Yarn Along--Cautionary Tale....

Well folks, this is a cautionary tale called “Knit A Non-Roll Edge To Your Lace Scarf.”

I started knitting this beloved scarf two years ago. This is one of the few things I have knit for myself.  So, the yarn is really nice dk weight-- “Tonal” from KnitPicks. I love this red color, “Gypsy.” Lots of great shades, very subtle, and a dream to knit. I was determined to knit through the entire skein of yarn, and make this scarf long enough to wrap around my neck and everyone else’s neck in the family.

But...the pattern, which was free....did not call for a slip stitch at the beginning of the rows. You who are further along in your knit knowledge know where this tale is heading. No matter how much I have blocked this baby, stretched it, pleaded with it, did dances around it asking it to please play nice and stay flat...it planted its stitches firmly in the roll position and stubbornly stayed there. I cried to my local yarn shop owner, who rocks by the way, and she broke the bad news to me. “This will continue to roll in unless you go back around the sides of the scarf and do some kind of crochet edging.” I think she was a nurse in another life, because Rachel delivered that news rather calmly, looking all sympathetic like we nurses do before we stick something foreign into your chest cavity. Actually she isn’t a nurse, but she could play one on TV.

So....here’s what it looks like done....

And here’s what it looks like wrapped around my head a few times, like a red rubber hose. Dang. Not the lacey goodness I was hoping for. I was doggedly determined to knit through that entire skein, of course, so I have enough left to tie my shoe with and that is IT. I will be ordering a new skein, I suppose, because two years to finish a blasted scarf is too long to let it be all curled up like a red snake in my drawer.

The only reason I smiled is because Peter was distressed by my melancholy over a scarf.

As far as reading, I’ve been reading lots and lots of sites on Pinterest trying to come up with the Thanksgiving recipes...it is tomorrow, guess I should step it up a bit. I have read more of my book from last week’s Yarn Along, “The End of the Present World,” by Fr. Arminjon. I read some out loud to my two boys at home, and had some great conversations afterwards with them.

Happy Thanksgiving, Friends! Many blessings on you and don’t you DARE go shopping tomorrow.

Yarn Along!!

Hi Friends!

I’m participating in Ginny’s Yarn Along, where every Wednesday folks link up to her blog and share what they are knitting and reading. I don’t always participate, but it is a fun thing to do!

Yarn Along...Ginny’s blog.

 Here is what I am knitting right now.

This cardigan is for my Lily. She picked out the yarn, Quince & Co Chickadee in sorbet.  This is more than I usually pay for yarn, and I am sort of wondering if it is normal for it to look so fuzzy. Hummm...the jury is still out on this one. Has anyone else noticed this with this yarn?

The pattern is from Ravelry, here is my project page for this so far....I am “malikestoknit” on Ravelry. This project is from Melissa Schaschwary. Here is her blog--  Another Dandi Day  The pattern is the little girl’s “Cricket.” Melissa was so helpful per email when I had a question. I think she does lovely, lovely patterns...check out her blog! She has an adult version of this sweater, “Heather” that I plan on doing one day for myself. 

As far as reading, I am going to try to finish “The End of the Present World and the Mysteries of the Future World,” by Fr. Charles Arminjon. Here is Susan Conroy’s website, the translator from French to English for this book.  You can also see an interview of Susan by Johnette Benkovic at that site. 

Susan Conroy

Wow....this is an amazing book!! I have always been a bit nervous about the “End Times.” I heard a priest say during a homily, “When Jesus comes, will you be the ones running towards Him, or away from Him?” That had a profound change in my anxiety. Of course, I want to be the one running towards Him!! We have nothing to fear as long as we stay in a state of Grace. 

St Therese of Lisieux, one of my favorite saints, read this book. It was one of her favorites. The quote on the front of the book from her is, “Reading this book was one of the greatest graces of my life.” 

That sold me. 

Great book, great pattern.....go forth!! 

