The Prayer Garden is under way

Did I mention that Hubby wanted a pond out back?

Did I mention that it would make a GREAT prayer garden?

Leveling the ground.

Still leveling.

Filling it up.

The finished product. Isn't it BEAUTIFUL? The waterfall has the BEST sound. All we have left is the landscaping. We're planning on planting certain herbs as well as annuals and perennials. Hopefully I'll post more pictures later.

Bubble's Baptism

June 17th, eleven years ago, some close family and friends were gathered upstairs in the Catholic Campus Center of UNT for Bubble's Baptism. It was such a wonderful occasion and of course, we had to remember it.

Here, Father Bob is baptizing her with water. I don't remember her crying.

Here, she is being held by her godmother, Aunt Tina with Uncle Quinn (godfather) in the background while she is being anointed with oil.
Our wonderful Father Bob!

Here's the crowd family.

In honor of that special when we all went to the local Pancho's buffet, I served up Mexican as we reminisced. These were cheese enchiladas.

Of course, you can't have Mexican without sopapillas. This was my first attempt at them, but as you can see from Hubby's photo-excellente, that they were fabulous and gone in minutes.

All in all, it was a wonderful time to bring out the Baptismal candle, dress, and photos and talk about the special day that it was.

Our cards have arrived!

If you remember from a post in May, we were wrapping up our art curriculum with pictures of Mary to be sent to other homeschoolers. We were to be receiving other's cards in a swap. Anxiously we waited until, of course, it was forgotten about.

Then, one bright summer day......they arrived. Oh the joy! Several of these savvy folks added their email address, blog address, or physical address so that they could have a pen pal. Bubbles immediately took to it. Currently, she emails one of the girls and has written and received a letter from the other. What a blessing!

Here are the cards that Prez received, although I'm not sure why the picture turned. Sorry about that. I'm not too computer literate.

Here are the ones that Bubbles received. All of these girls are EXCELLENT artists.

Here are the ones that I received. Aren't they beautiful?

Having had such a good time participating, we will plan to join again in November.

The Feast of Corpus Cristi

If you remember any of your Latin studies, you'd know that this feast day is concerning the Body of Christ. I've always loved the opportunity to stop and meditate on the true presence of Christ in the Eucharist. This feast day was established in 1246 and is always the Thursday after the feast of the Holy Trinity. The Bishop usually moves it to Sunday so that the faithful will be able to celebrate it with the rest of the Body of Christ--the church.

Without going into a ton of apologetics, I'll just say that with today's little "food fun" we were able to talk about this tremendous mystery. Bubbles is familiar with John 6:48 (I am the bread of life) John 6:54-55 (Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day. For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink.) Hubby and I were able to point out to her John 6:60 (On hearing it, many disciples said, "This is a hard teaching, who can hear it?) After that, many disciples desert Jesus and Jesus turns to Peter and asks is Peter will abandon Him as well. The beauty of this passage is the fact that Jesus doesn't ask the disciples to come back. He doesn't tell them that they have misunderstood and then try to explain it better. He lets them go because He knows that it is a hard teaching. A little twinkle in Bubble's eyes was encouraging as she seemed to understand on a different level.

Pictured above is strawberry jello in a wine glass with two lemon tea cookies to look like Communion Hosts. The kids loved it.

Pure Sweetness

New swimsuit. New hair style.

Same Sweetness.

The Budding Artist

Throughout this past school year, and ever since Bubbles was a toddler, I have had a sprinkling of consistency with what I creatively call "Quiet Time". I've tried to insist on this for two simple reasons:

(1) my sanity

(2) how can you ever hear God speaking to you when you have not trained yourself to be still or quiet

Imagine my contentment today when I read these words from Mother Teresa:

Souls of prayer are souls of great silence. We cannot put ourselves directly in the presence of God if we do not practice internal and external silence.

So, the way it worked with Bubbles was I would put her in her room, with gate at the door, and she would have to play, by herself for thirty minutes. I would put a timer on so that she could see just how much longer she had. Once the timer went off, she could come out. Now that the kids are older, the rule is to have your quiet time, well quietly. This means you can play with anything that does not make noise--no electronics, no battery operated toys, no playing with each other. You can read, draw, etc.

Pictured below are some pictures I took of Prez, without him knowing, while he was drawing during his quiet time. I had to take the pictures because I was amazed at his technique. I have never known a four year old to attempt drawing still life of inanimate 3-D objects. Amazing!

Study it (furrow the brow).

Get all the angles.

Be specific.

The object.

His rendition.

Another attempt I found while in his room later that day.

If I seem to be bragging, you better believe that I am. I'm thoroughly floored at his capabilities. I'm pretty sure I know what he's getting for Christmas this year. So, to re-cap....quiet time has many benefits, spiritual and practical.

