Archive for June, 2006:
Life is busy
Last weekend I was in Denver for the 7th Annual Colorado Catholic Home Educators Conference. It was a quick trip. I flew in Friday morning rented a car and went straight to the conference. Exhausted, I was asleep by 9 pm that night in my hotel room and wide awake at 5:30 am (still being on eastern time). I had a leisurely breakfast at Ihop and headed back for another day at the conference then flew home that same evening on the red eye. After going to an early mass with my husband I spent most of Sunday sleeping while my family played at the parish picnic.
The conference itself was very nice. True, I didn’t hear any of the talks (vendors rarely do) and sales were rather slow but it’s always lots of fun to meet and spend time with old friends (some of whom I have only known online up to this point) as well as new ones.
I talked with Susan about curriculum and Amy about sewing. I heard Jen’s awesome conversion story (Jen write it down!) and I got to meet and chat with Gwen, Mary M, Mary G, Suzi, Julie, Gayle and Maureen and even had a lovely dinner with Kim and Collin.
But travel is tiring and I’ve done enough of it that whatever romance and mystery it ever held for me is long gone. Especially at 5 am as I stand by the baggage carousel at BWI while my legs ache from swelling.
Still, in its own way it is a blessing. Being away from my family even for only a short time, always makes me miss them and gives me just enough time to reflect on my vocation as wife and mother and why it is I love it. I almost always come home with resolve to do better and that is certainly a valuable thing.
Subscribe to the comments for this postAn excellent question
and an excellent response: Why Doesn’t the Pope Do Something about “Bad” Bishops?
By Fr. Robert Johansen
Catholic Answers is one of my favorite sites. If you ever have questions about why we Catholics do what we do and believe what we beleive - this is the place to find answers!
And This Rock magazine is an excellent resourse. In fact I just re-ordered a subscription as a Father’s Day gift for my hubby.
Ineffective Blogging
Maureen over at Trinity Prep School posted a challenge to Write your OWN Seven Habits of Effective Homeschool Bloggers on your blog. While we are a homeschooling family I don’t consider this a strictly homeschooling blog. It’s a family life blog but hey she invited me anyway. So I’ve been thinking about it and I really don’t feel I’m qualified to write anything about effective blogging. The most obvious reason would be that I am NOT an effective blogger. In fact I am most definitely a slacker blogger. Oh sure I have some of Maureen’s “effective” traits in that I do try and be myself (boring as I am), I share photos and I try and check my spelling and grammar but beyond that I’m pretty pitifull. But hey I’m OK with that. I like blogging, but anything I do that’s beyond my vocation as a wife and mother has to serve me and not make me a slave to it. My goal is to be a higly effective Catholic woman, wife and mother. Anything else is just gravy and well we all know that too much gravy is fattening. At least it is for me. 
So I blog when I have the time and inclination. That’s it.
Now, that being said, I must tell you that I DO really enjoy reading many other blogs. And thanks be to God that those who post at those blogs ARE effective bloggers because what else would I read while I’m sipping my morning tea? So check out some of the other lists (lots of links in Maureen comments) and see what you think.
Morning Tea
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Iced tea that is. . .although it’s chilly enough this morning for hot tea. Not that I’m complaining. I love this weather. It’s been terribly hot lately so this is certainly a welcome respite. It means I can actually get some things done without feeling like I am sweating to death (no central air in this almost 100 year old house - no duct work just radiators).
Well it’s been 3 weeks since the stomach bug first hit. The weekend seemed to indicate it was gone and I was breathing a sigh of relief. . . that is until hubby got sick last night! He had a very rough and sleepless night. He’s resting now and the worst of it seems to be over but I’m wondering if the ones who didn’t get it yet (oldest two sons) are still in the running. Time will tell. It seems we aren’t the only ones suffering as the nasty stomach flu has made its way through the families of Six and the City,Karen Edmisten and Sweetness and Light just to name a few. Several local families have had it too. For us at least I am pretty sure we got it at the conference. Many of the children there got sick the same following week and I also I remember one of the out of state families being sick the second day of the conference. Of course it’s no one’s fault for spreading it. You don’t know you have it until you are sick and by then it’s too late.
Wow what a weekend! A dear friend, a young man from our parish who has come to be like a son to us over the last few years, was ordained a priest on Saturday. The ordination mass was absolutlely beautiful and as he lay on the floor in front of the bishop all I could do was cry. What a great and wonderful thing to witness a man become a priest. His first mass was yesterday afternoon and it was one of the most becautiful masses I have ever been to. Here’s a picture of the newly ordained Fr. Pang Tcheou and our Bishop Kevin Rhoades. The hard part now is going to be remembering to call him Father!
