A Manuscript Unpublished

We are each a manuscript unpublished

A story to be told
A life to behold
A mystery to unfold
The discretion ours alone

Throwback Thursday - Friends Again

It is entirely fitting that as I write this, I am basking in the joy of a great visit from some homeschool friends. I can't help but be grateful for the way my life has changed since I wrote this post six years ago. At that time Jeff and I felt so isolated, so far out in the country and with such small babies.  We really were much more restricted in those days when it came to how often we could get out to see people, and we had very few people who were really willing to invest time and energy into visiting us on anywhere near of a regular basis.

The Grand and the Grandeur

This year, as we have often done in years past, we took our kids to the Easter Vigil. It didn't come without much back and forth though.  It's long, it's late, the kids are WI-RED at that hour of night.  My three-year-old is in a particularly difficult stage of development where he screams like Gollum from Lord of the Rings at the mere thought of the word, "No."  We knew it would be good for them to go, but we weren't sure if it would be good for us.  In the end however, we did decide to go. And I'm so glad that we did.

Who are you in the Crucifixion narrative?

Yesterday evening, Good Friday, we watched The Passion of the Christ with some friends.  In keeping with the solemnity of the day, we concluded our evening in silence.  Silence is wonderful for what it does to the soul.  It gets us past those creature comforts and instant gratification, and turns us inward, to ourselves.  As hard as it was to deny the urge to talk to everyone about their thoughts on the movie, it was good because it forced me to consider what I really thought for myself.

Throwback Thursday - A Better Mother

Reading this week's throwback post was funny to me, because as I started delving into these things I realized what a luxury it was back then to have a babysitter I could drop older kids off to once a week.  It just seemed like a normal thing at the time (so much so that I wrote about it in every post!) and yet, not something that would last.  Finding a babysitter was such a heartwrenching experience, but the Lord provided someone right within our parish who was a Godsend, and continues to be a good friend, many years since we've stopped needing her babysitting services.

Ugly Love

We're finally on the mend from a stomach bug that took over a week to go through our house.  I called it "The Noah's Ark" bug, because it took us out two-by-two.  I know that stomach flus may not be everyone's idea of a great post (get over it already, I hear people telling me!) but when you have kids it can be quite harrowing.  Just ask Simcha Fisher, who says in one of my favorite posts:

Kids Art - Eric Carl

In honor of the beautiful springy weather, I wanted to post some sunny pictures the kids made in Art with our  homeschool co-op.  It follows the style of Eric Carl, and each picture needed to have a sun.

Happy spring!

Throwback Thursday - If You Can't Laugh At Yourself, You'll Go Crazy

Two things strike me about this post - 1) the timing couldn't be better, since our two littlest have been battling a stomach bug, and last night ended up being just one such night as I describe in my earlier post.  And 2) I was much more crude in my speech back then!  Maybe it was because it was just Facebook and not on the whole Internet (which of course Facebook is, but it's locked to anyone except my friends, giving me more security, false though it may be!)  Or maybe it was because I was in the throws of parenting three children ages three and under that left me a little rough around the edges.  Be that as it may, here are my undoctored (and uncensored) words from 2008.  Brace yourself! (it's really not that bad.)

Throwback Thursday - Music to my Ears

Music has been a big part of my life.  Growing up our house was always filled with music, and both sides of my family are gifted musicians.  My mother is from Newfoundland and my Dad is from Chatham, New Brunswick, and we were always surrounded with the flavor of both of those cultures.  When I became connected with a group of young people from the Queen of Peace Charismatic Prayer Group, I was engulfed in a new kind of music called Praise and Worship, that spoke to my heart a language I knew well. Through the gift of music Jesus romanced me and called me into deeper relationship with Him, and it continues to be one of the most powerful things for me.  Here is an early post about finding my musical footing in a house full of babies.