My daughter on her adult-sized trike bringing the berries home. As another languid summer comes to an end, I am grateful for yet another year with my family. It is all gift. We are owed nothing.
This post has come back to my mind several times over the past few days. On a walk with my four year old today, I was reminded of it as I watched her push her dolly in her stroller, chatting away, and was in awe at the beauty of the moment. "We are owed nothing", yet we are given so, so much.
The first part of organization is ineviably, paring down. And that brings with it the sometimes heartbreaking exercise of detaching yourself from things you once loved. (Yes, loved in the lower, materialistic sense, but nevertheless, loved.) So, in my effort to cut down my wardrobe, I gathered all my clothes from off-season storage and the cranies of the laundry basket and heaped them on the bed. I did the same with all my accessories: purses, scarves, shoes, and jewelry. Then the winnowing began: ruthlessly purging the unfit: clothing that was stained or getting straggly, clothes that really didn't fit me except in my fantasies, clothes that I never got around to wearing, and so on. Then I further winnowed out the remaining spring and summer clothes (farewell blue and green, till summer when we meet again!) as well any clothes that won't fit my third-trimester-pregnant figure. Also excised were maternity clothes from the last baby that were just too worn or out of style. I con
A problem peculiar to serious Catholics ... what do you DO with old scapulars? When the strings tear apart and the images of our Lady start hanging -- you can't just throw them out, you have to burn them or bury them. I suspect most moms of large families have a little pile in the corner of their top bureau drawer of these little patches of cloth embroidered with Christ and Our Lady. Well, here's what I started doing with them: sewing them on the backs of my boys' overalls. This allows me to combine my hatred of name brand dressing ("What? You mean I pay you to advertise YOUR product?") with a desire for covert evangelism. See, the scapulars LOOK like those ubiquitous OshKosh tags at first glance -- but then you look again... Also, I don't mind having the Blessed Mother and our Lord watching my boys' backs in an extra special way. :) For non-Catholics: a scapular is two scraps of wool cloth with an image of the Blessed Mother on it worn front and back ove
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I just passed on a picture of Jesus during His passion to my brother -in -law, James, that read:
He came to pay a debt He did not owe.
For a debt we can not pay.
God Bless!