"Would you like to lead us in prayer?"

That sentence will send most cradle Catholics into an anxious mental dizzy.
"What do I say? Am I getting too personal? We did not cover this in CCD. Oh my gosh THEY'RE LOOKING AT ME!"

Extemporaneous prayer, meditative prayer, Lectio Divina are all well beyond my comfort zone.
But they shouldn't be! Prayer is a skill and it needs to be practiced and developed.

Parents are to be the first, and primary, catechists to their children (CCC 2226). That means if I'm lacking knowledge or practice in prayer skills, it's my God-given job to get it together.

Thankfully, Catholicism is not a solo practice. Tools abound! I have been very impressed with The Catholic Family Book of Prayers: A Treasury of Prayers and Meditations for Families to Pray Together. It's a skinny book (fits easily in my purse) and successfully covers the essentials of prayer, with beautiful pieces of art throughout.

My personal favorite thing is the section on meditation and contemplation. It has step-by-step guides, with SCRIPTS, for leading your family in Christian meditation, Lectio Divina, praying with Sacred Art, and examination of conscience. If I can teach reading with a script, I can certainly handle a family meditation!

The book is a fantastic cheat sheet for all of those surprise additional prayers at the end of rosaries. When 2 or 3 are gathered...Catholics add prayers! The simplicity of the book means it only takes seconds to find prayers you might have learned once upon a time, but could use a refresher on the fly (*cough* Anima Christi).

I'm not good at extemporaneous prayer, but it no longer feels impossibly difficult to get started.

You can find The Catholic Family Book of Prayers in digital and hard copy directly from Gracewatch Media, or hard copy on Amazon.

I was provided with a free copy to review by Gracewatch Media, but all impressions and claims are my own.

Advent - Contain Your Excitement

Advent is coming! Now that we live in the Great White North it is very tempting to deck the halls with Christmas joy right when December 1st hits.

But we wait.

Advent is a season in of itself and it's worth the wait to let Advent do its work. Here's what we do before the joyous day of Christmas arrives!

Advent Wreath and Advent Decorating

On the first Sunday of Advent we put up our Advent wreath, greenery decorations, lights, and hang stockings.

This will be our first year getting a full size Christmas tree! While we'll probably get the tree in early December, I like the idea of not decorating it with ornaments until Gaudete Sunday. The Advent and Christmas seasons are a marathon - best to pace ourselves!

St. Nicholas (December 6th)

Our first Big Deal feast of Winter!
I grew up with the German style tradition of St. Nick filling stockings instead of shoes. I have a whole post on what we put in those stockings and how we celebrate the day.

St. Lucia (December 13th)

Like all good 90s girls, I was introduced to St. Lucia celebrations via American Girl books. This year Therese is finally big enough to play St. Lucia so maybe we'll add in more of the procession this year! Here's what the celebrations looked like last year.

Marian Feasts - Our Lady of Guadalupe (December 12th) and Immaculate Conception (December 8th)

There might be a lot of feasts in the month of December, but it would never do to forget mother Mary! I don't do anything too big for these feasts, but they are still celebrated.

Our Lady of Guadalupe is patroness of the pro-life movement. We watch the CCC Juan Diego movie and offer a rosary for life.

Immaculate Conception is actually for the conception of Mary, not the conception of Jesus (common mistake). It's also the patron feast day for the United States, and a solemnity. So get thee to mass, pray for the country, and have some sort of white dessert. Boom. Celebrated!

Ember Days - Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday of the 3rd Week of Advent

Those final days of preparation before settling into the welcoming of Christmas! I love Ember Days, but if you've never heard of them you're in good company. They are 3 days toward the beginning of each liturgical season set aside for fasting and prayer and to "to thank God for the gifts of nature, to teach men to make use of them in moderation, and to assist the needy." It contains the cleaning and preparing and forces me to stop and enjoy the fruits of our preparations! Read more about them here.

The beauty of letting Advent be Advent is we get to go all out through the whole Christmas season! This is the first year we will not be traveling to family for Christmas, and I'm planning an epic 12 day celebration. More on that later!

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Want more ideas? Check out other Advent posts on this month's CWBN Blog Hop!

Spiritual Hacks for Life with Kids

Linking up with This Ain't the Lyceum for 7 Quick Takes.

