Our Michaelmas

~a blackberry pound cake candle Husband picked up for me!

~ an angel food trifle for the kids with blackberries on top for Husband!

~a little boy ready to strike

~the end~

Paper Bag Pinata

OK, so I know I said we were keeping things simple and we are, but St. Michael is The Professor's confirmation saint and one particular heavenly friend that he has been very close to ever since he was two and would point at a picture of St. Michael and say, "Mama, he whacked dat debul!" So to encourage our children to "whack dat debul" we have sometimes enjoyed the fun of a pinata party. Now, the history of the pinata is fascinating, so if you have a moment, be sure to read about it here.

We like the traditional 7 coned pinata representing the 7 deadly sins. Those are hard to find in the party stores these days where is seems like everyone wants to whack their favorite Disney character (I know I've felt that way many a time), and since we are keeping it simple, making my own was out of the question (although I have done that before and it's tons of messy, goopy fun)!

So, a simple, paper bag pinata seemed the order of the day. I made this one in about 30 minutes.

First, I grabbed a bag from my stash. One with handles is preferred, but not necessary. I filled it with just enough candy including Twizzlers (Devil's Tails) and other fun stuff and then stapled closed the top including stapling over the handles for extra reinforcement.

Then, I made small half circle shapes on pretty paper (sin can be awfully attractive, now can't it) and attached some crepe paper streamers from the party box. I rolled them up and just taped them onto bag. I could have spent more time covering the bag with layers of fringed paper before attaching the cones, but didn't want to spend more time than I had. I printed out two pictures of St. Michael and taped them at the sides so they could slip over the handles and rope that will be used for hanging the pinata.

It's not pretty, but it will do the trick. I'll post pictures of it's demise later if I get a chance! Happy Michaelmas!

Feast Days Comin' Up...

There are so many wonderful saints to celebrate this week and as much as I would love to dive into each and everyone of them, I have to be realistic. Do you hear that self? Be REALISTIC!!! So that means... choose the ones which mean the most to my kids and not the ones that look fun and interesting to me no matter how tempting and creative the ideas are and, most of all, keep it simple. But for those of you who aren't sick of the smell of curing drywall mud and aren't going cross-eyed looking at tile samples, here are your coloring page reminders for this week. For us, we will be taking it easy and living vicariously through all of you. So that means take lots of pictures and share them!!! I need to know that there is life out there that exists without a fine white layer of dust covering it.

September 29th:
St. Michael Coloring Page
St. Gabriel Coloring Page
St. Raphael Coloring Page

October 1st:
St. Therese as a child Coloring Page
St. Therese in habit Coloring Page

October 2nd:
Guardian Angel Coloring Page

October 4th:
St. Francis of Assisi Coloring Page

Enjoy!

B Week

~Along the Alphabet Path with Bigboy, Michael and Mrs. Applebee~

B is for...

Bathrooms
Well, due to our sudden bathroom emergency project we did spend an awful lot of time this week looking at sinks and faucets and tile and tubs. That counts as school, right? Ok... I'll be serious now.

Bells!

(I wanted to try finding little bugles to represent the Bugle Fairy, but thought bells would be easier on my sanity our ears. These 8 note hand bells were such a huge hit, I am now on the hunt for more music to go with them. Oh and you can find them for less than half that Amazon price at Hobby Lobby!)

Banana Bread with chocolate chip B's



(the best part is eating the leftovers)

Balancing Bears



Blueberries

(sadly, my children don't like to eat them so he just measured them for me and I made a nice "goodbye summer, hello fall" crisp for Husband)

St. Brendan and St. Blaise

St. Brendan and the Voyage Before Columbus
St. Brendan the Navigator
Brendan's Voyage & Other Poems
(We have also been enjoying listening to this musical interpretation of Tim Severin's reproduction of St. Brendan's voyage. You can hear some of it on YouTube. Also, this song that tells the story of St. Brendan.)

Soap Propelled Boats


(This was a hit or miss experiment. Some of the boats we made moved and some didn't. It did give BigBoy a chance to practice his eye dropper skills.)