The final days of mini-camp

Sweetness is so proud of herself. I wish you could hear how she gets excited every time she begins "walking".

Here is Sweetness as she attacks my goddaughter's bow and blond hair, which she loved.

Here is my cousin, pregnant with her third, holding Sweetness. God Bless her for giving my arms a rest.

Proof as to why this is everybody's favorite uncle. He also celebrated "a" birthday today!

Here I am holding my goddaughter. Isn't she the model of grace?

Here is Prez attacking his cousin. Why are my children always attacking others?

Planning on feeding the ducks/geese with bread, but Prez practically fed them his finger. OUCH!

All in all, it was a great time with family.

The Homecoming

On the last day of camp, families were invited to the final "meeting" as the kiddos recapped some of the week, learned their counselors real names (they used code names all week), and sang songs together for the last time. It was awesome to be a part of and it gave us a real sense of how much fun and spiritual growth the kids were afforded.

Bubbles spots us in the back.

Someone couldn't wait to be with his sister and BFF.

Still happily attached.

The trio is whole again.

One big, HAPPY family!

Bubbles had THE best time EVER! She is still singing the songs, teaching us the fun prayers, and logging onto the camp website to re-watch videos and photo slide shows. She has already written letters to her new friends and made four new rosaries like she learned in arts and crafts. It is unanimous.....money well spent!

Preparing for Battle

With this kid there is much comic relief.

Fearless!

Fearless?

Just a glimpse into this awesome life of mine.

Pentecost Party

You know you've done a good thing when your four year old wakes up, walks into the room, and says, "Let the party begin!"

Much to his dismay, I informed him that the party would begin after Mass. "Can I at least wear my party hat?"

Did he say party hat? Why, yes. You can't have a party without hats.

This one looks especially good in hats.

Of course, what kind of party would it be if there were no games? Here the kids were on a team against hubby and me and we had to use "a strong driving wind" to blow the fire (balled up paper) off the opposing team's side of the counter. Despite all the laughing, the kids were able to blow well enough to beat us.

Our next game was using the fruits of the Spirit--all twelve of them. We were on our own for this one. You called out the fruit of the Spirit that you were aiming for and then you tossed the hacky sack into it (if you were lucky). None of us hit the intended spot.

For our third and final game, we had to drop the fire (clothespins) into the glass container. There were three pins. Bubbles was the winner on this one.

Prez gave it a valiant try.

I thought for sure Hubby would dominate, but he couldn't keep a straight arm. Oh wait, he couldn't keep a straight face. Now, which one was it?

And of course....the cake! This one came complete with tongues of fire.

Just as we hope to be filled with the Holy Spirit, our cake was filled with icing and fresh strawberries. DELICIOUS! We also had "pigs in a blanket" (wrapped in the Spirit) and macaroni and cheese (covered with the Spirit) and red Pentecost Punch (cherry kool-aid).

Looking back, one thing that would have been cool was to teach the kiddos some phrases or words in other languages. This is of course a reference to the fact that the Apostles went out and were speaking in tongues. All in all, it was such fun and Hubby is so WONDERFUL to let me be so cheesy. Last but not least, I had been meaning to buy Dove chocolates for prizes, but forgot. I guess it's a good thing. I wouldn't have gotten any. ;)

On Sunday we return to Ordinary time in the church's liturgical season which means the Easter candle gets puts away for now and we return to our Friday sacrifices in honor of Good Friday. I will be honest that I am not looking forward to this, but with the past 50 days of Easter feasting, my waistline could use the restraint.

Give me grace, O Holy Spirit, Spirit of the Father and the Son to say to You always and everywhere, "Speak Lord for Your servant heareth." Amen.

Mini camp

God's heart is always with the little ones and so here is a display of the mercy of the Father. Knowing that Prez was sad and lonely without big sis, we received a phone call from my aunt that her grandkids were coming for a visit. Luckily for us, we live about 40 minutes from her. My cousin's oldest is only three months younger than Prez and her youngest is our goddaughter. They still live in the city that we just moved from, so these two clowns have missed each other. Yesterday and today and still even tomorrow (3 day "half camp" seems just right for a four year old) we have spent time together.

Now, you may be asking yourself why they are in a watering trough for horses. Great question.

Awwww. How cute. Apparently the bunnies are too fast to catch now, so this allowed them to play for an extended time.

In this heat (95 degrees), swimming is a necessity if you are going to be outside.

When that gets boring, you can always go for a spin in the sprinkler.

This last picture was a bonus for Prez. Our neighbor had her granddaughter in town and she stopped by to take him on a deer sighting, pine cone picking tour. It was a success.

So, although I have not achieved much on my to do list, I sleep with a contented heart knowing the kids are having an excellent start to their summer.