We're on the edge of Fall! Some people do New Year's Resolutions, but for me Fall has always been the time for new beginnings. This is when I look back and see what has been working, what needs to be readjusted, and maybe where some priorities are getting forgotten.

Priorities like....having a prayer life?

With tiny people underfoot most of the day, it can be reeeeaaaallllyyy hard to give prayer the pride of place it deserves in my day. But it's a new season and a new chance to try something new and see if it sticks. Here are some of the ways I'm getting in spiritual time while having kids around 24/7.

1

Take advantage of the kid friendly prayer options

Our parish has a children's holy hour every Wednesday morning in the adoration chapel. Getting a chance to go to adoration and not worry too much about disturbing others is such a blessing!

Growing up, my mom would take all of us kids to her weekly rosary group. It was a group of moms and kids who gathered in one side of the church every Friday to say the rosary together. Not a lot of planning needed, and nobody minded if a baby needed to be soothed or a toddler never stopped organizing the hymnals.

If there is not an offering at your parish, or one nearby, start your own! It doesn't take a lot to invite a family or two over for rosary time. Don't worry about making it perfect or having a spic and span house. Your effort counts!

2

Make it a routine

When I look at what consistently happens in my prayer life, even in the busy times, it's the things that I do as a matter of routine. We always make it to mass on Sunday's because that's just what we do on Sunday mornings. Blessings before meals are part of the ritual of mealtimes in our house.

One thing we have started with the new school year is having rosary time. About 3pm has worked well. It's post-nap and afternoon snack and the kids have had a little free time. I light a candle on the mantle, hand out rosaries, and roll with it. It's not always easy, but getting started is most of the battle for me.

3

 Embrace the wiggles

A rosary takes about 20 minutes and you can bet there are wiggles! Lots and lots of wiggles. 

So we have embraced the wiggles.

One technique that works well with my kids is having "walking mysteries". Every other mystery we pace the length of the room with each Hail Mary. Now we have lots of ground rules to keep this from devolving into racing and running into things:

1. If you get to the end of the room early, you still have to wait for the next Hail Mary to start for the other side.

2. No touching anyone

3. Rosaries need to be held nicely (not hitting objects or people.)

Breaking the rules gets a quick warning. If the rules are broken 3 times, we sit down for the rest of that mystery. It did not take the kids long to figure out life is a lot more fun if you follow the ground rules.

4

Invest in some good children's religious books

I'm talking books with good art, lots of pictures, and are well written. Check out Mater Amabilis or Mother of Divine Grace to see some recommendations for liturgical year or saint books that are age appropriate for your kids.

They are fantastic to bring to mass, adoration, to have on hand for feast days, or just to read aloud and get your kids more familiar with bible stories, saints, and the meaning behind Catholic traditions.

5

Lower your expectations

I say lower because I seem to fall into the trap of expecting higher level behavior than what is reasonable when it comes to prayer time. 

Define what counts as "good behavior". Is it sitting in one spot? Staying in the pew? Making an effort at whispering in church? Kids cannot meet expectations if they are not clearly defined and communicated.

For rosary time I ask that everyone pick their spot at the beginning of each mystery, and no rosaries in months or on feet.

For mass I ask that everyone stay in the pew, my 3ish and ups follow along with the stand, sit, kneel times, and all questions be whispered. 

In Therese's case, keeping her non-stop commentary and free association whispered is her doing well. For John I have a rule about not putting himself to sleep during mass on purpose. 

Different kids have different struggles.

6

Explain as you go

It's very hard for kids to behave well if they do not understand what is happening. I do a quick little explanation of each mystery as we say the rosary, point out what part of the mass we are doing right now, and teach them the words for liturgical objects.

7

Do it anyway

We have had masses in which I completely missed the homily because I was taking the toddler to the potty for what felt like the billionth time. Rosaries that got interrupted so many times I wanted to quit. 

But I make myself do prayer anyway.

Sometimes showing up is the prayer. Even if I'm just showing up to the rosary in my living room. I don't let a bad experience the day before prevent me from trying again today. The kids will not get better at prayer without practice, and everyone needs another chance to get it together. - including me.

What are some of your tips and tricks for praying with kids around?