Building Bridges


Inspired by this book, Bridges Are to Cross, which has a wonderful selection of bridges to look at including Pont Sant'Angelo in Rome and a sweet tribute to the rainbow as a heavenly bridge at the end, we made our own bridges out of Legos.

That's all for now. "C" you next week!

Technical difficulties with Scribd

Sue informed me that Scridb was acting goofy with regards to downloading St. Gabriel. I'm not sure what they have against him, but I have let them know that there is a problem and they are working on fixing it. In the meantime, it looks like you have to go to Scridb and log in first, then come back to my blog and click the link for St. Gabriel. You shouldn't have any problems downloading him then. If you can't, try printing him directly from Scribd by clicking the Print tab. If that still doesn't work, you can email me and I will try to send you the coloring page as an attachment, but be forewarned that we will be up to our elbows this weekend in drywall mud and I might not be able to respond very quickly!

Mom, come see this!

subtitled: What I would have missed if I'd given into "I'm too busy right now!"

Feast of Padre Pio

For new friends and old, this is a story I shared a couple of years ago. I still get chills when I think about that whole experience....but first, a few reminders:

Padre Pio Coloring Page

Padre Pio at Mass Coloring Page

Recipe for Cappuccino Mousse

From the archives...
Back before BigBoy came along, the older children and I were living in South Texas with my mom while Husband was working here in North Texas. We were trying to sell our house and thought it would happen faster with the primary sources of chaos and disaster (3 children under the age of 5) located at the opposite end of the state. While I was there (feeling my sanity slowly slip away), I decided to distract myself busy our days with some dabbling in this crazy adventure called "home education". The Professor was four already; he should have been conjugating Latin verbs and composing his first symphony, right? (snicker) We also tried to make some connections with other homeschoolers in the area for some of that "socialization" that we all know homeschooled children lack. (snort)

I don't remember how I got "Linda's" number, but somehow I did and she invited me to some home school activities based out of a church across town including the upcoming All Saints Party. Everyone was supposed to bring some candy and a game or activity. I signed up for "Pin the Halo on the Saint".

All I had was a few holy cards, my large sketchpad and some yellow sticky notes (this was back when my hazard lights were flashing in the slow lane of the information super highway). It had been years since I had tried to do a pencil portrait so it must have been the Holy Spirit guiding my hand as I picked up that sketchpad and pencil. I looked through the holy cards and chose Padre Pio. Many nights during that time I found myself praying his "Don't Worry" prayer. (He was also pictured in profile so I thought he would be an easier subject.) I drew the portrait which turned out surprisingly accurate, made halos out of the sticky notes and headed off to the party.

Well, it turned out to be one of those nights. The kids were fussy and my mom was feeling neglected so we decided to pack up St. George's sword, Helena's cross and Agnes' fuzzy little lamb and leave before the games got going. We had already had enough fun for one evening.

Most of the group, including Linda was in another room in the parish hall, so when I saw her husband step into the game room to grab the diaper bag, I asked him to please tell Linda we would have to leave early. He asked if I was taking the game with me. Well, of course I wasn't. I hoped the children would play the game and then, remembering how Linda had admired it when I taped it to the wall, I asked her husband to please offer it to her with my thanks for her kindness. A strange expression crept over his face and he said,"You know... she's going to cry." Hmmmmm. I didn't know my new friend was of a more sensitive nature but I figured that was his problem, not mine. : )

When the phone rang the next day, I didn't expect that the faucets would still be running. Linda was very emotional and thanked me profusely for the portrait. Really, it wasn't that good. Beards are very hard to do well and have you ever really looked at that man's nose? But this sweet, sobbing lady had a story to tell so I listened.

Her daughter "Laura" had been born with a very rare heart condition. The doctors had convinced her to try a risky surgical procedure. The surgery had been attempted before on others, but had not been successful. Unfortunately, without a successful surgery, the condition would be fatal. The day of the surgery, a friend had dropped off a pewter relic medal of the newly canonized St. Pio of Pietrelcina. Linda had never heard of this amazing saint, but grasping at any and all hope, she asked the doctor if she could pin the medal to Laura's surgical gown. He agreed and then even allowed Linda to come in and kiss her unconscious daughter as she lay on the table ready for operation.

