Three Plus Two

Which Early Church Father are you?

Bit of nerdy fun this morning ...

 

You’re St. Melito of Sardis! You have a great love of history and liturgy. You’re attached to the traditions of the ancients, yet you recognize that the old world — great as it was — is passing away. You are loyal to the customs of your family, though you do not hesitate to call family members to account for their sins. Find out which Church Father you are at The Way of the Fathers!

(HT: What Does the Prayer Really Say?)

The Feast of All Saints... Belatedly

So what did we do yesterday, on All Saints Day?

We made Spoon Saints! 

First we had to lay down some rules.

1.  No making up your own saints.

2.  No alien saints.

Then we got to work.

Farmerboy and I made Mary, St. Nicholas, and St. Patrick.

I made St. Angela Merici.  She's the patroness of teachers of young children, and my name saint. 

Gareth made St. Patrick, St. Therese, and St. Dominic.  He dressed as St. Dominic for our All Saints Day party, which was held on Saturday at the shrine of Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha.

This is Katydid's first batch of saints -- St. Therese, St. Barabara, St. Lucy (she's supposed to have a wreath of candles on her head), and St. Catherine of Siena.  (Katydid dressed as St. Catherine for our All Saints Day party.  But I don't have any pictures, because my batteries died.)

After the kids were done making saints, Farmerboy took his into the learning room to play with them.  We discovered the saints in pitched battle, calling each other names.

"Saints do not call people dinghead!" said Gareth.

"No," I said, "I'm pretty sure Mary would never call anyone a dinghead."

Farmerboy looked down at the saints in his hands.  "Yeah, well, St. Patrick would," he said.

A week of feast days

Elizabeth posted a link to this post about the upcoming "Days of Grace."   My education as a Catholic has been mostly lacking in information about saints' days and the liturgical calendar in general, so it has made me very happy this year to learn more.

I was particularly pleased to learn that October 2 is the Feast of Guardian Angels.  When I was pregnant with the babies, I would say the Angel of God three times every night: once for Pip, once for Pop, and once for me.  It was such a stressful time, and I was very worried that all of this stress would result in premature labor.  So I leaned a lot on our guardian angels.

The babies' birthday is coming up.  It's October 3, the day after the Feast of Guardian Angels.  In spite of being born a month early and weighing in at only about five and a half pounds each, the babies were so healthy that they spent not one moment in the NICU and came home when I did. 

I used to feel funny talking about answers to prayers, but the babies have taught me a lot in that regard.

A Day of Sacraments

Yesterday must have been a good day to receive the sacraments.  Gareth made his First Communion... and the babies were baptized... (They were mad they couldn't crawl around and someone who shall not be named {ahem - not me} forgot their bottles so they were hungry... and Father had a hard time keeping them straight, but both of them were eventually baptized.)

And so were Mary Ellen's babies!

Later we had cake...

which Katydid and Farmerboy helped bake...

(That's Grandma sneaking them frosting.)

I would like to include a family photo, but the one we have shows a three year old who'd just been crying that he wanted to go home, one very hot and disheveled looking baby, one screaming baby trying to climb over my shoulder, and a bored looking First Communicant.  (Katydid, however, is beaming.  But then Katydid tells me that she wants to be a saint.  And a zoologist.)  So I think we'll just leave that one to laugh over at home.  It's a good thing that God doesn't require all our special occasions to be perfect!   

Catholic Homeschooling Blogs!

Catholic Homeschooling in Hawaii has started a new Catholic Homeschooling Blog Directory, organized by state!

HT: Danielle Bean

So, what are you doing for Lent?

Pop rolled over for the first time today.   He had supposedly accomplished this feat on Saturday when I was in the shower (of course), but that afternoon Katydid confessed that she may have just nudged him, well, a tiny bit.

Pip, on the other hand, is still shrieking like a pteradactyl if anyone so much as lays a finger on his neck.  Therapy is not progressing rapidly.  But he has a sweet smile to make up for it.

The two day trip did not go as badly as I'd feared, although I have to confess that my Lenten resolve did not hold up to the Applebee's serendipitously located right across the street from our hotel.  Hallelujah, Carside to Go!  It's been 6 months since we've eaten anything other than McDonald's that I wasn't forced to slap together myself with babies wailing in the background.  (Microwaved hot dogs and grapes anyone?  No?  Microwaved cheese quesadillas and, er, cheetos then?)  I had buttermilk shrimp and only felt slightly guilty about it.  I had been determined to live the spirit of Lent this Lent, instead of trying on the half-hearted "it's Friday so today we eat fish" version I have known so well in the past.  But eating Applebee's in the hotel room after a long day of traveling was at least sustaining.

Mostly what Lent has prompted in me this year is the realization of how little I really know about what it is to be a Catholic -- or to live like one.  I'm a cradle Catholic.  I went to Catholic school, as far as I could -- sixth grade in the small Tennessee town where I grew up.  In school we went to Mass every day and filled out religion workbooks.  At home we had a few crucifixes on the wall.  We went to church on Sunday, and Midnight Mass at Christmas.  My father, who was (and is, I suppose) agnostic never stood in the way of my mother transmitting her religion to us.  But somehow the religion wasn't transmitted very well, and I nearly abandoned it for a long while.  Then I had kid #1 and had to ask myself, what is it that I really believe?  What do I want to teach my child?

I guess that's a familiar story.

My journey back to the church of my childhood has been slow and complicated.  I felt like I was doing better for a while -- at least I was reading the Bible to my kids and trying to share my beliefs, and my husband (who was going through a similar process) was attempting to share his own discoveries -- but then Katydid began to display a disturbing level of theological insight.

In other words, she started asking me questions I couldn't answer.  Like, "If Jesus said to love our enemies, does that mean we're supposed to love Satan, too?  Because he's our enemy."

Try answering that one while rocking two screaming babies on your lap.

So now here I am.  It's Lent and I have a disturbing habit of sneaking chocolate cheesecake.  But at least I have a better idea now of where I need to start.

And that would be at the very beginning.

Traveling for Lent

Our big trip begins bright and early tomorrow morning.  Mapquest says that it should take 16 hours to drive from here to my parents' house in Tennessee.  Then, of course, you have to add a couple more for the twin and toddler allowance.  Then maybe a little more time for the girl who never has to go to the bathroom when it's convenient.

I would prefer not to have to leave on Ash Wednesday.  I told my husband -- my husband the Quaker who grew up in a not-really-anything-except-decidedly-Protestant household -- that we would have no cookies in the van tomorrow.  He got this deer in the headlights look.  "No cookies??  But what will we eat?"

Me: "Technically, we're not supposed to eat anything.  We're supposed to fast."

Him: "Until sundown?  Not eat anything all day?"

Me: "Technically.  But now you're allowed two small meals.  So I guess it's not really a true fast.  And if you're under 14 you're exempt."

Him: "And if you're not Catholic."

Me: "Yeah, well..."

Him: "So that means I get to eat whatever I want, right?"

I'll be looking for that secret cookie stash in the van tomorrow morning.