I have read a bunch of blogger's posts about what they do for Halloween, All Saints, and All Souls, but they are almost always AFTER those days have happened. And I tend to forget before the next year. So I decided to write up my plans now so these ideas are fresh for anyone who wants to give them a shot!

I decided after my first Halloween in college that kid Halloween is the better Halloween.
Candy, costumes (the non-Playboy variety), and doing things just for fun. The kids got the better deal.

I figure other people about my age might feel that way too, and they might not have little kids of their own as a built in excuse for participating in kid Halloween.

Enter, the Catholic young adult Halloween party!

I theme it, decorate like mad, whip up a lot of food that is of the "looks cool but is secretly simple" variety, and invite ALL of the Catholic young adults I can find.
It's a hoot.

This year it's a Harry Potter party!

I've been reading aloud the first book to 3 year old John as a special mom and John only thing. I thought he wasn't listening too much, but some of the storylines have worked their way into his playing lately. (And the nerd time begins...)

He got to pick his costume yesterday (at the Dollar Tree). Behold Sir John!

I'm not sure if we're going to call him one of the enchanted suits of armor or make him into one of the ghosts.

Therese is going to be Dobby. As in the house elf. She is going to be a baby house elf! I'm saving that cuteness for the post-Halloween version of this post.

The extra creative fun part comes in for all of the days post-Halloween: All Saints and All Souls.
And John is finally old enough for my awesome ideas to go into effect!

On All Saints, you get to keep wearing your costume, but now you have been transformed into a saint!

John will probably be St. George, but we might find someone more obscure for funsies. Therese will probably be a beggar girl of some sort.

The highlight of All Saints is All Saints Dinner. I try to make a dish that reflects each of the individual saints. The fun part is the kids get to wear their costumes to dinner but (as much as age possible) they have to be in character. So if you are Roman, prepare for the pig Latin!

On All Souls the costumes get put into their "grave" (aka. the box I will hide at the top of the closet until the next rainy day) and we get ready to remember our dead.

I try to go to the local Catholic cemetery, even though we don't personally know anyone there. I make a red construction paper heart and we write down the names of everyone we know who has died. Our family altar will morph into a memorial altar with the paper hearts, I buy extra large white votive candles to try and keep burning whenever we are home during the month of November.

This year, there is a neighborhood Dia de los Muertos celebration just down the street from us, so we might participate in that. That involves a candle light procession and collaborative memorial altar. That obviously won't be distinctly Catholic, but it's about a pseudo-Catholic of a celebration that I can ever hope to happen in Berkeley.


So what are you doing to celebrate the trifecta of mid-fall holidays?

Ships, Slides, and Rosaries! - 7QT

Linking up with This Ain't the Lyceum for another round of 7 Quick Takes!

1

This is John looking very deep in thought. This is what he did before roaring at the pigeons. 

We went to the very last day of SF Fleet Week on Monday. They only had ship tours going that day, but that's all I really wanted to do with the little kids any way.

We saw this ship.

HMCS Calgary

She's Canadian, and had to miss the Sunday tours because it was Canadian Thanksgiving. Thank goodness we came on Monday. 

Everyone was very friendly, and John was only a little bit terrified of the diving gear and big guys in uniforms. 

2

Monday was also cool because we got our friend David, known as David the Jesuit to come with us!

Therese is a little groupie.

 He is a seminarian and fellow Texan, so we're obviously friends.

Thanks for hanging out with us! I feel like it should count towards priestly training to experience a day with littles. Maybe some penance.

3

Matt has been taking an evening bike repair class on Tuesdays. The kids are pretty fine with it until we are eating dinner. Then there is BIG concern about where Daddy might be.

When he does come home, it's a little like the world was crashing but now it's all better because DADDY'S HOME!

Lots of props to Matt for getting right down to baths and bedtime stories. I think they like it.

4

Giant spoons are not nearly as fun as squishing food with your fingers.