"Where is my miracle girl?" the doctor shouted as he burst into the hospital room the next day. He confessed he had not expected the surgery to succeed. They had allowed Laura special privileges (the medal and the kiss) only because the little girl's chance of survival was so slim. He explained to Linda when he let her kiss Laura, he believed she was kissing her goodbye.

Laura's medical information was documented in journals and at that time, Linda was told her daughter was the only patient to have survived the surgical procedure that corrected the condition. She credited the miracle to Padre Pio, a saint she knew nothing about. Prayers of thanksgiving were offered, the medal was saved in a special place and Linda delighted in seeing her little girl romp and play like a normal child.

The story could end there, but it doesn't.

One day, as she and Laura were flipping through a book of saints the little girl saw for the first time a color picture of the saint whose intercession had saved her life. "Mommy, that's the man who played with me" she said.

"What dear?" her mother stammered.

"That man. He played with me when I got cut." This was Laura's childish way of referring to her frightening ordeal. "He told me not to be afraid and played with me. Then I woke up."

Linda cried.

She assured me this child had never seen a picture of this great man, had never even heard his name or his story. Linda herself didn't know much about him other than he was a new saint in Heaven and that she had pinned all of her hopes and fears on his intercession when she pinned that medal on her little girl's gown.

He not only came through... he was there.

I just have to ask...

All you designers who think a cushy leather chair is just perfect in the bathroom with an oriental rug and a lamp... what in the world do you expect people to do in there?

And what exactly is a steam shower for? If it can be used as a supersonic wrinkle remover for my clothes, then you might win me over, but if the purpose is to get clean, does it really do the job or just leave you sweaty like a sauna?

And why do you like to recommend leaving your bathroom window exposed to let the natural light in? Do you people live in real neighborhoods and have you never heard of binoculars? I don't have windows in my master bath, but my neighbors do and let's just say I am very glad they are not that internet savvy.

Now, here's a serious one for all of you non-designers... do you think vessel sinks are just a fad or here to stay? We aren't considering one, just having a discussion while we peel off wallpaper and sand down walls. Oh, and I'd love your thoughts on subway tile. Does it scream retro chic or New York City rush hour?

24 hours

That's how long it took us to go from this...

...to this...

...all because of this...

Moral of the story... don't discuss your plans to remodel the bathroom in January with your husband today lest you find a broken albeit sparkling clean shower head in your hand instead of where it should be!

(Here we go... I'll keep you posted!)

Racing along the Alphabet Path...

...BigBoy style!!!

BigBoy is in Kindergarten this year. Since he is already reading I thought we would jump right in with some handwriting and math along with picture book science and history. Well, as most of you experienced homeschooling moms know, natural strengths in one area can mean weaknesses in others. In BigBoy's case, it's his fine motor skills. He can grab the pencil and hold it just fine, but doesn't quite have the strength or control to maneuver it well. There is nothing wrong with him developmentally, it's just the problem of being #4 and having three obliging older siblings to do everything for him. I came to that realization while talking to a friend who asked if he played with Legos. I said, "Well, yes... um, after his brother builds them for him." Clue phone... it's for me! (I'm dating myself, I know.)

So, as often happens, my plans were put on hold and revamped so that we could do an intensive fine motor skills workout. I am thrilled though because I had hoped to get to travel along the Alphabet Path and this seems likes the perfect opportunity! Now, I am super excited to share with you some of our journey down the alphabet path (lots of things like sticker activities and coloring will go undocumented). Our jaunt will be heavily focused on fine motor skills and of course, all boy!

A is for...

Architecture

Ants

(Kimberlee's idea was just too good to pass up.)

Apple blossom stamps

Apple Muffins with Butterscotch Chip A's

Alligators and Alabama (for the big kids)
(This activity included an alligator hunt for all things A. Bigboy had to use the puppet to collect and chomp the things he found.)

Next Week...B Week!