Read It All

I never shared these wonderful family photos our dear friend Emily Rumsey took over the summer. I mean, it’s only NOVEMBER 30! I also just ordered some Christmas cards so hopefully they’ll arrive before Christmas so I can get them mailed out before Valentines? Sheesh. With all the bustle and hustle of my sister’s Thanksgiving weekend wedding (YAY! SHE MARRIED THE BEST GUY and we are so HAPPY) and ensuing disease: all 10 little nieces and nephews threw up over the course of the week they were visiting, I actually had some quiet time to think. Maybe it’s because I was up a few nights changing sheets and rubbing backs while people threw up and that doesn’t lend to much talking which is my preferred way of processing. I’m so behind on everything. I didn’t get anything ready for a Small Biz Saturday or Cyber Monday sale for my shop. I haven’t blogged in a long time. I haven’t planned out anything for Christmas yet. I feel so BEHIND. And yet in those semi-still hours of realizing all my time and creative energy had gone toward the thing that really mattered: my sister’s wedding! prepping food for a few meals of 40 people for the festivities after it (freezer friendly meals)! rearranging my third floor and basement to accommodate the highly anticipated cousin crew! Blessed is She work that needed to be done before I took a week or so off! Paying attention to my children and their homework assignments and…

I’m not well-acquainted with grief. My parents are still alive and in good health. I’ve got all four siblings still alive and kicking. My four children have no lost siblings waiting for them in the afterlife. My family of origin has only two deceased aunts & uncles out of 12. So while I don’t wear grief comfortably, increasingly it’s journeying alongside me. My cousin whom I grew up with’s little daughter, a year older than our oldest, is on hospice at home from brain cancer. Another close friend passed from cancer earlier this year, a loss so large it’s hard to mourn. And other adults in my life lost to cancer. But the grief Laura and Franco Fanucci have walked through, and AA and I have walked alongside them at times, is an entirely different burden. Miscarriage. Babies lost as premies from a terrible tragedy. Babies longed for and waited for with heavy empty wombs. These griefs these write about in their book, “Grieving Together: A Couple’s Journey through Miscarriage.” And it’s a book like nothing I’ve ever seen! It addresses loss for both the parents, not just discounting the dad like so many others out there. It gathers many stories from other couples, too. The resources for parishes and couples is astounding. There’s a whole chapter on understanding the Catholic Church’s intricate teaching on loss in the womb. And if you’re still sorting through your own suffering, it’s a book you can piece through, not one you have to…

My sister and I were talking about books her daughter (2nd grade) and my son (3rd) are really loving and then I thought, I should just do a blog post about them because then I’ll remember them myself! So please tune in at the bottom and tell me what you guys are loving reading in your household at these ages. I’m using my amazon links so that means if you click through and buy anything I get a sliver. Just so you know. F A M I L Y Mercy Watson. This pig is a family favorite and her adventures are ha-larious. Anything by Kevin Henkes. Especially the Lilly books. Especially this one. Great Pie Robbery and other mysteries. A HUGE family favorite. Millie-Molly-Mandy. Girl adventure power tales from the 1920’s.   C H A P T E R Pony Scouts. This early reader (level 2) is kinda a chapter series but it’s also just a really fun one for any horse lovers out there. I can’t find a boxed set so I just am contented to buy them one-off used via ‘zon. Magic Treehouse, of course. Freddy the Pig. It’s hilarious and my son wolfed it down. There are tons of them so also grabbing them used. Narnia. Got a used box set and it’s so sweet. The Penderwicks. Adventure, kids, all good stuff. American Adventures. He got the whole set as a gift from my family and every single one was riveting and he loved these. He’s a…

She IS the mini boss around here. I’m finding that letting my kids learn and grow means a lot of me observing. Of course I step in and stop the fighting. Like, you know, every other minute or so. But when no one’s life is imperiled, and I can actually keep my hands to myself, I try to just observe. Observe them laughing and saying funny dramatic off-key things. Observe them negotiating and haggling with a honed craft to make any street vendor proud. Observe them making dire proclamations about whomever they’re hating on that moment (Mama side bar: “we only hate the Devil”). And when I observe and I take meager mental notes and I pat myself on the back or, just as quickly, kick my own shins as to where they learned THAT, I remember. They are not mine. They are their own. They aren’t accomplishments of mine. They are their own masterpieces unfolding. They aren’t just an inverse of the mirror in Snow White (showing me my worst). They are their own struggling, gasping, reaching spirited person. Prone to virtue and vice. Made in the image of their Creator. I still have many years of big parenting work ahead. Guiding and teaching, disciplining and snuggling. But today, and maybe for you, too, today I am content to letting them grow with a little water and a little sun and a whole lot of air. — If you haven’t seen that the Blessed is She Advent reflection book is…