Maybe It's Not Just About the Kids - Becoming a Catholic Parent

What does it mean to raise Catholic kids? I think it has more to do with forming Catholic parents first.

You know the saying "you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink"? This is a part of parenting in which that is especially true - and also one where many are tempted to pretend it is not true. The reality is we can do x, y, z as perfect Catholic parents, but there is still no guarantee that we will get Catholic adults out of our kids.

There is no magic bullet for success in this challenge, however there is hope.

The best thing you can do to raise Catholic kids is to give them a Catholic parent serious about their own formation.

Your personal decision to take the charge of raising your children Catholic seriously is something you CAN guarantee. Here are three reminders that have been helpful to me in gaining perspective for teaching the faith to my own kids.

Treat teaching the faith like the J-O-B it is

If you were married in the Church, even if you are the sole Catholic spouse, you vowed to take on responsibility for raising your children Catholic. In that moment you gained a new job for life.

What would you need to do to do a good job at work? Show up, do what you say you will, make priorities, consult with coworkers, and adapt to changing circumstances. These are the basics of doing a good job. How could we expect our job of teaching the faith to require any less?

Just like in the workplace, not every endeavor, project, or attempt will be successful. That does not mean I'm failing at ALL THE THINGS. It just means I need to try something different.

For me this looks like:
Making sure the kids come to mass with me as much as possible.
Finding a way to go to the church at least one non-Sunday mass a week. That could be for a parish event, adoration, daily mass, or even just a pop into the church to say hi to Jesus.
Make my own faith formation commitments.
Seek out connection with others in the Catholic community, and feed those friendships.
Accept that life events happen, but those should mean a temporary change not a long term slide.

Know that I am not superwoman

There are many Church documents making it clear that Catholic parents are the primary educators of their children, but I have to be careful not to read "primary" as "only". The Church is not asking me to somehow form Catholic children on a deserted island. She has given me a husband, a parish, Catholic friends, godparents, and the larger Catholic community.

For me this looks like:
Taking advantage of any children's faith formation my parish offers.
Involving my husband in his own special way for the kid's faith formation. My husband likes to do Bible reading with the kids so that is a special thing they do with Dad.
Calling up, texting, or emailing trusted friends or family when I'm frustrated or need perspective.
Making sure the kids stay connected with their Catholic godparents.
Continue to reach out to other families and not settle into a clique.

Remember these kids are not just mine

My children are not mine to keep. They are beautiful souls entrusted to us for a time, but they are meant to become part of the bigger Church.
This concept is such a relief to me! It means that I do not need to mother hen them for the rest of their lives.
It also reminds me that my children ultimately have to choose to continue the faith as adults.
Faith formation is really about giving them as much of a foundation as we can so when the time comes to make their choice they are able to make a fully informed choice.

For me this looks like:
Praying for my children as individuals.
Praying for their future vocations and potential spouse.
Aiming to convey love and truth, not fear and anxiety.

Go over to the CWBN Blog Hop to read more takes on "Keeping our kids Catholic".

Do you do any of these things? What made a difference for you to stay Catholic?

A Tactile Prayer Life - Making Your Family Altar

I am a very tactile person when it comes to prayer. I like to have physical Bibles, prayer books, and rosary beads. This works out well when trying to teach little kids about prayer since they are very tactile too!

My greatest struggle with prayer is just starting! I have found having a family altar, or oratory, very helpful as a reminder that we should have prayer in our homes. Here's the typical things we have on our family altar.

Note: Apologies this will not have many pictures. Many of my liturgical items, kid faith art, and statues got crushed/beheaded in the move. A new opportunity for improvement awaits!

Crucifix

Nothing makes you think of Jesus more than seeing the guy himself in the moment of his crucifixion. Even young kids really get what the cross is all about when they see at least one crucifix on a regular basis.

Rosaries

Family rosary is never gonna happen if it's always proceeded by a scramble to find rosaries scattered all over the house. It also helps the kids to understand that rosaries are not toys when they are kept in a special place in the house.

Holy Family Statue

I really love statues of the Holy Family since they often show Jesus as a small child, and it seems to blow kid's minds that once upon a time Jesus was a little kid like them. It presents Joseph and Mary in their context as Jesus' mom and foster father which has helped my kids understand what the big deal is about them.