**Humm....Ginny’s site won’t come up, it looks like her server is down or something. I’ll link up later. 

Encouragement For the Weary Homeschooling Mom

Ok. Here it goes. For those of you who know and still love me, you know life with my beloved posse is not always easy. The medical stuff...the illnesses and surgeries....the crazy serious food allergies....it all adds up to be sort of.....hard. I can’t remember a time when it has been easy, except maybe when my sweet husband and I were first married almost 22 years ago and we lived on Diet Coke and love. Easy.

And then we started having our kids. The pregnancies were not simple (to say life threatening for both me and babe would not be overstating it) and our second had severe asthma. We started getting a taste of what “dying to self” meant.

Then, we got all crazy 15 years ago and decided to home educate our children.

 

Do you see that tiny cherub adored by his big brothers? He’s fifteen years old now. I know how long we have been homeschooling by how old Gabe is...you can’t see the small “school room” set up behind this scene. Tiny table, workbooks....we had it all locked down. I gave myself six weeks after his birth and then announced, “We are officially homeschooling, people!” I thought that meant I was in charge. Lesson one...you are NOT in charge. The sooner ya’ll get that one embedded in your weary brain, things will start to go much smoother. 

This tiny chubby cheek wonder did not ever, ever want to be put down. Ever. He cried and cried if I dared lay him down for a nap. I nursed every ten minutes for months on end...that isn’t too much of an exaggeration. I had just learned all about attachment parenting and waaalaaa,  I was attached alright. What we didn’t know was Gabe had horrible food allergies, so everything I was giving him in my milk, he was having constant GI upset and distress...for months. He also was blessed with asthma. That did a real number on my perfectly arranged home education model. It went from a well put together Charlotte Mason inspired curriculum to, “Legos anyone??” This was right out of the gate. Boom went my plans, confettied and immediately outdated. 

So, I’m going to do the equivalent of hitting the fast forward button....interspersed with some pictures because...my kids are pretty cute. 

Peter was born with quite a few medical issues...trach, feeding tube, and sixteen surgeries later, this kid rocks it! 

And then we had our pink caboose as we moved to a new state. 

Lily has the same syndrome as Peter, so she got her very own ticket to several surgeries, and her own personalized trach and feeding tube. This girl doesn’t sweat it, she is has a whole house full of men who adore her, and would lay down their life for her. It doesn’t get much better than that! 

Yes, yes, I know. I’m suppose to be writing some encouragement here for ya’ll! I just wanted to show you that this has not been any ordinary path to homeschooling. 

Life is hard whether you home educate or not. It is messy and difficult and beautiful and broken. We all come to this game with our own toolbox filled in some ways, and lacking in others. Looking back on 15 years of home educating, with two boys in college, and my three “littles” not so little anymore, I can say this has been so worth it.

I have not been equal to the task. That’s the truth. People say, “Oh, I don’t know HOW you do it all.” Here’s the deal, I don’t!! My house is a mess, I invite people over just so I’ll get my act together and start bellowing out orders to PICK UP!! My kids aren’t perfect, they do and say immature, thoughtless things. This is all true whether we home educate or not!! So embrace the imperfection called Your Family! I have a wise confessor who says, “Invite God into your mess.” Ha! I not only invite Him, I throw open the door and yell, “Emergency!! Code Red, Mom down!” 

Home educating our children has always been about doing what God has called our particular family to do.  I am not here to convince you to homeschool. That is seriously not my place, it is between God, your spouse and you. But, it is nice to hear how others have done it, especially ones who admit freely that they are far from perfect and struggle mightily with big issues. 

So...here’s my little list that I know is true for my family. I hope it helps you. Take what you like.

#1 God is in charge.

#2 Consult Him often... 

#3 Never try to copy exactly how some other hip home school mama does it. It never works out, ask me how I know. 

#4 Do run to your Mama’s side, the Blessed Mother. She is all about picking us up and taking us to the King. 

