I appear to have just had an unplanned blog holiday. Oops. I lost my voice for a while and the strain of whisper shouting at the children exhausted all my mental faculties. It is at just the right time, then, that I got the all clear to delight you with some news. Many of you have been asking over and over the many long years When is your mother going to blog? and When is your mother going to write... Read more
Every year on Father’s Day I waffle between discouragement about that horrible statistic about fathers’ church attendance and the resulting faith of their children (what is it, one in fifty children grow up to be church going if the father doesn’t go, I need to look it up) and huge gratitude and joy that I have a good father, that my husband has a good father and that my children have a good father. And by Good I mean Kind,... Read more
We’re in to week two of no bottles and day four of no Strawberry Short Cake and My Little Pony. How has it gone? Well….I mean……probably good. Marigold was horribly addicted to massive bottles of milk so that she wasn’t really eating food. Fatty Lumpkin was so addicted to My Little Pony that she had no ability to play or do anything interesting when the wretched program was playing and when it wasn’t. It’s been like what I imagine a... Read more
It’s raining torrentially and all manner of flood warnings are in effect. I cannot face my basement which I know is filling with water. I ought to get down there and cope with all the stuff on the floor. I ought also to be more holy and good. I ought to do a lot of things. So clearly blogging moves itself to the front of the line. {Pretty} Gladys has such an interesting eye. I discovered this jumbled in a... Read more
Baseball is well nigh at a close. Alouicious has plugged along all this season, keeping track of his glove and bat and cleats and hat and uniform, playing catch when there’s time, throwing the ball into the tire placed carefully against our gorgeous fence (see posts from last summer) when there’s less time, whistling his way through practices and games. The rest of us have been trying to live sanely around him. Elphine and I, waiting out practices, have bought... Read more
I have been in bed for two days. Well, not really in bed, more languishing on the couch trying to keep the children from razing the house to its foundations while I move as minimally as possible lest something terrible befall me. And also, all the time exerting prayers and supplications over the contents of my insides, I’ve gone ahead and started the next school year. It’s raining and cold and everyone is fractious. We might as well get on... Read more
I’ve just been making a great long comprehensive list of everything I need to do in the world in order to be allowed to take a holiday later this summer. It includes things like Coping with the Basement and Throwing Half the Contents of the House Away because there’s no where to put it. I’ve already completed some of the tasks–End of the Year Reports for the Government, Getting the Babies off of Drinking Out of Bottles since they’re not... Read more
I really ought to be downstairs doing laundry…I feel like that line should be set to music and be playing as the soundtrack to my life…it’s always down there, like Gallum, hissing at me in the dark, even when I’m up here doing nice things like making tarts for a sad goodbye to graduating seniors. Strawberry Tarts: pie crust rolled out and baked in muffin tins and then filled first with a layer of cream cheese whipped with the juice... Read more
Rhubarb Mango Crumble I made some rhubarb strawberry sauce, but more almost jam. Just cooked down all the rhubarb I was given, maybe four cups chopped all told, with the end of some frozen strawberries and a goodly measure of sugar until it was gorgeously pectinous and delicious. Then I discovered some unripened mangos in the back of the fridge (? What was I thinking?) and diced them up, covered them with sugar and some of the Rhubarb Strawberry Delight... Read more
We’re going to be in Leviticus 23 and Acts 2 this morning. So let’s pray together.Merciful and heavenly Father, we praise you for incorporating us into the mystical body of your Son, Jesus Christ, and making us heirs thorough him of your everlasting kingdom. Help us this morning to see this gift more clearly and to give ourselves over completely to the work of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Long ago, after rescuing the people of Israel from slavery in Egypt, God... Read more
Preventing Grace
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