Linking up with Kendra today at Catholic All Year because she's my old buddy from LA and because I like her blog and because I like blog posts that write themselves especially when I've been in a bit of a blogging dessert, so here we go.

1. What time do you prefer to go to Mass?

In Lent we tend to find ourselves at Saturday vigil Masses. Jacob ALWAYS gives up alcohol and sweets for Lent which basically means I do too, and since Jacob is a Letter of the Law type, we go to Mass on Saturdays so we can start our feasting early. Because Saturdays without beer are kind of more like Sadurdays (Get it? Get it? 100% for you, honey)



But my preferred Mass is the 11am. An 11am Mass means that we don't have to rush breakfast and we can maybe even be on time. Also, our couple crush goes to the 11am, so that's another reason.

2. Would you rather be too hot or too cold?

I would have to say hot, so long as I am somewhere like Houston with really great A/C. 

My dear friend from college has a very smart grandmother (who with her husband basically started the Core at University of Dallas, so Smart Smart) said that the hottest she ever was was in Boston in the summer and the coldest she ever was was Florida in the winter. Tell me that doesn't blow your mind.

3. How many brothers and/or sisters do you have?

Four. Three brothers and a sister. They're awesome and I could talk about them all day.

My dad's mother had sixteen brothers and sisters though, which is a lot more than four. 



I snapped that picture of a picture at her house last week. This is sixteen of my great grandparents' eighteen children. One died when he was two before my grandmother - middle row, second from the right - was even born. She was number 13. She was named June because she was born in June and didn't get a middle name. Number 12 - Ralph - is not in the picture up there because he was the one boy who died in the war. My great-grandmother had seven sons in the war. Seven. Legend has it she got a medal from the president. My Nana June and her brother Ralph were super close. She still has the last letter he ever wrote. He wrote it in a foxhole. He wrote it to her.  

Uncle Otto - top row, third from the left - didn't make the photo so they left a hole for him and drew him in. Clever clever pre-Picasa.

4. If you were faced with a boggart, what would it turn into?

This isn't a very fun question. Probably a judge. Judges are very scary. The whole legal authority to require things of me or take things away from me. Or maybe I just can't stand getting in trouble.  

5. Barbie: thumbs up or thumbs down?

I played with Barbies a lot as a little girl - by myself in my room and sometimes at a specific friend's house - but I was embarrassed about it, and I still kind of am. I think that answers the question. 

6. If someone asked you to give them a random piece of advice, what would you say?

Learn to be wrong at least sometimes because chances are you're wrong a lot. (Said me to myself.)

The Angelus

We certainly are only scratching at the surface of liturgical living around here. Here's some daily bread for you:

Jake: Is it Lent or is it Easter?
Me: It's Lent.
Jake: (cries)

Catechesis? Check.

Neither Jacob nor I grew up Catholic. So this life of feasts and fasts doesn't feel very organic. The culture at large helps with the big ones like Christmas and Easter, but the lesser known ones - like today's Feast of the Annunciation - don't feel natural to me. At least not yet. They sneak up on me, and I encounter them via some social media outlet, and I fumble out a celebration like a person who missed the joke. I want to fill my children's lives with all the loveliness of the Church's traditions, and I want those traditions to feel as if they'd grown right up out of the earth, but so far my efforts have looked more like a mom directing a stilted pageant of hot cross buns.

I guess I want our family faith life to feel like this:

Jean Francois Millet's "Angelus"

I made this for Jacob one Christmas because, in addition to the Angelus being a favorite prayer of his, this is one of his favorite paintings. Side by side this couple labors, and together they interrupt their ordinary and set aside their tools, he takes off his hat, she clasps her hands, and they speak Mary's blessed words anew.

This morning I conquered my distaste for leaving the house alone, and I trucked me and the littles to Goodwill so I could score some makeshift planters for my succulents, the succulents that I bought last week so we could finally get some Lenten desert up in our house. Up until this morning they were sitting in a clump on our kitchen table, still in their black plastic cups.

 Instead of letting yet another feast day pass us by - instead of losing yet another opportunity in the fuss of "what shall we do?" and "how can it be perfect?" - today we did something beautiful.

Today we said yes to something beautiful.





I also said yes to a second cup of coffee when my toddler skipped his nap this afternoon. That was a good idea too.

Baptized

Lucy June's baptism was all sorts of lovely. The family got to sit in four different parts of the church because we were prompt as usual. At one point during the service I saw my son walking down the side aisle aiming, per his most recent ecclesial obsession, for the kneelers in the front. I had the baby and turned around to glare at my husband four pews back and sent my brother running down to fetch back our wannabe altar boy. I then thought of all the people who had seen the not-so-nice face I'd made at my husband, so I turned back to Jacob and mustered more of a "Kids do the darnedest and I love you" face. Nothing if not genuine over here.

