Mary's Muse

Sketchy Summer Plans

Compass Kid has a full schedule this summer.  He will be finishing history and science as well as religion and math.  Ugh!  I didn't do very well in keeping up with him.

Zookeeper has to finish a little math.  This should be easily accomplished by the end of June, if not sooner.  He's working on the next catechism book so that in eighth grade, his religion book will dovetail with what he studies for history.  He also is completing his science book.

Princess has a week's worth of math.  That is ALL she has to do all summer.  However, partly for fun and partly for an introduction to a panorama of American history, she will be reading the American Girl books in order.  She narrates each one for me and at the end of each set of books, we may do a project.

Little Man is already 1/2  year ahead in math, so his goal is to complete two lessons per week, just to keep it fresh, and read to me daily.  Every week he must choose a different subject area: history, science, religion, or fun.

I had great plans to purge excess items and do a deep clean of much of the house.  Apparently, however, God had other plans for me.  Again.

Devotional Humor

In our morning devotions, I asked the kids what would cause them fear and trembling.

Zookeeper:  Being attacked by a bear, or wolves, or wolverines.

Princess:  Watching Zookeeper being attacked by a bear, or wolves, or wolverines.

Self Deprivation #2

I went for a walk with the dog ~ the one that still walks ~ up toward the mountain on which we live.  This started my mind churning about what I gave up for Lent and how this Lent, my fasting has kind of taken on a life of its own. 

I began the whole giving up thing going easy on myself, since due to gluten intolerance, I am limited as to what I can eat and then recently, I found I have a yeast intolerance as well.  So I told myself I'd give up second helpings for dinner.  But then, we overspend our budget occasionally due to me not realizing that undergarments for five people should cost well over $100.  Or that a couple pairs of church pants and a belt, along with two $5 tee shirts, should cost at about $100.  So we don't have quite enough money sometimes weeks before my husband's next pay day. 

This said, I realized that this Lent, I have been fasting regularly.  I eat little for breakfast because not only my kids, but also my husband like the cereal I can eat.  It's often whittled away to nothing before I can get much out of the bag.  So, it's often a piece of fruit.  I can't eat anything with yeast or wheat, so that limits lunch oftentimes to carrot and celery sticks, sometimes a bit of leftovers, if there are any to be had.  It's dinner that I can eat.  And I often am so hungry by then, that I mess up and have second helpings.   Since I'm nursing a baby still and considering my health-imposed fasts, I allowed myself to waive the original deprivation of second helpings.  I'm thinking this fast was Other-imposed, because I certainly didn't intend to do it.  But, as is usual with His plans for me, I'm so glad I am fasting.

We are stretching our budget to the limit to raise nine children still at home and improve the house.  Some of the recipes through this blog help in this endeavor.  Here's another one, based on what we have around the house.  This came from 101 Cookbooks.com.

Carrot Soup

2 1/2 pounds carrots
2 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil (or butter)
4 medium cloves garlic, minced
1 large yellow onion, chopped
8 cups+ vegetable stock or water
juice of 1/2 a lemon

parsley and/or basil to taste (we used both)

quinoa (we used two cups but that turned this soup into more of a stew)
fine grain sea salt (as much as you need)

- olive oil, toasted sesame oil, or red chile oil for a finishing drizzle - if you use toasted sesame oil (sometimes labeled pure sesame oil) it is very strong. I typically dilute it with olive oil. I use one part sesame oil to four parts olive oil.

Heat the olive oil in a large, heavy soup pot over medium heat. Add the cut carrots, garlic, and onions and saute for a few minutes or until the onions start to get translucent. Add the stock and bring to a gentle boil. Lower the heat and simmer for 20 - 30 minutes or until the carrots are tender - longer if your carrot pieces ended up larger. But try not to overcook. Remove from heat and cool for a few minutes.

Puree with a blender (we like the soup chunky, so we leave at least 1/2 unblended) - then stir in the lemon juice. Add salt to taste.  Keep adding a few pinches at a time until the carrot flavor really pops. If it tastes flat or dull, keep adding.

Finish with a drizzle of great extra-virgin olive oil, one of the other drizzles I mention up above, or whatever twist you come up with.  Popcorn or croutons can be popped in at the end.

