Home

I'm home...but just for one day. :) We pulled in only a few hours ago from a wonderful 4 days at the 2006 Couple to Couple League Family Convention in Arkansas, and have only today to do laundry and repack before my Mom, sisters, and I are off to the Ave Cor Mariae Summer Girls' Camp run by Miles Jesu.

A few random highlights from our trip...

Playing violin and piano and singing for the daily Conference Masses
Meeting up with new and old friends from around the country (particularly one whom I hadn't seen in four years!)
Being a childcare leader/helper for 45 eight-and-nine-year-olds
French braiding about 20 little girls' hair from the above mentioned group :)
One smiling little boy from my group asking me if I've seen the Sound of Music and telling me that I "reminded him of Maria".
Being told that I "looked like Anne of Green Gables"
Being greeted by a Southern gentleman sweeping the sidewalk with "Good day, miss. Lovely bonnet!" as the group of children and I walked past (I was wearing a straw hat).
Enjoying volleyball each night with wonderful, faith-filled teens from all over - and the rosary afterward, right there in the sand.
Enjoying the AR natives' accent...quite the twang they talk with down there, y'all know?
Driving through the lovely Ozark Mountains and lots of red-colored earth!

Surprise!

The first time I've been able to post while away from home. :) So while you and I thought I wouldn't be back here for a week (maybe two), here I am! Here's some wisdom for today from G.K. Chesterton...

"Coincidences are spiritual puns."
"If I had only one sermon to preach it would be a sermon against pride."
And best of all...
"Tolerance is the virtue of the man without convictions."

-Gilbert K. Chesterton

And while I'm away, you may enjoy visiting a few of my favorite blogs -- that is, if they aren't already your favorite too!

Catholic Mom and Author Danielle Bean

Biblical Womanhood

Here in the Bonny Glen and The Lilting House by Catholic Mom and Author Melissa Wiley

The Rebelution by Christian Homeschooled Twin Teens Alex and Brett Harris

Pax tecum and God bless!

I'm Off...

with my family on vacation for the next week. In the meantime you will all be in my prayers.

And a note from Claire's secretary (aka: sister Sarah)
In case Claire doesn't get a chance to write during the one day we are home between being gone, we're off to a Catholic Girls' Summer camp the first week of July! So if you don't hear from her until the middle of July...that's why.

Blessings!

A Lost Art

Few youth have had the chance I had last week: to enjoy real dancing. Not hip-swaying, body jiggling, or head jerking. Real wholesome, enjoyable, fun dancing in a group of lighthearted young men and women who don’t leave respect behind to enjoy themselves. Have you noticed the strange majority of young folks nowadays who have been deprived the simple joy of learning how to polka? Or waltz?

Perhaps a significant part of our problem is the absence of real music. I'm sorry, but you just can't call what's now blared at most weddings music. And it seems that the movement taking place on the dance floor is either something inspired by hip-hop or a hugging session. Dancing is indeed a lost art. And I daresay one which needs to be restored as part of the Culture of Life.

“..thou shalt again be adorned with thy timbrels, and shalt go forth in the dances of them that make merry.” (Jeremiah 31:4)

5th-Grade Schoolchildren Folk Dancing in 1935

A Beautiful Story

Many years ago, when I worked as a volunteer at Stanford Hospital, I got to know a little girl named Liza who was suffering from a disease and needed a blood transfusion from her five-year-old brother, who had miraculously survived the same disease and had developed the antibodies needed to combat the illness. The doctor explained the situation to her little brother, and asked the boy if he would be willing to give his blood to his sister. I saw him hesitate for only a moment before taking a deep breath and saying, "Yes, I'll do it if it will save Liza." As the transfusion progressed, he lay in bed next to his sister and smiled, as we all did, seeing the color returning to her cheeks. Then his face grew pale and his smile faded. He looked up at the doctor and asked with a trembling voice, "Will I start to die right away?" Being young, the boy had misunderstood the doctor; he thought he was going to have to give her all his blood.

"Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends." John 15:13

- Author Unknown
From "Glen's Story Corner" on Relevant Radio

Happy Father's Day!

"It is a wise father that knows his own child." (William Shakespeare)

Thank you, Daddy, for knowing me so well! God bless all our wonderful fathers, and all our priests too.

Chapters of Life

Graduation was beautiful. Not so much an end, but more so a beginning. My education is not over...it's just beginning another chapter. I love this quote from Robert Hutchkins, which we put on the graduation invitation: "The object of education is to prepare the young to educate themselves throughout their lives." Over the years, I have met so many students in the "regular" school system who simply loathe school and despise learning. And I remember listening to these grievances with the curiosity of one to whom learning was an adventure, and wondering what they meant. I often reflect on how my education, my years of homeschooling, have been so much more than simply book-learning. Of course books played a key role for me - and they always will! - but our "life skills" days of cooking, or cleaning, or sewing projects, or preparing for houseguests were just as much a part of fashioning me into who I am today. Homeschooling at its best is the cultivation of not only knowledge, but wisdom. Of not only brainpower, but heartpower. Of not only hearing and grasping, but seeing and understanding. Of not only principles, but truths. Of not only facts and figures, but virtues and values. Of not just preparation for a job or career...but preparation for LIFE. For the next chapter.

At the Graduation Mass, I read the following poem just before we graduates presented our parents with roses...

For all the heartfelt prayers for us
You’ve offered through the years
For all the sacrifices and struggles,
All the sweat and toil and tears

For all the times you held us
And wiped our tiny tears
For all the time you hugged us
And soothed away our fears

For all the smiles you gave us
When you wanted to give a sigh
For all the times you went on strong
When you wanted to sit down and cry

For all the years of learning
Of sitting on your knee
For all the years you’ve showed us
What a Christian ought to be

For loving us when we’re not loveable
For teaching us what’s true
And most of all for giving us life
Mom and Dad, we’re trying to say…thank you

P.S. No photos are available yet, but when they are, I'll try to post some. :)