Candles

Fire is one of those magical elements that signal to kids "this is a big deal".
Having a candle stash by your altar is nice when you want to light a candle as a reminder to pray during a particular period of time during a day. Maybe someone is having surgery, is in labor, or doing a job interview. One more way to stay prayerful even when we have to attend to daily concerns.

I have three stashes of candles around my house: candles for prayer, candles for emergencies, and candles for ambiance/make the house smell pretty. I strongly suggest getting unscented candles for your family altar since it's sad to have to blow out a prayer candle that is making you nauseous.

Liturgical Year Items

These rotate depending on the time of year. I stash my blessed palms in a vase on the altar during the Easter season. We fill a red construction paper heart with the names of our loved ones who have died and place it on the altar for the month of November. There's a huge range of what you could do, but changing the look of the altar with the seasons has really helped my kids see where the differences are in the liturgical seasons.

Holy Water/Other Blessed Items

It's amazing how many blessed items a family can accumulate! In order to keep them together (and not forget they are blessed and should be treated differently) I like to keep them near our altar. Not necessarily on the altar since they are not all needed on a regular basis. A great example for this is the blessed chalk we use for the Epiphany house blessing. We only do the blessing once a year, but the rest of the year I need to manage not to use the chalk that is blessed as regular sidewalk chalk for the kids (because we did have father bless Crayola sidewalk chalk. It was on sale.)

Kid Faith Creations

The kids both participate in our Little Lambs faith formation program which sends us lots of super cute liturgical year crafts. Some of them are things I think are clever and useful for family prayer, and the kids get a lot of pride in seeing something they made go someplace as special as the family altar.

For more ideas about family altars, I highly recommend the book The Little Oratory: A Beginner's Guide to Praying in the Home by David Clayton and Leila Marie Lawler. It is very detailed so don't be afraid to take what you need and come back for more later.

This post is part of the Catholic Women Blogger's Network (CWBN) monthly Blog Hop! Make sure to click over to the hop to check out more posts on this month's theme: Different ways to pray - holiness in our daily lives.

Do you have a family altar? How to you like to physically live the liturgical year in your home?

That Time I Cried In Church - How Parishes Can Be More Family Friendly

Yesterday was the first time in a long time, perhaps the first time at this parish, that I had a run in with one of the church ladies of internet mom lore.
The ones who make it clear that they are tolerating your kids in mass, but that only extends as long as perfect silence reigns.
One wrong sound and the glares start.
Two and the snippy flares up.

We have been attending the 8am mass at our parish for a few years now. We are, typically, the only family with young kids at that mass.
That has been far and away a positive experience. Therese will pop across the aisle to sit with her "Grandma Helen" - the sweetest old lady you will ever meet who has adopted Therese as a spiritual granddaughter of sorts. I'm pretty sure there are two sprinkle doughnuts saved specifically for the kids at the social after mass, and people have gone out of their way to smile and be encouraging about bringing the kids to mass.

But then there is an event like yesterday, and I end up crying silent tears in the pew.

To get settled in the pew, I paired off with 2 year old Therese and my husband, Matt, got 4 year old John. Everyone was in good spirits and even doing better than usual. Therese was talking about her "singing book" (the hymnal) and looking to find the first song to sing. John found the kid page in the bulletin and was coloring in page.

The problem came when the woman I'm going to refer to as "church lady" came in late and slid into the pew directly in front of us.

John dropped one of the fliers from the bulletin, and Therese retrieved it from under the pew for him. *Glance back from church lady.*

Therese came back to me to start looking at the hymnal again.
*Second glance back from church lady.*

Therese went down the pew to Matt to ask for water.
Church lady turns around, gives me a look, and says, "Can you do something about your child?"

Can I DO SOMETHING about my child? Like what?
Gag her? Tie her to the pew? Make sure she is something adults never have to hear or see? She's asking for WATER (ya know, that human necessity) not having a screaming fit.

I just stared at church lady for a good minute, unable to say all of the things that were popping into my head. Things like, "Can you DO something about your lack of human charity?", "I'm sorry, this is not your private mass.", and, "You're welcome to find a different seat."

Instead I held my two year old in my lap, and cried big silent tears.

Because I'm pregnant and hormonal.

