Just for Fun
In this video he is crawling towards me, but the other afternoon he actually “ran” away from me, giggling the whole time, when I went to try and take one of his older brothers toys away from him. The little stinker!
Back-to-School :: 2012-2013
Today was the first day of our new school year! Despite my efforts to keep our extra activities to a minimum this week, it just wasn’t meant to be… Today we ended up with one last Dentist Appointment for Captain, tomorrow morning Captain and Twinkle Toes will be getting their braces put on, Friday the boy’s will be serving a special Mass in honor of Our Lady, and Saturday (on Our Lady’s Birthday!) we are finally having our Mother/Daughter Tea Party – which I will be hosting at our home! I was a little overwhelmed last night thinking about it all, but I’m trying to focus on one thing at a time,and praying that it all falls into place… Sure enough, our first day went as well as could be expected (for a first day), and we are all very excited about the new year!
Dear Mother Mary, in your motherhood of Christ you have become Mother to us all. Praise God for this great gift to us! Today I place all my children again under your mantle of loving care. Please protect and watch over them with your motherly compassion. Bless their spirits, that they may come to know, love and serve the Lord. Guard their minds to be ever pure and focused on the true, the good, and the beautiful.
Finally, dear Mother, please help me also to be a good wife to my husband and a good mother to our children. Please supply where we may be lacking, and protect our children from all evil. Amen.
Inspiration for the New School Year
May the most just, most high, and most adorable will of God
be in all things done, praised and magnified forever.
Happy 9th Birthday, Twinkle Toes!
A Camping Themed Birthday Cake
{pretty, happy, funny, real}
{pretty}
I purchased a few new things from the Sunflower Smiles collection for the girls “back-to-school” pictures, with my Gymbucks last month. Chiquita will be getting this dress, but I gave her the headband early, to wear on Sunday, since it matched Twinkle Toes old sweater so nicely.
Watching the seagulls fly around the parking lot. So captivating, those seagulls!
Our sweet little Rose…
Hubby mentioned that the lyrics from this Sound of Music song fit her so well, especially the other morning during Mass. She can be such a stinker!
“Unpredictable as weather…”
*Twinkle Toes’ veil can be found here (Modesty Veils website no longer active), and here is the link to Amy’s free pattern for the veil Rose is wearing, which she gave to my girls.
Let’s Travel Back to the World of the Vikings!
What the Boys Read:
Who Were The Vikings
Vikings: Dress, Eat, Write and Play Like the Vikings
Leif the Lucky
Viking Raiders
Viking Ships At Sunrise
Our Family Read Alouds:
Founders of Freedom
Twelve Bright Trumpets
Son of Charlemagne
Beorn the Proud (Living History Library)
Added to Timeline:
800 – Charlemagne is crowned Holy Roman Emperor by Pope St. Leo III
861 – Norsemen discover Iceland
903-935 – St. Wenceslaus, martyr and patron of Bohemia
962 – Pope John XII crowns Otto I the Holy Roman Emperor
c. 1000 – Leif Ericsson discovers North America
Crafts:
Make Viking Ship from Crayola
Worksheets and Coloring Pages:
Viking Worksheet (for my younger students)
Color Viking Warrior in Dover Coloring Book Knights And Armor
Other Reources:
BBC – Vikings
Nova Online
After studying the Vikings, Captain added the Playmobil Viking Longboat
My Daybook: August 29, 2012
Outside my window…
it has been chilly, though not as cool as it was over at the coast this past Sunday, with a high of 55. We were very glad we had checked the forecast and wore sweaters. Here in the valley it has been around 80 during the day and dropping to the 40s at night. It’s definitely starting to feel like autumn.
I am thinking…
about my kid’s teeth. I took the four oldest in for Orthodontic evaluations last week and both Captain and Twinkle Toes are in need of braces now. Twinkle Toes is the most urgent, and if she has braces, in two phases – beginning right now for a year and then again in a few years – we should be able make room for the teeth that have nowhere to come in, and avoid pulling permanent teeth and oral surgery in the long run. We then found out, yesterday morning when I took them to the Dentist for Cleanings and Exams, that they both need quite a bit of Dental Work before the braces go (Captain needs four fillings to correct defects in four of his molars, and Twinkle Toes needs quite a few sealants.) They also had the impressions made at the Orthodontist yesterday morning. If everything falls into place, their braces are scheduled to go on next Wednesday!