#5 Relationships always, always above academics!!! It is easy to become a task master and not a mentor. Build your relationship with each person in your family, and the rest will fall into place. This is especially true of the most important relationship in the family, the one between you and your husband. Ultimately, the Relationship with God and our Faith journey is the highest good here to which all other relationships should point to.....

#6 Great literature is key. That is going to look different in each family. Maybe for one that means kids reading Lord of the Rings when they are nine. In another family it might mean listening to audio books, or seeing the play, “Anne of Green Gables.” The point is to have a life influenced by rich literature. So much is learned of virtue through the great books. 

#7 Simplify when life gets out of control. That was brilliant, wasn’t it? It took me a whole second to think it up, but I’m still learning what that means after 15 years. I always seem to fall back on Catechism, math and literature when those times of craziness start for our family. I guess with our medical issues, thoughts like, “Breathing ranks first!” makes it easy to prioritize.  What is your family’s biggest priority?? Start with that and move forward. 

#8  God fills in the gaps. There has been a lot of untidy muckiness in our life of home education, due to the stops and starts of having medically fragile kids and an imperfect mom.  I have never finished everything on my list and I never will. There. I said it. But God is faithful, and if He called you to do this, become small so He can work. He’ll blow you away. 

#9 Poetry. Read it. Read it to your kids, and read some on your own. And don’t just stick to the classics, do check out books like Amy Vanderwater’s "Forest Has a Song." We don’t read poetry every day, every week, or even every month...but it is a loving friend who likes to share the couch with us and start great conversations. 

#10 You will never feel like you have it all completely together. That is true for everyone, but somewhere along the way, we home educating moms think that if we just would get the perfect schedule, the perfect chore chart, the perfect math curriculum, our kids will be amazing and our house will sparkle. Yeah...whatever. 

I’m done with the number thing.....but a few more observations of mine. 

Homeschooling is a lifestyle. Embrace it!! Some days will be brilliant with the lessons and learning flying off like sparklers in your hand. Other days will feel like the sparkler just fizzed out and burnt your pinkie. Be okay with the uneven terrain, the duds, the beauty.....it all makes for an amazing story. 

Little St. Bernadette

And stay close to the Saints! (If I had meant football, I would have said the Colts, but.....I mean our own cheering crowd, our brothers and sisters who see the face of God. Go to them! )

St Therese of Lisieux, pray for us! Help us to home educate following your Little Way! 

Detroit trip...

So we took a short three hour trip to Detroit to see my son, who is studying architecture at college. It was his birthday week and we wanted to see him. You can tell everyone was saving their energy for the day!

We picked J up and went to Mass at a beautiful church in Greektown, Old St. Mary’s. It is run by the Redemptorists, and is a must see. I have a very special friend who lives in Louisiana, and she has introduced me to Blessed Seelos. The more we have learned about him, the more we are just amazed at the intersections between our lives and Blessed Seelos. Here is a link to lots of information on this wonderful priest. He was in Detroit for a short amount of time before he traveled to Louisiana, where he died a year later as he tended to those with yellow fever. Fr. Seelos was known for his joyful devotion to his people, he was a true shepherd to his flock. I count him as my newest friend amongst the Communion of Saints.

http://www.seelos.org/

As I walked into the main church, I was so struck by the church’s beauty. I immediately saw our mutual friend, Blessed Seelos, in the front of the church.

Here’s a few pictures of the inside of the church...

The wood was ornate and hand cut with intricate designs. The main altar was so nice.

I took this with my phone, so they aren’t the best, but it really does need to be seen in person to appreciate how beautiful this church is on the inside. 

Old St. Mary’s also has a few grottos in the back, within the church itself. I have never seen anything like this, a Marian grotto and one for the Sacred Heart. Very nice, Lily loved these. 

These were made to be like caves that you walked through...very European looking. 