Because I had never before felt un-welcomed and unwanted in that mass before.

Because attending mass with little kids, much akin to flying with little kids, is HARD. It feels like a full contact sport some days, and I will spend most of mass working my butt off so to minimize sound or distraction for anyone else - often at the expense of getting to participate much myself. To have someone suggest I'm not even trying hit deep.

Then my little community went to work.

A lady a pew ahead of church lady invited her up to her pew, I'm guessing to prevent church lady from doing any more damage.

Grandma Helen got Therese to come over and sit with her a good portion of mass.

At the Sign of Peace, I turned around to find two guys I know had been sitting behind us the whole time. My first thought was, "Great, more people who know me just saw me cry in church. Fan-freakin-tastic." Then one told me not to worry about it, and I teared up again. Because hormonal, but also just so relieved to hear something encouraging.

I saw the woman who invited church lady up to her pew giving church lady a talkin'-to after mass. She also made a point to come up and tell me I had a beautiful family.

To all of y'all who helped yesterday, thanks for not leaving us to deal with that on our own.
Thanks for saying something and doing what you could.

No parish can prevent bad experiences from happening, but the little things matter to parents. Things that show us you think little kids might show up to mass at your parish.

I love that our parish has started having a kids page in the bulletin. They even provide little crayon packs to use.

I love that all of our concerts at the parish, including the ones with extremely good musicians, are free for all kids 18 and younger, and that kids are actively encouraged to come.

I love that we have a changing station in the bathroom. It sounds so simple, but I have been hard pressed to find one in most restaurants here.

I love that we have whole parish events that include kid specific activities, like the St. Patrick's Day party and parish BBQs.

I love that the priests make a point to say hi to the kids as they come in.

Those little signs add up to give parents the hope to keep coming, even when bad experiences happen. We can always keep improving and be better at serving the families who are raising our future priests, nuns, and parishioners, but I hope parishes don't neglect to make small changes. Just because they are small does not make them without impact to a family searching for a place to make their faith home.

St. Lucia Day 2016

Happy St. Lucia Day everyone!

This year we're having a very Swedish inspired St. Lucia day. Since I had Ballet commitments in the morning, and Theater in the evening, everything had to be relatively simple and easy. Here's the plan!

Saffron Buns!

This is probably the only recipe I do all year that uses Saffron, but it's worth it. I used this recipe this year. It has you grind the saffron in a mortar and pestle first and have it sit in the hot milk for 15 minutes. I think this really helped bump up the yellow color in the buns, which helps make it fun and different for the kids.

Books

Since John has been so very into chapter books lately, we're doing a longer book today. It's a blast from my past doing Kirsten's Surprise: A Christmas Story.

It covers the Swedish traditions associated with St. Lucia, while still being in the same vain as the Little House books that John currently loves so much.

We're also doing the story of the real St. Lucy from this book.

St. Lucia Wreath and Procession

I got my wreath from American Girl when I was a kid (because I was just a little bit obsessed with Kirsten). It has fake holly leaves and electric candles so we can safely process around the house with little people leading the way. John's head is finally big enough for it!

This year I'm trying to teach them the Santa Lucia song since Therese loves songs so much. If that doesn't work, I'll just play this while we have a little procession around the house with the wreath and saffron buns:

What does St. Lucia Day look like in your home?

Faith Formation For When You Don't Know How To Teach Faith

Linking up with The Zelie Group for JEI (Just Enough Info).

Faith Formation is an essential part of Catholic parenting, and I mean that quite literally (see CCC 2226-7), but so many of us have circumstances that may have prevented us from learning how to actually do Catholic faith formation.
Maybe you're a convert and didn't grow up with faith.
Maybe you grew up Catholic but now feel shaky about how to explain the teachings of the Church. Maybe you just never learned this stuff period.
There is hope! So many (dare I say, most?) people are in one of the above categories. So let's huddle together and figure this out!

1. Do your children attend your parish’s religious education program?

As far as I know, our parish only has formal faith formation for sacrament prep. Since my kids have another two or so years until First Communion, all the faith formation has to be done at home.

Our current at home program, Little Lambs from Family Formation, is ideally done as a whole parish program. The idea with that is 1 lesson a month is at the parish and it involves talks for the parents and grade level classes for the kids. For the other 3 weeks the lessons are done by the parents at home, drawing on the training they just had in the parish class.