 

More prayers for Catherine!

Please continue your prayers for Catherine. Double them, if you can.

Here's an update from my godmother:

Tom and Catherine were at her doctor appointment yesterday. Her myeloma doubled since Friday.  The doctor changed medicine to one she has taken by infusion, but now it is in pill form. She is shaky, weak, and tired.  She doesn't have so many nose bleeds, but she has clots in her throat, which makes eating a chore.  She still has her great smile and enjoyed a trek to Christmas Mountain last Thursday and Friday to watch teh children enjoy their Christmas snow toys.  Tom has taken off the month of January, God bless him, and Olivia has stayed home from her masters classes this semester.  You may see a need for prayer here.  We're still waiting for her miracle, which is all that will save her.  Every day is a gift!!!

 

Cookie Baking

It's a messy job, but somebody had to do it!

Soup Wednesday

I'm a terrible planner. Knowing this about myself, I thought it would be a good idea to plan the general type of meal and then go from there.  Soup is an anchor in the middle of the week.  Sundays we usually have a roast.  Monday is something with chicken unless our roast happens to be chicken or turkey.  Tuesday is spaghetti day ~ not every week, but fairly often.  Wednesday is soup (or salad in summer).  Friday is a no meat day.  So that leaves Thursday and Saturday for leftovers or chance.

In an effort to keep food costs low as well as for our health and especially to sacrifice a little thing to pray for those in need (sometimes to pray for ourselves), we started soup Wednesday.  It's generally a vegetarian soup, especially during Advent and Lent, but even meat soups have a lot less meat than other meat meals.  I make two regular-sized recipes for our double-sized family so that if the kids don't like one type, they'll eat the other.

So this is our first installment of Soup Wednesday recipes.

Sweet Potato Chili

3 tbls canola oil

2 large onions, finely diced

6 garlic cloves

1 green pepper, diced

1.5 tbls chili powder

1.5 tsp ground cumin

1 tsp oregano

5 cups water

2 15 oz cans chopped tomatoes

2 large yams peeled and cut bite-sized

1 can black beans + 1 can kidney beans (or any other combination you prefer)

Smattering of salt

Saute the onions and garlic in oil for about 10 minutes, until the onions begin to brown.  Add the bell peppers and cook for 10 minutes more.

Sprinkle the chili powder and cumin and cook the spices 2 minutes, stirring constantly.  Stir in all remaining ingredients and bring the mixture to a boil.  Cook 15 minutes, just until the sweet potatoes are tender.  Stir the soup occasionally during this time. Serve with cilantro or Sofrito sprinkled on top, if desired.

Pumpkin and Corn Curry

2 medium leeks

1/4 cup olive oil

2 carrots, finely diced

10 cups vegetable stock

2 medium boiling potatoes, peeled and finely diced

1.5 tsp salt

generous seasoning of pepper

1/4 tsp cloves

dash of cayenne

2 16-oz cans pumpkin

1/2 cup heavy cream

2 cups corn kernels, fresh or frozen

minced fresh parsley for garnish

Assuming you know how to wash and peel leeks, I'll take the recipe from there.  Cut the leeks into thin slices.  You should have about 3 cups.

Heat the olive oil in a large stock pot.  Add the leeks and carrots and saute for 15 minutes.  Pour the vegetable stock (we used water) in and bring to a boil.  Add the potatoes, salt, pepper, cloves, and cayenne; cook the soup for 30 minutes. 

Place the pumpkin in a large bowl. Ladle abotu a cup of soup onto the pumpkin and stirl it together to liquefy it.  Then Pour it into the soup along with the heavy cream and corn. Cook 5 more minutes (or longer if the chowder it too thin). Serve in bowls with minced parsley sprinkled on top.

 Both recipes are from Jeanne Lemlin's Quick, Simple, and Main-Course Vegetarian Pleasures.  This is one of my three favorite vegetarian cookbooks. 

Letter to a Friend

A very dear friend just miscarried her eighth baby.  She was quite down, until I wrote her the following letter.  It's this attitude that keeps me afloat when I think of the three I lost.

