lately, I've been listening to Andrew Pudewa:
Teaching Boys & Other Children Who Would Rather Make Forts All Day
Nurturing Competent Communicators
Fairytales and the Moral Imagination
I admit to crying not far into that last one. I'm a big fan of fairytales. Suggesting them to homeschoolers has not always been a happily-ever-after experience for me. It was nice to be among friends.
All of these talks have been excellent. I don't think I've learned anything new, philosophically speaking. I'm not going to drastically change the way we do things around here. Instead, there has been a sense of kinship. Here are folks who speak my language (far better than I speak it). These methods work. They do. And they are sound and they are faithful.
I pulled out my copy of Tending the Heart of Virtue to re-read. Amazon tells me I purchased it in 2008. I remember buying it at the recommendation of Katherine, shortly after the first online firestorm of protestations against the way I was educating my children. After the second firestorm, three years ago, I stepped away from homeschool groups--both online and any place else. It's hard enough to raise a family that is in the world but not of the world of the secular culture. Why heap onto that feeling like a pariah in homeschool circles, too? There's no upside. Homeschoolers have so many hot buttons; seems pretty easy to set off an alarm every other day.
I'm not interested in dissent.
But here's the curious thing. After three years away from all those "support" groups, I have a deeply rooted sense of confidence in what is happening in my home. It doesn't come from someone else's affirmation--not even Andrew Pudewa's affirmation. It comes from looking back on how I've spent the last 25 years and knowing that I gave my best to God. I made mistakes every single day. I still make mistakes every single day. But I sought His will and I answered His call as best I could.
One of my favorite phrases when sharing with other homeschooling moms is "In our family..." It's the ultimate caveat perhaps. This is what works in our family, with our children, and our husband and father. Your mileage my a vary. God may have put you in another vehicle altogether.
I love to talk with young moms about home education. I love to share what I've learned along the way and I love to hear the enthusiasm and utter joy in their voices. Young moms have an idealism that reminds me of newly wed idealism. You know, when you look back and wonder at the miracle of how you dared to marry someone and make a whole new family? How did you get so brave? You need that same courage and idealism to embark upon home education. I love to watch and listen to it. It is such a gift.
Two of my dearest, closest, and most forever friends aren't going to homeschool in the coming year. These were my two phone calls or visits for the quick "I hardly have to say it and she already gets it." Women who have held my hand--literally--in some of the scariest places I've ever been. Last night had me wondering at the aloneness of it all. Endeavoring to educate one's children in your own home, taking on that entire challenge for nine kids over twelve years each? That's a formidable task.
We all need kindhearted, holy support. Let's be that to one another.
What are you sewing, reading. Heck, what are you cleaning and organizing? How are you preparing for the next season? What makes you happy? About what are you excited? It's a free-for-all. Just talk.
::noticing God's glory
This is how amazing the pond in front of our library looks right now.
::listening to
Three boys discussing last night's All Star game. One of our dance teacher's sons spent the night last night. It's so fun to have a "little boy" in the house! And this one is quite the charmer.
::clothing myself in
not my contacts:-(. I went a long time between eye doctor appointments. I don't recommend doing this, particularly if this long time period includes being pregnant, weaning, and being not pregnant/not nursing for the first time in two decades. When you stop being pregnant and nursing, your eyes change shape, ladies! My contacts have now warped my corneas. We're hoping a long break from contacts will fix this. Since I don't have a right ear, I kind of love my contacts. It's a tricky thing to keep glasses balanced.
::talking with my children about these books
The One Thing is Three: How the Most Holy Trinity Explains Everything I am really enjoying this one. Fr. Gaitley just speaks a language I understand, I think.
::thinking and thinking
about the coming school year. And I'm scouring my bookshelves and moving things from one basket to another, ensuring that each child will have a rich banquet spread for him or her--all without buying anything. We have everything we need right here or at the library pictured above (isn't it lovely?). This is the year of the no-purchase curriculum.
::pondering prayerfully
Screwtape explains: Our business is to get them away from the eternal and from the Present. With this in view, we sometimes tempt a human (say a widow or a scholar) to live in the Past. But this is of limited value, for they have some real knowledge of the past and it has a determinate nature and, to that extent, resembles eternity. It is far better to make them live in the Future....In a word, the Future is, of all things, the thing least like eternity. It is the most completely temporal part of time--for the Past is frozen and no longer flows, and the Present is all lit up with eternal rays... ~C.S. Lewis
::carefully cultivating rhythm
The Screen Rules are doing good things for rhythm around here. I've enjoyed the conversation in the combox, too. Even the naysayers have been interesting to me. (By the way, why are the naysayers on my blog in the summer almost always 20-something?)
I'm relishing this week, our summer finally feels like summer. We've had a revolving door of friends and FINALLY enough sunshine and heat to hang out at the pool. Next week, it will all be different, but for now, I'm happy to have this golden time.
.
::creating by hand
We're still rocking those headbands. Every girl who walks through the door these days leaves with a handmade headband.
::learning lessons in
flexibility.
and in the value of homemaking.
::encouraging learning
Have you read this? Please do. So, so good.
Also, I'm tutoring a young man who is playing professional soccer. Much of our work is done via Google Docs and Skype. I'm on the lookout for ways for him to use the computer to work on schoolish things and for me to check in from afar. We're working at the middle school level, academically. Suggestions out there?
::begging prayers
In the last three weeks, three people very close to me have confronted a cancer diagnosis. I've told you a little about Shawn. There's a longer, detailed update by Shawn himself on my Facebook page. And my friend Carmen is recovering from a double mastectomy. The third one I'm holding very close for now.. Please, please pray for all!
::living the Liturgy
Today is the day to begin the St. Anne novena in order to finish it on her feast day. This novena is so, so special to us. I love this feast! Here are some thoughts and ideas for preparing to celebrate.
::keeping house
I had three hours alone yesterday. I used it to clean and to listen to homeschool talks on mp3. It was so incredibly therapeutic I can't begin to express its value. But I intend to figure out a way to replicate the experience again soon. And again. And again.
.
::crafting in the kitchen
I'm doing a lot of cooking ahead this week, prepping meals for our time away at a dance competition next week. I can't afford to eat out on the road, either financially or physically. Who has great ideas for things to make ahead and eat in a beach house?
::loving the moments
when the whole house is clean at the same time. Can that happen again? Please?
::giving thanks
for a peaceful, productive week.
::planning for the week ahead
Lots of dance rehearsals this week and lots of little people coming to visit while their moms teach. We're having fun with them! Patrick has a playoff game in Richmond again this weekend. And we have a road trip to take to the beach for competition. Last weekend, we vistied Richmond and then went on to Charlottesville to hang out with Paddy for awhile.
I'm Elizabeth. I'm a happy wife and the mother of nine children. I grab grace with both hands and write to encourage myself and others to seize and nurture the joy of every day. I blog here with my daughter, Mary Beth, a wholehearted young lady on the brink of adulthood.
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