We are loving doing the program at home, but there are lots of times when I can see how awesome it would be to be doing these with a least a few other families.

2. Do you or have you ever taught religious education? Tell us about it.

I used to assist in the 2nd Grade CCD class at my home parish in high school. 2nd Grade was our typical grade for First Communion and I loved getting to do things like practice commissions (a sister recommended Neco wafers as practice hosts).

Honestly, the best part was seeing the how incredibly excited all the little kids were for their First Communion. Little kid excitement is hilarious and adorable.

3. What are your favourite religious education resources for kids?

Obviously I'm partial to Family Formation, but here are the other things we use.

The Golden Children's Bible

We read from this pretty much every morning. It takes it's time telling the story, and I like how it puts the Gospels in sequence. AKA. Instead of having Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, etc. it tells the story in the order those events (probably) occurred. I think that makes it a lot easier on little kids to learn the outline of the Gospel stories in sequence.

CCC Saint Movies

I grew up with these movies, and I think they still win for teaching little kids about saints via media.

Magnifikid

The kid version of Magnificat, it's a monthly subscription geared for kids 6-12 years. 

From their website: "Every week, MagnifiKid offers:

• All the readings and the prayers of the Sunday Mass with explanations of the difficult words and the meaning of the rituals;
• A suggested prayer for Morning and Evening;
• Many suggestions on how to live the entire week with the Lord;
• Various games, a comic, and activities to help children learn about Christian life and culture;
• A page intended for the parents with suggestions for family prayers."

I could see this being a fantastic gift for a kid's First Communion!

But the ultimate faith formation resource is YOU! Nothing beats having a parent who is also learning and growing their faith. If you want a simple place to start, check out Catholic Truths for Our Children by Patti Armstrong. 

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Your turn! Answer the questions in our own blog post or in the comments. 

Here they are again:

1. Do your children attend your parish’s religious education program? 

2. Do you or have you ever taught religious education? Tell us about it.

3. What are your favourite religious education resources for kids?

Celebrating St. Francis of Assisi - 3 Easy and Cheap Ideas

Happy Feast of St. Francis of Assisi!

St. Francis is my confirmation saint, so I celebrate today as one of my personal feast days.

Growing up I had a big love for animals. They made more sense to me then the confusing gamut of pre-teen drama. I was homeschooled and just wasn't going to figure out girl code with a few hours a week of interaction with school kids. It's ok - I think I'm better for it.

Being outside with the animals was my element. I volunteered at the zoo, I was in the 4-H poultry project, and had awesome parents who let me take in the unwanted animals from family and friends.

Now we live in a little 2 bedroom apartment with no yard and a ban on pets. :(

It's not forever, but it is for now. 

Here's how we celebrate today! Lack of dirt, animals, and all!

Nature Walk

The single easiest way to celebrate St. Francis with kids - take a nature walk!

This is also what I do when I *need* to get out of the house, but don't have anywhere to go and don't want to spend any money.

From that time I took the kids to climb all over lots of big rocks. Also a good example of why I will never be a regular poster of selfies,,,,

I do a few versions of this, depending on the ages and temperaments of kids:

Sometimes it's a scavenger hunt with lists (can be a photography hunt with older ones.)

Leaf gathering, only taking things that are on the ground not the plant, to bring home and make leaf rubbing art.

Animal Search, Cat Count, Bug Find - we've come up with a lot of nature walk themes, but the point of all of them is to have the kids look at their surroundings in new ways and with a new appreciation.

And sometimes walks end with sitting in the middle of a farmer's market eating a cookie the size of your head. Appreciation was had!

 Green It Up

The Feast of St. Francis is a good opportunity to do a personal evaluation for some eco-friendly changes for your family. This does not need to be drastic - maybe this is the day you have a chat with your kids about taking shorter showers or eat some leftovers. 

I noticed when looking through my pictures of leftover meals that my response to needing to reuse something normally results in fry it, microwave it, add a sauce, or bake it with cheese.
I'm ok with this. It's delicious and less waste. Win!

If there is a big change you've been on the fence about making, today is a great day to start! 