My friend:

Think about this. God has allowed you to carry in your womb a SAINT!  Does that not excite you?  You can pray to your own child for your children here on this earth.  I especially pray to Brendan Christopher to assist my teenagers in navigating through these confusing years.  I pray to Gabriella for my babies (all the way up to my 6-year-old).  And to the other saint, whom I've yet to name, I pray for the middle children, who take on so much.  Don't remember the pain. Don't remember the loss.  Remember your gain in heaven.  I'm reaching for a hug from you and I feel it.  Yes, even through this could, soulless medium, I feel your hug.  I love those three children that I lost just as much as I love mine here on earth. Only the children I lost acutally help ME get through life with these children on earth.  I only hope that God is happy with these little souls (I can't imagine He wouldn't be ... they didn't even have a chance to sin!).

Dear God, please quiet (my friend's) heart with your love.  Please let her know that it is through your love that this child was conceived and taken to heaven before she had the chance to see this baby on earth.  Please let her celebrate this child.  Let her love her baby as greatly as she can.  Let her communicate with her saint through You.  Thanks be to You for all of your blessings, even those we sometimes don't see as blessings.

 

To A Dear Friend

Thank you for being quite the friend I need right now.  Always, really.  I thank God that you encourage and even CHALLENGE me to walk in the faith that God offered me at Baptism.  God didn't call us to have an easy road in this life. I think we'd get complacent, saying our prayers by rote, if even saying them at all, enjoying our richness, looking down on those not as well endowed with riches, and leading corrupt lives without a care in the world.  Like Ancient Romans did before the fall.  Like many people do, now.

He called us to have disquiet, to experience challenges, some of which we don't even know whether we can handle. All of which we can NOT tackle without his Grace.  But in the day-by-day, moment-by-moment, I forget his presence.  I forget that if I only get down on my knees and ask that his will be done, his will for me will be done.  I forget that I can go to him with all my needs, large and small, and he will answer me.  I don't always understand the answers.  I don't always feel he even has answered.  God has his own time (darn it!).  And he has his own way of speaking to us.

Sometimes I *do* hear a voice.  Most often this happens when I am at Adoration.  And most often what he says is something on the order of: "Bring the children to me."  I have not been very faithful in that during the week.  We're working on it this year after having had Jumping Bean last year.

God bless you and thank you, thank you, THANK YOU fo rbeing my friend during this really overwhelming time.  If I stop to reflect ~ but I don't often stop for anything, do I? ~ I would remember that all I have to do is beseech our Maker.  He loves us so much that he won't let me fall, at least not too hard.  He and my husband and I will grow this family together. He may make a servant family of us yet. 

What About Training the Will?

Some friends and I were chatting over coffee one day when I explained my home schooling theory.  School at home ought to be, within a framework, delight-directed.  Kids who learn grudgingly only to dump facts on a test paper or jump through the next hoop that someone else says they need to learn are unable to grasp the joy of learning.  They don't experience the "Aha!" moment fully.  They don't retain ANYTHING.  And they are just not happy kids.  I tried that method. Cramming someone else's ideas down my kids' throats doesn't work. 

I explained that I changed up my ninth grader's history to be more of a delight-filled subject.  With what we're doing now (to include many books between), not only does he get to read a ton.  He also gets to complete projects like an early American flatboat.  And he gets to relate what  he learns via composition.

Religion is another discussion subject, which requires analysis on paper.  I'm still in the process of perfecting this subject as it seems to elude the grasp of teenagers who have been studying it all their lives.

Instead of using an expensive foreign language computer program, we use about $40 worth of workbooks which will take us through at least 2 years and $20 of audio CD products.

Science is a complete joy for ALL of my kids this year.  Compass Kid, my 9th grader, finished the Oceanography using Apologia.  He's working through many resources for his study of geology.  The main texts we are using are: All About Our Changing Rocks, How the Earth Works, and Geology Made Simple.  During winter, we'll tackle Astronomy using How the Universe Works and Astronomy Made Simple.  Labs are worked into each area just to foster interest and retention as well as give depth to the subject.

