7 Quick Takes February 3, 2012

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We went to one of our weekday churches on Wednesday morning to meet the new pastor.  They were having coffee and donuts after Mass to welcome him, so of course we stayed.  I was just walking up to him to introduce myself when there was a commotion.  It seems Mr 11 yo knocked over Mr 6 yo's full glass of orange juice...all over the wood table and the carpeting.  Well, needless to say, we made quite an impression.  The priest informed me that we were "marked forever".  Lovely!

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This Friday evening marks our monthly evening of recollection with the Miles Christi priests.  A peaceful three hours of rosary, Mass, benediction, adoration, confession, two spiritual talks and ending with...snacks!  We look forward to this night every month.

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Did you realize that it is almost Valentine's Day?  Would you like to get some great smelling soap for your sweetie?  Or maybe you'd like to use some great smelling soap for your sweetie? :)  Go check out our Valentine's Day page at the Goat Milk Soap Shop.  There's still enough time for the soap to arrive before the big day!

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We just got on DVD, and devoured, the first season of Downton Abbey this past week.  The girls and I just love British TV series.  In a way I like being behind the times with a series because then you can sit down and watch a whole bunch of them at once without having to be strung out in suspense.  Right now, however, we have to catch up with season two by watching them on the internet.  This takes a lot longer and we can only watch one a day or my DH gets upset because we ate up the bandwidth.  Season two episode one coming up!

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Ms 19 yo also brought another addiction into the house last week when she brought home the book "Matched" by Ally Condie.  I love one of the reviews on the back:  "If you like a ton of romance with your totalitarian government, this novel is for you!"  While I'm sure I don't like the thought of a totalitarian government, the book was a good read and all four of us enjoyed it enough to run to the library to get the next book in the series, "Crossed".  Can't wait to devour that one!

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The book mentioned above is a lot like "The Hunger Games" so if you liked that book, you will like "Matched", too.  Imho, however, I think "The Hunger Games" is still a better book and we are all very excited for the movie to be coming out next month!

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We have a relatively low key weekend coming up.  We're going to have our family portrait taken on Sunday for our parish directory.  Looking forward to that!  Have a very blessed weekend.

For more Quick Takes, visit the Quick Takes being hosted by Betty Beguiles this week!

 

The Charismatic Movement

I've been reading Mark Mallett's blog posts about the Charismatic movement with interest lately.  I feel that I have an affinity for all things Charismatic.  This becomes difficult, however, when 1. you don't have much access to it and 2. you live with a bunch of people who have no interest in searching it out.

My husband, children and I have had various discussions over the years with the things I like and they don't like about things Charismatic.  I'm sure you can guess what they are because they're all pretty standard:

- Is this even really part of the Catholic church?
- Where is the reverence?
- Where is the silence?
- What's up with that music??

That is why I've been reading Mark's posts with interest.  I'm glad to see the movement explained and given some validity.  While I was reading the posts by Mark, I was struck by his statements that the sacrament of Confirmation should really be as it was during Pentecost:  meaning that we should expect to receive the Holy Spirit and all of His gifts and fruits and charisms just like the apostles did.  He made mention that when his sister and his daughter were Confirmed, they received the gift of tongues.  While I'm not going to debate about that particular gift, it made me think about how we've approached our Confirmation preparation in this household.


By the time the girls were ready to be Confirmed they all had a lot of book knowledge about the sacrament, but I began to think back to how much spiritual preparation they had...or didn't have.  I believe that the lack of spiritual preparation severely limited their reception of what God wanted to give them.  My eldest daughter said she remembered her Confirmation being a powerful and moving event.  The next two girls, due to an unusual set of circumstances, did not have much spiritual preparation.  Consequently neither of them had any powerful memories of their Confirmation.


Likewise, I was brought up in the Church and was Confirmed at the appropriate age, but I was of the generation that picked a Confirmation name because it sounded good with your given name, not because it signified a Saint that you wanted to emulate.  Therefore, I too do not have any great recollection of my Confirmation being a moving experience.  I remember going out for my first prime rib dinner.  Sad, but true...


Our next daughter is going to be Confirmed this year and I'm taking all of this as a wake-up call, an exciting call, to spend a lot more time spiritually preparing her to receive the Holy Spirit instead of just having the book knowledge.  I even believe that if myself and my other daughters prepare along with her, that we might be able to receive some of what we missed; even from the pew.  I am looking forward to really spending time in prayer leading up to this event and am excited about the possibility of a surge of the Holy Spirit within our household.

What are your thoughts on the Charismatic Movement?


Note: I reread what I wrote in this last paragraph and I'd like to clarify that I know we all received the fullness of the sacrament!  And while I know that a sacrament is valid even if you don't "feel" anything, I believe that by being better prepared spiritually the gifts received during that time would have been better manifested in us.  I hope that better clarifies what I was trying to say.

A B See - X is for...

Xanadu.  You have to admit that X is a really hard letter to come up with photo for, so this is the best I can do.  Xanadu means an idyllic, beautiful place.  My first thought was to find a photo of somewhere idyllic and beautiful and just call it Xanadu...instead I did this.

If you have a better idea for an X photo, then click on the image below and put your own up there :)

Bananagrams!

We were reintroduced to this game on New Year's Eve.  I say reintroduced because we used to own a set but we couldn't figure out how to play it!  We tried following the directions a couple of times and whatever we were not doing right made the game incredibly boring, so there it sat on the shelf until I finally gave it away.