I am thankful…
that the Dentist and Orthodontist are both willing to work with us and allow us to make small interest free payments each month, with larger payments at tax time. Still, we are really nervous about the cost. It isn’t exactly in our budget… I’m also thankful that the only cavities that were found, happened to be on Rascal’s last couple baby teeth, and those should be falling out sometime this year!
Learning all the time…
Yep… It is definitely time for our family to seriously consider any options we might have for Dental Insurance.
Celebrating the liturgical year…
today is the feast of the Martyrdom of St. John the Baptist. We don’t usually do much to celebrate this feast in our home, since we have a birthday tomorrow, but we will read a short story at dinner time as usual. Still, there are so many cute ideas from some of the other contributors over at Catholic Cuisine… One of these years I really need to try a few of them!
From the kitchen…
Gluten-free Carrot Cake made with Spice Cake Mix. Yum!!!
I am creating…
plans for our Little Flower’s Mother/Daughter Tea. Since we meet through the summer to complete Wreath IV, we decided to have our tea on September 8th, our Blessed Mother’s Birthday!
I am working on…
being creative with our budget and looking for areas we can cut back.
I am going…
to try really hard to limit our trips to town to save on gas. This means that the boys won’t be able to play hockey this year, but they are very excited about taking a Lego Robotics class instead, which will be just once a week and only 5 minutes from home.
I am hoping…
that we are able to enjoy our sunflowers for at least a little while before it starts getting too cold. It’s taken them all spring and summer to finally bloom.
I am reading…
about one of my little brothers! There was quite the article in the paper this past weekend about him, and one of my neighbors dropped it off for us to read. If you’d like to check it out you can do so here: Different Strokes
I am praying…
for a special intention.
Pondering these words…
from St. Rose of Lima, whose traditional feast day is tomorrow:
I am listening…
to Liberty Kids. The kids are watching an episode in the living room. We recently cancelled our Netflix subscription, but thankfully we do have the whole collection on DVD.
Around the house…
Bud sure loves to crawl and explore. His latest favorite thing to do is pull books off of the bookshelves. I’m thinking he got the idea from his godsister – that little Cupcake Cutie, who is going to turn one already this weekend!
Gymboree’s beautiful sweaters for my girls! I’m trying to decide between the Gem Button Cable Sweater or the Butterfly Button Diamond Knit Sweater to give Twinkle Toes for her birthday. (They are on sale right now, plus I have an extra 25% off coupon!) Poor girl, she usually ends up getting mostly “back-to-school” clothes and new books on her birthday each year! Not that she minds… 😉
This week’s plans…
- Dentist Appointments & Orthodontist Appointments Tuesday Morning
- End-of-Summer Ice Cream Social and Park Day Tuesday Afternoon
- Mom’s Night Out Tuesday Night
- Celebrate Twinkle Toes’ 9th Birthday on Thursday
- Friday morning Mass
- Older boys attending a friend Birthday Party Friday night
- Saturday Morning Grower’s Market
- Sunday Mass
- Hubby has an extra long weekend for Labor Day!!!
A little peek at my day…
A Sunday Drive
Our family loves the Latin Mass. The only problem is, it is rather hard to come by where we live. In fact, we usually have to have a baby in order to get a Latin Mass around here! (ie: My brother-in-laws’ fly out to baptize the new little one, offering Mass while they are in town.) The closest parishes that offer the Latin Mass (or rather, Extraordinary Form) are 3 hours north and 5 hours south, with a couple mountain passes to cross each direction. As much as my husband would love to move, it just doesn’t seem to be in God’s plan for our family at this time.