At some point during the homily I started to wonder whether I'd gotten the baptism date wrong. What if today wasn't the right day? What if this wasn't the right Mass time? I was pretty sure, but I haven't been winning at the whole life organization game. I mean last week could alternately be called 7 posts in 7 days or 1 home cooked meal in 7 days. By the prayer of the faithful I was almost in a sweat. My 93 year old grandmother had driven four hours to be here and Jacob had three family members in from three corners of the nation, and I might have told them the wrong thing. So when they asked for our personal intentions I offered up some heartfelt "don't let me actually be this flaky" and "please please please let my daughter get baptized today." 

My prayers were answered, and now baby smells of holy chrism and a new beginning of goodness. 

The family baptismal gown - appropriately size newborn - was a little scandalous on little miss four months already, but at least it showed off her not androgynous diaper cover.

Opie wrangled the toddler during the naptime baptism.

They were both champs.

Jake even - almost - cooperated for the formal photography.

We enjoyed the 100% humidity 78 degree weather  

with Mrs. Bazin Chronicles and her little Miracle Man and lots of others

until a front sent the temps plummeting and blew us all inside.

The godparents did bang up jobs and posed for an awkward number 

of awkward pictures 

with their charge. No, they are not married, and, no, they are not related, and, yes, Jacob and I are fully aware of the general lack of genetic diversity between our families of origin. 

So welcome into the fold little Lucy June. We are so glad you are here with us.

Simple Gifts

Here we are squeaking in under the wire on the 7 in 7 challenge. 11:55pm. I feel like I'm writing a paper for college or something. Well get ready. Apparently deadlines make me corny. And no pictures because...11:56

A few weeks ago Jacob and I were at church with our minions. As usual we shuffled in a couple minutes late and thus found ourselves haunting a back pew. It was kind of an early Mass since Jacob's been working Sunday afternoons we've been going kind of early. We settled into our Mass rhythm as parents of little people. The baby was on my lap bobbling her head around, and the toddler was jungle gyming around the pew always within arm's reach of his father. They're pretty good in Mass at this stage. They mostly stay quiet and smile at the people around us, and I can kind of even have a prayerful experience.

This particular Sunday we sat behind an elderly couple. A very elderly couple actually. Lucy June was enamored by the cardinals painted on the woman's light blue cardigan. The husband's dark pants and coat hung loosely on his withering frame. Together he and his wife made the routine motions of Mass look strenuous. Close to the couple sat their daughter who was probably about sixty and also sporting a painted cardigan. I thought about the stage of life the couple was in, about how dependent they were. Their daughter had probably driven them to Mass. They were too slow to amble down the aisle for communion, so the bread was brought to them. Someone probably brings them groceries. They needed help to accomplish even small things in life. So much help.

Kind of like me.

As a still relatively new and relatively clueless mother of young children, I need help. I need help taking my groceries to the car. I need help to go to the dentist or clean the house or take a shower. I need help by way of expert advice and encouraging words and down time. I just need help. And, honestly, people are pretty helpful. But I hate needing help. I don't want to need help; I want to be a helper. I serve my children the live long day (and night) but my helpfulness rarely extends beyond my front door. I thought about this couple and the aging process that makes you more needy. I thought about how everyone has to eventually make peace with needing help. I wondered if it had been a struggle for them. I wondered how long they'd fought before they let their daughter drive them places or before they'd stopped trekking the aisle for communion.

By the eucharistic prayer, I was beginning to feel right sorry for all of us.

During the sign of peace the couple turned to offer us their hands, and they were so delighted to
interact with the children. I pointed Lucy June at them and she gave them a gummy juicy smile, and Jake shook their hands vigorously. And I remembered something, something not brilliant, but something important: I could give this. I could afford people glimpses of my children. Even though I'm still learning this whole motherhood thing and most days my orbit is all snotty noses and shoelaces, I had brought these children here today and they were bringing people joy.

As the service continued, I found myself comforted by this little reminder, encouraged, revitalized, happy for the little extra I'd been able to give that day.

Then I watched as the elderly man took his wife's hand. 

And my breath stuck in my throat. This longstanding love. The lady in the cardinal-print cardigan and her aged husband. The decades upon decades of simple gestures.

I cried through the rest of Mass.

I'm sure they had no idea of the beautiful gift they had given me.