Old St Mary’s is a German church, I haven’t seen many like this since we left Indy. It reminded me of Sacred Heart and Old St John’s, both in Indy.

We returned to J’s dorm room,where we slowly heated up home made beef stew I had brought from home, in J’s microwave, and opened presents. It’s fun having a little sister who is ever so helpful in opening those gifts! 

It’s sort of strange seeing my son live and work somewhere other than our home. I am so proud of him, but miss him, as we all do. I am happy things are going well, and look forward to our next visit when he is home for Fall Break. 

Do get to Old St. Mary’s in Detroit if you can, and look of Blessed Seelos, I love his story! 

What to do after a hard summer.....

So, this summer hasn’t been the greatest, most fantastic, amazing recharging kind of summer. No...this has been of the “keep breathin’ ya’ll, it will get better eventually” kind of summer. And, it has gotten better, Deo Gratias. I see the boys outside right now trying to play as much ball as they can before it completely goes dark outside. This is the first time they have played ball together this summer....late at night...and it is August. The pertussis just took it out of us. We rallied a bit a few weeks ago, everyone was so sick of being sick, not quite great enough to do any heavy hiking, but desperately needing to be outdoors...without a lot of camp smoke, allergens, you get the picture, sterile nature walks?? Ha!  We headed two hours north of here and found an amazing state park that included the largest acreage of virgin forest in our part of the state. We didn’t find an allergen free forest, but the beauty here was the medicine we really needed. What drew me to this particular place was the fact the interpretive trail was PAVED. That means we could bring our stroller for a certain five year old who gets pooped out waaaay too soon, but there was no way anyone could carry her this time, so a paved trail was perfect for this convalescing crew.

We have been on a lot of nature walks and have tried to read interpretive trails before, but it always feels a bit forced or not too relevant to the kids’ experience.  The Hartwick Pines State Park did a terrific job of writing the trail map and historical markers. It flowed nicely through the forests, without belaboring points or overwhelming us with too much information, but enough to keep us wanting to get to the next stop to read about the next area. We all really enjoyed this part a lot and learned so much about new vs. old growth forests and many historical facts of Michigan’s logging history that we had no clue of until visiting here. There was a really neat cluster of buildings as part of the “museum” area on the trail....Lily and Gabe hung out for a minute, playing checkers in the building that was a replica of the house that all of the loggers stayed in while working the forest. It was a very interesting slice of history, with tables set up like it would be in a logging mess hall, and bunk areas to show what it looked like in the sleeping quarters for the crews. 

The wheel that helped carry out the 150+ft long logs was impressive. There was a gentleman that worked for the DNR that was an historical interpreter, he eagerly showed us around, including how this  large wheel set worked...very cool!

The nature center at the start of the trail had a great bird watching area and several stuffed animals like wolves, etc from around Michigan. Everyone enjoyed that and the gift shop! Speaking of birds, I saw this beautiful bird that was so striking red, but not a cardinal, I had never seen anything like it....so you might be able to make out the “Scarlet Tanager” that I tried hard to catch with my camera. The bird books say this bird is usually in the canopy and often not seen closer to the ground! Not bad for a very amateur bird watcher, don’t you say? 

More “out to heal with nature” trips are planned for the next few months. Autumn here is absolutely gorgeous and we plan on taking advantage of a flexible homeschooling schedule to get out and enjoy it! 

An Answer to Some Questions....

Positive for Whooping cough.....that is the answer, my friends, to the fierce breathing and asthma issues  from the last month here at our outpost.

Yes...we vaccinate...and guess what? It is NOT 100% effective. The first year following vaccination, it is 80-90% effective and after that it wanes. Three local docs could not believe it was possibly Pertussis, because we “had been vaccinated” and therefore, it can’t be Pertussis. Wrong!! Fortunately, we finally had someone listen to my amazing rendition of Peter’s cough, and ordered the swabs so I would shut up and quit doing the cough drama. If ever in doubt, be dramatic, right?