Zoo Keeper is in 7th grade this year and is using a delightful physical science book by Critical Thinking Company.  This book is geared to classes of several kids, but works just as well at home.  Simple experiments with most items found easily at home, question-and-answer format, and clear explanations make this great book for home study. 

Princess uses another Critical Thinking book for science.  It's totally hands-off for me, except where I added things to round out her year.

Little Man reads Christian Liberty Nature Readers and, when we can, we follow bunny trails.  For instance, right now, we're hot on the trail of bees.

We're trying something new for spelling this year.  Spelling Wisdom was recommended by many and i hope it will solve at least some of our spelling woes.  We're about to start it tomorrow, so stay tuned ...

Math is our only sit-down-and-do-it subject.  However, since it is conducted on the computer, just a colorful and noisy different media method, the kids are ready and willing to take it on.

So all this to say that my friend asked me, "What about training the will?"  Aren't kids' wills trained enough by attending Sunday and daily Mass, attending Adoration, participating in sports or musical instruments, functioning in a family where chores need to be accomplished, schedules met, and rules followed?  Even just getting up on time is a training of the will. Participating in morning prayers before breakfast and devotions and completing school all day ~ fun or no fun, a day-long foray in several subjects when all you want to do is read the latest book from the library can be challenging ~ is definitely bending a child's desires to higher needs.

Give Up or Give In?

My brother and his wife were due in two weeks to have their first child. The baby was breach and both of them were concerned not only for the health fo the baby, but also for my sister-in-law's wellbeing.  I understood that they did not want to have a C-section. It's a bit scary, the first time.  But for the safety of that baby, I would do it (and have done it) in a heartbeat.  My brother didn't know what to do or think.  He finally 'threw his hands up in the air'.

They went to the last appointment, 11 days before she was due, to try to flip the baby.  And it worked.  I told him, "Maybe God was waiting for you to 'throw your hands up in the air'."

"To give up?" he asked.

"Did you give up? Or did you finally give over the cares in your life to God?" I asked him.

"I don't know. Did I?" he asked. "It's so hard for me to let go of being able to manage my life."

Isn't that the truth for all of us? Don't we want so badly to control how our lives are laid out?  But who is ultimately in control?  And who cares so much for the sparrow?  How much more, then, must He care for those He created in His image?

I took what my family might consider drastic leaps of faith in my life, the first one involving who I married.  I fell passionately in love with him within a few months of knowing him.  And we lived 2,000 miles apart for the entire year we courted.  After that first year, with only a 10-day visit in between, we were engaged.  Inside of the next year, we were married.  "How can you marry someone who lives 2,000 miles away?  You barely even know each other!" my family advised.  Ah, but God knows.

Twenty years later, we're still married.  And we made nine more leaps together despite living all over the United States and Europe.  "Nine children! Wow!  Did you plan this?"  No, but apparently God did.  "Are you finished having children?"  Only God knows. "You must be a saint!"  Uh ... no.  But I hope that is what God, in His infinite wisdom, is leading me to be.

When I started to feel like I could reassert some sense of contorl over my life, I had teenagers.  Now, there's a second person wanting to direct his or her own life.  I can tell that child from experience that you never really manage your own life.  You may smile when something goes your way and think you hold the reins, but you don't.  So, completely out of my hands (and placed gently in God's) I send my top two off to school again this year. It must be what God wants because I've been fighting it for two years.  Maybe, who knows, by their actions and words they will convert other kids to the true faith.  Many of their friends are so mixed up about their own faith.  I believe that part of the reason those kids are attracted to our kids is because ours are so grounded, so solid in our faith.  I am grateful when my son asks me, "Mom, is it OK with the Catholic faith to have two kids and then do natural family planning?" He's asking. He wants to comply with Mother Church.  Some day.  Not too soon, I hope. ;o)

Only God knows what will happen with our children as  we gradually give over what little control of them we have.  All we can do is pray for them unceasingly and work with them to help God mold them into the people He wants them to be. Beyond that, we trust in God. Only He knows what will become of them on earth.  Only He knows what part they'll play in fulfilling His plan.

In case you were wondering, my brother and his wife had a baby boy, 10 days early.  All things in God's time.