Put that compost bin in the backyard, switch to cloth napkins, try some of those kinda weird crunchy mom things. I've surprised myself with how well a lot of it jives with my thrifty and busy life.

Have a "Dark Hour"

In line with the concept of being a little greener today, have a Dark Hour!

This is when you turn off all the things that use electricity that could be considered optional (my exception is the fridge/freezer and heat/cooling, in the event of extreme temperatures, because those are safety issues.)

That means no tech and no lights. 

Use the dark to have a holy hour! Pray the prayer of St. Francis together, sing songs, read books aloud. Shower of Roses has some great suggestions for books and coloring pages.

I recommend doing your holy hour about 3pm. 

Hour of mercy + still daylight + middle of the day when you're running out of things to do but it's too early to cook dinner.

#YouKnowYoureACatholicMomWhen...

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We'll also be celebrating with some extra dessert tonight because it is Therese's Baptism Day!!

Happy 2 years as a Catholic, Therese! 

JEI - Prayer Edition

Great news y'all!

The facebook community for The Zelie Group is now up and running! We have some fun ideas in the works, so like the page to stay in the loop.

This week on JEI (Just Enough Info) we're talking about prayer.

1.What are your favorite devotions?

I switch around favorite devotions depending on what kind of season of life I'm in at the moment.


I favor the rosary when I'm on the go, or when I have a baby that is in the will-only-sleep-on-a-breathing-person stage.
I re-re-(I can't even tell you how many times I've restarted) start the Liturgy of the Hours when I *could* slow down but I need to reinvigorate the discipline it takes to accept that that10 minutes would be better spent in prayer.
I do believe taking some time to have devotional time without small people crawling on me is important. I wouldn't count being a human jungle gym as quality time if I was trying to talk to my husband, why would it be fine when I'm trying to talk to God?

However, I DO pray with my kids. More on that to come!

2.Have any of your prayers been answered? Do you have any prayers that you are glad weren’t answered the way you’d hoped?

Oh yes.

Perhaps the biggest one was about my vocation.

When I was a kid, I had a strong attraction to the religious life. My parents were very supportive of this possibility, and when I was 12 I was able to spend a week at the convent of the Sisters of the Holy Family of Nazareth in Grand Prairie, TX. Just a short drive from where I grew up in Dallas.

It was one of the motherhouse convents, so the very old and the very young were all together. I lived in the Formation House, a part of the convent especially for those in formation and discernment, which meant some of the time recreation and group prayer was sometimes just with others at varying stages of discernment.

The sisters assigned us jobs like every other able bodied person in the convent. Mine was helping Sr. Mary Francis in the laundry, and occasionally in the convent library, shop, or museum.
I learned the rhythm of the convent days. It's where I learned how to pray the Liturgy of the Hours and how to chant.

I ended up coming back for a few summers, as well as Come and See Days. I entered the order as an Associate - a lay member who is pledged to assist the order through prayer and a commitment to living the spirit of the Holy Family.

The whole time I was praying about entering, but it was more like "what do I need to do to be the best sister I can be?" instead of asking God if this is what he really wanted for me.

My answer came one day during adoration. As best I can explain, I passed out and I had a total answer that God was not calling me to be a sister when I woke up. To this day I have a hard time explaining exactly what happened, but the certainty never wavered - this was not my calling.

And I was mad about it!

Religious life was what I very much wanted for myself, and letting go of that dream was rough.

It was a long road to discerning that married life would be my calling, and a funny story about how I finally came to accepting my vocation and meeting my husband. That's a story for another day.

3. How do you pray with your kids?

If you've been reading this blog for a bit, you might know I write about this a good bit.

Right now, we read a chapter from our Golden Children's Bible as part of our school time everyday. We pray before all meals - even Therese. I aim for at least one rosary a week with them.

We have mass study as part of my homeschooling this year. I'll have to write more about how I do that, because I'm really making it up as I go, but we use John's mass kit to go over different parts of the mass. The goal is for them to gain familiarity with the prayers and movements in the mass so it is easier for them to follow.

Here's three of my favorite posts about praying kids!

On inviting kids into the living faith of adults, and bring a prayer role model.

On the peace to be found in prayer with kids - even when it didn't go picture perfect.

Then just the sweet hilariousness that can come from kids during prayer.