Well, once we learned how to play it the right way we just had to go out and purchase it again!  This time, however, we got the double set with 288 tiles so that we can all play.

Depending on how many are playing, each player picks a certain number of tiles and then you all set about building your own crossword puzzle. 

 

 You can move things around whenever you like; you can even destroy your puzzle and start over again!  When you run out of your tiles, you yell "peel" and everyone has to pick one more tile.  This continues until all of the tiles are gone.  The first one to use all of their tiles (and not misspell anything) wins.

 

 

It may not sound like much fun but once you begin playing you won't want to stop!  Even the kids who weren't good spellers and didn't like it at first have come around and are enjoying it as much as the rest of us.  We make sure we have a dictionary handy, too.  It helps if you need to find word ideas or to check the spelling of your opponents words!

 

If you're looking for an educational, fiercely competitive game, I highly recommend Bananagrams!

7 Quick Takes January 27, 2012

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 As much as I dislike looking at this red blob of stuff moving around in a clear tube, I found myself mesmerized by it while we were praying our rosary the other night.  It was a great thing to focus on while trying to meditate on the mysteries...and believe me, I need all the help I can get.

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I can't believe that I am already contemplating things to do during and give up for Lent.  There's that kind of love/hate relationship I have with Lent.  While I can't say I look forward to extra sacrifices, it does give that extra motivation I need to stick with something.  So far we're considering taking on something in the dietary realm which would be quite a challenge for most of us.  It's something called "clean eating".  Even the sound of it makes my skin crawl.

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On the same note - I also found the thought of fresh strawberry paczki's smothered in whip cream running through my mind the other day.

Only 25 more days until I can get one!

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In case you didn't get a chance to see the trailer for our upcoming production of "The Seven Last Words of Christ", you can go here to take a look at it.  Even if you don't live in our area, the pictures are mesmerizing, so it is worth six minutes of your day!  We'd love to spread the word, too, so feel free to share it with others who you think would appreciate good, Catholic theater.

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One of my favorite movies and one of my new favorite songs.  We've been playing this over and over again...it, too, is very captivating!

 

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Doesn't this picture remind you of something out of the 40s (or some earlier time era)?  This is a photo from our Father Daughter Ball a few weeks ago.  I'm finally getting all of the pictures processed and this one just keeps jumping out at me.  Ah, the beauty of innocence.

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I'm contemplating running a series during Lent here on my blog that would be connected with my book "A Plan for Joy in the Home".  I haven't developed it fully yet, but I'd like to take a day a week discussing each of the chapters.  This way, if you have the book, you can work along with me and emerge at Easter time a much more organized person.  Sound good?  I know...that love/hate thing again.  You'd love to be more organized and have a plan for your day, but you hate the thought of working to get that way.  Well, maybe the "pressure" of Lent and some guidance are what you need.  If you'd like to participate, you can go here to get the book in time to begin.  Remember...only 26 more days till Ash Wednesday!

Have a great weekend.

For more Quick Takes, visit Conversion Diary!

The Seven Last Words of Christ - a Trailer...

We just got the finished trailer today and I couldn't wait to show it to y'all.  I know that most of you don't live in the Chicagoland area, but this video is still worth a watch.  The images give you a great sense of the profoundness of this production.

My family is privileged to be a part of this performance.  This year we will have my husband and four of our girls performing and our oldest daughter and oldest son singing in the choir.  It is such an incredible way to meditate on the Passion of Christ that I wish all of you could see it.  For now, however, you'll just have to be content with watching this video:)

If perchance you do live in the area, drop me a comment...I'd be happy to tell you when the three performances will be and get you tickets, too.

If you like what you see and you'd like to help support these performances you can make a donation here.

Two Powerful Days

I have to say that I rather enjoyed the split between the actual Roe v Wade day on the 22nd and the day that everything took place on the 23rd.  Since Ms 16 yo's birthday is the 22nd, we usually spend our time split between celebrating and praying.  Many times we're having dinner, shoving cake in, ripping through cards and gifts and then running out the door to a prayer service.

This year, however, was so nice and peaceful.  We had the opportunity to focus on her birthday on Sunday and then on Monday were really able to devote time to praying for LIFE.

Two of our daughters were in Washington over the weekend, so we attempted to watch EWTN's coverage of the March on the computer.  Unfortunately the picture quality was poor and our feed was slow.  There would be about 5 seconds of talking for every 10 seconds of silence.  Very frustrating when you are trying to concentrate on all of the great speakers they had.  Needless to say we didn't see anyone...or at least we couldn't determine if the blobs we were looking at were anyone recognizable.

Then on Monday evening we went to our parish for a very beautiful holy hour.  The lights were dimmed, candles and incense were burning, Our Lord was on the altar and we prayed the Evening Prayers of the Liturgy of the Hours.  It was very moving.  After that they showed the film "Blood Money".  I had not seen it before and I must say that it is a very powerful movie.  I am glad that the little kids bailed out early and went to play in the narthex.  While there wasn't anything visually graphic, the discussions were very forthright and incredibly disturbing.  I can't imagine how anyone who would see this movie could still support abortion afterwards.

So now I await the coming home of my pilgrims and I have a feeling that we've all just been reinvigorated in our desire to fight for LIFE!  I pray that the entire country has, too.