So, not to start a debate about vaccines, because that is NOT what this is about, I do want to make people aware that if your family has a cough that just won’t leave, or gets worse after you think they should have been getting better, or they have a nasty “whooping” sound with breathing in, (think long audible high pitch gasping sound) or if your asthma kids are especially drained from coughing...or turn nice shades of purple and gray like our dear Petey, perhaps the whole Pertussis eval should be broached with your doc. It is a simple swab of the nose to send to the lab. AND...sometimes there is no “whooping sound,” only Pete had that with his cough. Fortunately, Lily didn’t come down with this, she had just been vaccinated a few months ago.

I’m not a doctor, and the only advise I am giving is to persist with your doctor if you think your child might have pertussis. The big deal is, for infants, it is especially serious. People usually need treated with an antibiotic once there is a positive test for Pertussis.  Read what the CDC says about this, and ask your doctor if you have any questions.

http://www.cdc.gov/pertussis/

We are on the mend and feeling better, but that cough....oh...you don’t forget it, let me tell ya’!

Now....I leave you with a picture of my latest shower gift I have made for the next bride- to- be in Jim’s family. I love this pattern, I have made it a few times now, and the brides all seem to like it a lot. It is the “Emmaline” from Sew Liberated. I intentionally post a pic with the chaos showing in my room/sewing area in the background....I didn’t have time to clean up, I was sewing aprons and keeping kids breathing.

Sew Liberated Emmaline Apron

It is reversible, but I forgot to take a pic of the other side! It is in a complementing blue chevron from the same fabric line, bought at Joann’s....with my 50% off coupon, of course! 

Room For God

“Make room therefore for Christ, and refuse entrance to all others. When you have Christ, you are rich and have need of (nothing) else.
--Thomas A Kempis


How are you making room for Christ? What does it look like in your life to make room for Him? I am endeavoring to attend daily Mass as many times during the week as possible. This has been a challenge in the past, and continues to be so. We have a lovely chapel not too far away, and I am starting with 7pm Mass there on Monday and Tuesday. It is a start. I also am praying through “33 Days to Morning Glory,” renewing my Marian Consecration that I made several years ago. I need to hold tight to Our Lady. She was the perfect follower of Christ. If we endeavor to follow Christ, we need look no further than His dear Mother, who will always point the way back to Him...and boy do I need some directions!

So often in the last several years of motherhood, my prayer time has consisted of short cries of distress, like a “toddler” cries for “Help!” and yells “Why?” My childrens’ medical needs have been so intense at times, I haven’t been able to count on anything being consistent except that it won’t be consistent, and someone will need to see a doctor the present week...often several times in one week. We are moving out of a difficult time this Summer. It hasn’t been full of camping, hiking and beach trips like I was dreaming of the last several months of winter.

Lovely Sleeping Bear Dunes from last year’s trip.

Instead, we got an awful virus in June that set off some of the worst asthma flares we have had in a long time, including myself, and an older son who isn’t typically as fragile as he has been the past few weeks. We have made many, many trips to the doctor and children’s hospital and the pharmacy staff are incredulous when I drive up...again. It has been rough. I shouldn’t complain too much, the time we have spent at clinics and such are a far cry from what they used to be! Now the kids have wave cushions and videos to keep them occupied during long waits. But...the view isn’t quite as pretty as the one above.

I am still brought up short when these times happen, and start the same old whine of “But Lord, why?” Instead...I need to say, “Lord, what? What is it You want me to get from this time?”

During this last round of medical crises, I have heard....”Come closer....lean into Me....and quit with the distractions.”

So, I will read....I will pray...and I will try to attend Mass when I can. I’m signing off of FB for the foreseeable future. I need to hone my writing skills and this is a nicer format for me to do just that, and I need less distractions.

Share with me what works for your prayer time, are you consistent? That’s my most difficult challenge....consistency!!