 Your turn!

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Sorrowful Mysteries of the Rosary with Littles

Hope you enjoyed John's take on the Joyful Mysteries. Here's what it's like praying the Sorrowful mysteries with him!

Sorrowful Mysteries

1st Sorrowful Mystery: The Agony in the Garden

Me: This is when Jesus was in a garden late at night asking God, his father, to give him strength and maybe not have him die.

John: But Mom, we don't have a garden!

Me: Well Jesus found one.

John: ...Did he find the one at church? That's a good garden.

2nd Sorrowful Mystery: The Scourging at the Pillar

Me: This is when Jesus was tied up to a pillar and the soldiers hit him over and over again.

John: But those are knights!

Me: But why would knights hit Jesus?

John: Because they was....

3rd Sorrowful Mystery: The Crowning with Thorns

Me: This is when they pushed a crown of prickly hurting thorns onto Jesus's head and made him bleed.

John: I wanna take that thing and put all the band-aids on him. That'll make it better!

4th Sorrowful Mystery: The Carrying of the Cross

Me: This is when Jesus had to carry his big, heavy cross all the way up a very big hill. He was very hurt and tired, and it was a lot to carry.

John: He got splinters?

Me: I don't know, probably.

John: Jesus don't worry. Your momma will get 'em out and make you ALL better!

5th Sorrowful Mystery: The Crucifixion 

Me: This is when Jesus died, nailed up to the cross.
John: They put him in a cage?
Me: No, but they put his body in a cave after he died.
John: The soldiers do that?
Me: Yup.
John: Bet they're sad about that. Bet they sorry. They will go give Jesus big hug and say "I so sorry Jesus."
Me: He'd probably like that John.


So in general: John is really concerned about the roles of soldiers/knights (interchangeable terms for him at the moment) in the Passion. Valid.

Mysteries of Rosary with Littles - Joyful Mysteries

I've been trying to pray the rosary with the kids more often this Lent. They are currently 3.5 years and 18 months old so attention spans are short. In order to get through an entire rosary I have taken to making the rosary mystery announcement into an exciting little story.

All of them start like this.

Me: Who knows what the ___th _____ mystery is?
John: ME!
Me: What is it?
John: I don't know....

Repeat for all mysteries. Eventually, he'll say something besides I don't know. (Maybe? Hopefully?)

From there I tell a little story about the mystery. Because this is mostly to draw their attention back to the rosary, these stories have become kind of hilarious due to John's responses. I wanted to write them down before the kids get too big to do this anymore.

Joyful Mysteries

1st Joyful Mystery - The Annunciation

Me: This is when the angel Gabriel came to tell Mary she was going to have a baby!

John: Where?!

Me: A long time ago.

John: Is the baby going to want to play with my toys?

Me: John, the baby was Jesus.

John: Oh....so he only play with church toys then?

2nd Joyful Mystery - The Visitation

Me: This is when Mary went to visit her cousin Elizabeth to help her have her baby John the Baptist!

John: ME?!

Me: No, different John.

3rd Joyful Mystery - The Nativity

Me: The Nativity is when baby Jesus was finally born - Christmas!

John: Momma, it's not Christmas time. It's not Advent time. It is Lent. Time.

Me: I know John, but Jesus was still born on Christmas.

John: Oh, maybe he get presents later then.

4th Joyful Mystery - The Presentation

Me: This is when Jesus' mommy and daddy brought him to the temple. It was a very special day, like how your mommy and daddy brought you to the church to be baptized.

John: He got water poured on his head?

Me: No, that came later.

John: Oh good. Jesus not very dirty. He don't need no water.

5th Joyful Mystery - The Finding in the Temple

Me: One time, Jesus went missing for three days! He did not tell his parents were he was going.

John: What?!

Me: Yup. His mommy and daddy were very worried. They looked everywhere for him. Eventually they found him in the temple teaching the teachers.

John: He got in trouble?

Me: He got in a little trouble. But then he decided to be very good and listen to his mommy and daddy. He always listened to them after that.

John: Jesus was a good boy?

Me: I think so.

Let's hope John doesn't get any sneaky ideas from that last one. I'm hoping we cling onto the "listen to mommy and daddy" part.

Stay turned for the Sorrowful Mysteries!