Merry Belated (but not really) Christmas!!

St Nicholas

Happy Feast Day to you all.  The St. Nicholas Center has some great ideas to help celebrate today, so go check your shoes for chocolates and what-not and have a great day!

Happy Birthday GG!

We all love you and miss you much. Happy day to you!!

Poetry Friday

Back to our regularly scheduled program:

Anticipation

Lots of waiting and anticipation goin' on around here in the new digs.  Waiting for our furniture that was in storage to be delivered, waiting for painters, waiting to get motivated to unpack our household (for the 427th 9th time), waiting for my sore back to heal (I should have been reminded that I'm not as strong at 39 as I was at 19--what up wit dat??!!?), waiting for..(you name it....)  But most importantly waiting and anticipating the birth of Our Lord and Savior.   

We've been adding more activities to our Advent.  We have various Advent calendars all about the house.  We've got our Advent wreath which we light at dinner and while reading Bartholomew's Passage (the second book in the Advent Trilogy by Arnold Ytreeide).  The kids have been begging me to "Find Jesus' bed Mommy!" so they can add straw to it with each good deed done in order to provide Baby Jesus with a nice soft bed come Christmas Day when we place the Christ Child in it.  Aaand, I'm planning to dig out our Jesse Tree from the boxes that surround us so we can add our ornaments daily.  

St. Nicholas' Feast Day is coming up Saturday!  I had hoped to make some of these.  Buut we've still got to clean out the old house and our storage unit, so pfffffttt!-- phoey.  Monday brings about the Immaculate Conception and the 12th is Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe ....  so much richness in this season to embrace.  I hope to share some of our activities here.  But for now, I guess I'd better get offa here and get crackin'!  Blessed Advent to you all.

Jotham's Journey

Before the movers pry away my keyboard.. gotta hurry... they're on the way.... I thought I'd share one of our favorite books for Advent.   Jotham's Journey  (click on the purple writing for a quick review) is a great read for the family.  It can be a bit intense for littles-- depending on how sensitive they are, but mine have all enjoyed it (we're on our third time reading it).  It's the first book in a series of three by Arnold Ytreeide, but I think at this time only Jotham's Journey is in print.  

Uh oh.. here come the big burly dudes... better run. 

See ya! 

Because doesn't everyone need a little chuckle in their day?

Oh, and also because this is something that would sooo-oo happen to me.. 

Happy Thanksgiving!

Taking a quick pause in all the PAINting, moving and cooking action around here to wish you all a Blessed and Happy Thanksgiving.  

Please take time today to say a prayer for our many deployed soldiers, sailors, marines and airmen-- especially for their safety and swift return home.  Also lift in prayer those family member that are here on the home front  missing their loved ones on this holiday.

I'll close this post with the prayer that will be said before our dinner this afternoon and that accompanied loaves of bread that some very thoughtful ladies baked for our parish to share:

Gracious and generous God, 

we come before you today with grateful hearts.

In the beauty and bounty of creation

we see the work of you hands.

In the loving faces around us 

we know you own love for us. 

May this meal nourish us and strengthen us.

We pray in thanks to you, 

our God who lives forever and ever.  Amen

Christ the King

Viva Christo Rey!

I can't help but think of Bl. Miguel Pro and his story today , the solemnity of Christ the King--the last Sunday of the Liturgical Year. 

ACK!  I also can't believe that Advent starts a week from today!  We're in the midsts of moving.  (Yes, I said moving-- after only 5 short months here in our base house--we're moving to another one.)  However, I hope to get up an Advent post sometime this week.  Advent is such a special time in our home.  LOTS of preparation for the Babe Jesus.  I hope to post some of our family's favorite reads an activities that have helped us prepare our hearts for the Savior in Advents past.

Until then, I leave you with this... 

A discussion of the finer things in life~namely jelly beans...

At lunch earlier this week:

Four: "So, Princess (he really doesn't call her by that-- I think he'd rather choke first..) what's your favorite color of jelly bean?  I like the pink ones, 'cause they, um, they taste like bubble gum.  But those black ones.... are HORRIBLE!  Unless you eat them after pancakes and syrup, 'cause then, ...um, they taste better.  Not delicious, but, uh  definitely better."

Princess: "Yeah, I yike dem.  The purpo ones are my favwrit.  They taste like purpo bubble gum."  Do you like purpo Four?"  (she really doesn't call him that either.... but she does like to tell you she's four-- 'four and a half!!' thank you vewry much!)

Four: "Um, I don't think that I've ever tasted purple before.  But remember, uh, remember thaaaat time thaaat Grandpa, um, not Grandpa Skip and not Papa, but Graaandpa had this HUGE jelly bean jar?  It was wicked huge! (... and here we see the effect older brothers can have on a 6 year old's vocabulary...)  And it was so DELICIOUS!!  All those jellybeans.  DE-LI-SHUUS!  Buut, um, not broccoli.  Blech! 

Princess: "Yeah.."

Four:  "You know, if you wrapped gum, like all around your tongue, well then it wouldn't be so bad, 'cause all you would taste would be, um... GUM!  Yeah... gum.  HEY MOOOOOM!  Where's all the gum??" 

Princess:  I can't have gum until I'm five..(big sigh)