from our house to yours! Read more

It’s Sunday morning and #4 is still not swelling. Her fever broke for good on Thursday, and I held my breath. We’ve not seen a relapse, so I don’t know if it happens right away or take a few days to get going. I’ve asked some other JRA moms who all say “It just depends on your child.” While I imagine that that’s a true statement, it irritates me anyway. Why are there never any concrete guidelines for how this... Read more

In a day of interesting and amazing news, here’s the latest “Alleluia!” moment. (I know it’s not Easter yet, so sue me.) For the first time since the Schism, the Patriarch of Constantinople will be at the Inaugural Mass of the Bishop of Rome. Holy cow, folks, this is huge! Read more

Sick with fevers, but riveted by the smoke I cried like a big ol’ baby. I’ll admit it. There are only three things that make me cry with joy: new babies, new marriages, and new popes. God bless His servant, Pope Francis. My favorite comment of the day was #3, age 11, when he saw the Swiss Guard march out with their swords and then face each other and salute. He sighed and said, “Oh good. They’re going to put... Read more

#4 is curled up next to me on the couch and running a fever of 101.6. If it were any of my other kids, I would dose them with Tylenol and put them to bed. But this is #4 and it’s never normal with her. Anything over 101.5 means a call to the rheumatologist. A fever for her could mean a resurgence of her arthritis. Which is why she’s sitting by me. It may be completely irrational, in fact I... Read more

Can you hear them calling my name? I can Three weeks or so into Lent, and the shininess has worn off of the eating the Paleo way. The first two weeks were not so hard. I like meat. I like vegetables. Its wasn’t too hard to eat only that plus some fruit. It was new  and a bit exciting to figure out recipes and plan new meals. It was almost like play. I was “flexing my self-control muscles for God”... Read more

***Today starts a series on the mistakes we all make. If this one isn’t you, hang with me, I’ll get to you eventually.*** You can’t do it all. You really can’t. If you had unlimited financial resources and an unlimited amount of time, you might be able to swing it. (You’d be insane, but you could do it.) I’m going to assume that that’s not the majority of homeschooling moms. Most of us live with tight schedules and tighter budgets,... Read more

 I love Penn Jillette. His honesty and clarity of thought about subjects, even when he doesn’t agree with them, just makes me happy. Piers Morgan? Him not so much… h/t to New Advent Read more

I love a bargain. Have I shared that with you before? I’m frugal like a maniac. That’s how we can afford the family that we have. I used to look at big families and wonder how they could afford to dress the whole big gang, especially when I just wanted them to look cute. Today I went to the local consignment sale on the last day. Things today were 75% off. I made out like a bandit. Two summer wardrobes... Read more

We took #1 to look at her college of choice last weekend, and discovered to our great relief and delight, that her grades and test scores guaranteed her automatic acceptance into the honors program she had hoped for. I was somewhere beyond thrilled. Her grandmother said, “Now you just have to do it 6 more times.” I was chatting with a homeschooling mom of 10 whose first 2 students have won full scholarships to prestigious universities on the day the... Read more