Recently we found out that there is a priest about 2 1/2 hours away, in another state and diocese, that is now offering a Latin Mass every Sunday! The only problem is that it begins at 8 a.m. Rather early, when you have that far to drive with an over full van load of kiddos and a baby that doesn’t sleep through the night. We discussed making the drive again this past Saturday, but I just said I don’t know how it could even be possible, without going over the night before, so we didn’t even bother to prepare or set the alarm… However, amazingly, the baby woke us up at 4:25 yesterday morning, Rascal was already awake as well, Hubby felt abnormally rested, and we decided to give it a shot. We woke the rest of the kids up, got dressed for Mass, packed a bag with extra clothes and snacks, and were on our way by 5:45. We made it to Mass with 15 minutes to spare!
As we pulled up to the church, not seeing another car or person in sight and wondering if they still offered the Latin Mass, the pastor walked out of the rectory with a visiting missionary priest (who is headed to Bolivia today) and welcomed our family! We had been expecting a low Mass, but the visiting priest was able to play the organ and sing the responses, so we were blessed with a beautiful sung Mass!
After Mass we visited some more with the pastor and he invited us back to the hall, following his English Mass, to attend a reception for their newly ordained deacon and to meet some of the other parishioners. In the meantime we went to pick up a couple coffees and breakfast for the kids.
After attending the cake reception at the Church, some of us changed from our Mass clothes, and headed to the beach. A trip to the ocean was on our “Summer Bucket List” and we were all so happy to finally be able to check that off our list! When we pulled off the highway we couldn’t believe our luck when we spotted a whale just off the shoreline!! (What a perfect way to kick off our new school year, and our study of Swimming Creatures!)
If you look closely at the following pictures you can see a little glimpse of the whale spray/blow in the first two pictures, and the top of the whale in the third. I wasn’t successful with getting a picture of the tail when diving, but the kids were so excited to see that. This was the first time any of them actually got to see a whale that wasn’t in captivity! Very exciting, for sure!
We then spent the rest of the afternoon having a blast on the beach! And, yes, I am going to share a whole ton of pictures, as usual… It was Bud’s first trip to the ocean, after all! 🙂
Hopefully it won’t be too long before we are able to make the trip again… However, with the cost of gas and over crowded mini-van we won’t be able to go too often. In the meantime, we will just continue praying for a local (and frequent) Latin Mass.
In Honor of the Immaculate Heart of Mary
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Lemon-Lavender Cookies to celebrate Our Lady’s feast
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I purchased the cookies pictured above at a local Lavender Farm last week, and they were a perfect afternoon treat to give the kids on the (traditional) feast of the Immaculate Heart this past Wednesday, after sharing the legend of lavender with them.
Since the whole month of August is dedicated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, and since I happened to pick a bunch of lavender as well, I think we might try and make some more of our own using a recipe from Better Homes & Gardens.
Ingredients:
- 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon dried lavender buds, ground with mortar and pestle
- 1 teaspoon finely shredded lemon peel
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 3/4 cup butter, softened
- 1 cup powdered sugar
Directions:
1. In a medium bowl, combine flour, ground lavender buds, finely shredded lemon peel, and salt. In a large mixing bowl beat the 3/4 cup butter with an electric mixer on medium to high speed for 30 seconds. Add 1 cup powdered sugar. Beat until combined. Beat in as much of the flour mixture as you can with the mixer. Stir in any remaining flour mixture.
2. On a lightly floured surface, roll dough into a 10-inch-long log. Wrap log in plastic wrap or waxed paper. Chill for 2 to 24 hours or until firm.
3. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Cut roll into 1/4-inch slices. (We will probably then cut out heart shapes with a cookie cutter.) Place slices 2 inches apart on ungreased cookie sheet. Bake in preheated oven about 10 minutes or until edges are lightly browned. Transfer cookies to a wire rack and let cool. Makes 3 dozen cookies.
In a small bowl, combine the 1/4 cup butter, 1 cup powdered sugar, and the milk. Beat with a wooden spoon until smooth. If necessary, stir in additional milk, 1 teaspoon at a time, to make a frosting of spreading consistency. Spread frosting on tops of cookies and, if desired, garnish with additional lavender buds and thin strips of lemon peel.
Note: If frosted, place in single layer in an airtight container; cover. Store at room temperature for up to 3 days. Or freeze unfrosted cookies for up to 3 months; thaw and frost.
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