I have been trying to do a little more cooking with John. He seems to be a more adventurous eater if he can help make it. This week we made chocolate chip granola bars as our fun one.

Always remember to grease the pan! Syrupy sugary foods will become like concrete in the fridge.

I did figure out we could fix it by placing the pan in a hot water bath for small time increments until the spatula could start to lift the bars up.

Look at the delilicious! Totally worth it.

5

John went down the giant concrete slide for the very first time! 

I really didn't think he was going to do it by himself, but I didn't say anything about it. I went down first, holding Therese, and John had been behind me. When I looked up, and he was getting ready, I just grabbed the camera. 

You slide down sitting on a piece of cardboard. People normally leave a few there so it's easy enough to go even without planning ahead. But John is small, and he slid off the cardboard just after this photo was taken. Perhaps that was a good thing because that made him slow down for the fast part.

6

Our very first batch of rosaries ready for shipping!

October is the Month of the Holy Rosary, and our young adult group is celebrating by making rosaries for the Sisters of the Eleventh Hour. They bring the rosaries to prisons in the US and Mexico.

This is also one of the cheapest ministries ever! We get our supplies through Our Lady's Rosary Makers for roughly $10, including shipping, for every 50 rosaries.

Trust me, get the knotting tool. It makes it so much easier!

7

And it makes total sense to follow up making rosaries with trivia at the bar! 

If you don't know this by now, I'm a super nerd and trivia is my idea of a fun evening.

We really are going to make as many rosaries as possible and then go to trivia. 

Might continue making rosaries at the bar.

How great would it be if we got these hipsters making rosaries because they like crafting?!

UPDATE!

Apparently, I'm supposed to answer“Who is your favorite blogger that you discovered through Quick Takes?”

This is why you should always read the instructions.

Well I discovered 7 Quick Takes via Kendra at Catholic All Year. I'm pretty sure I found My Domestic Monastery via 7QT.

Though I would say I mostly continue to follow people I found through links on other blogs. Mostly because I tend to click on people with a pretty graphic or catchy title. 

On God's Time, But That Guy's Got a Sense of Humor

Linking up with Blessed Is She and #BISsisterhood, to talk about God's timing.

Our oldest child was born 9 1/2 months after our wedding. We get a lot of questions about if he was a "honeymoon baby", and subtle (along with not so subtle) inquiries about if he was an "oops".

Short answer is: not really and no. We had decided to "try to whatever" (TTW) for that cycle. We had no strong reasons to wait, but were not actively trying to conceive either.

It had occurred to me that having a baby at that point, my senior year of college and while I was writing my thesis and working as a TA and an Admissions Coordinator, might present some challenges. Not so much on not being able to do the work, that was fun at that point, but on being a pregnant woman at a school that tended to ignore the realities of reproduction.

My whole first trimester, I was a TA for Introduction to Women's Studies. You know, the class where we talk about women's issues all day all the time. I could not bring myself to tell anyone in that class for a while. When I finally did, they didn't believe me.

According to these women, pregnancy was hard, and scary, and potentially life threatening as a matter of course. I could not possibly be pregnant if I had been showing up for class, not sick constantly, and looking even more healthy than normal.

It was a hard, but enlightening discussion. A conversation that wouldn't have occurred if we had waited the more typical 2-5 years after the wedding to be open to conceiving. 

Reality finally set in for them when I came back for the last semester showing considerably more than in the Fall, but it continued to be an uphill battle to be seen as a capable person.

I'm not sure I would have had the courage to go through a pregnancy then if I had known the fight I was in for, but God knew. That guy knew the consequences of placing someone who challenged so many assumptions right smack in the middle of that class. 

I was there on purpose. I continue to be where I am on purpose - it's just not solely my purpose. And that's a good thing. It's how God keeps me from whimping out. He gets me.

Tourists Our Own Backyard: Alcatraz Night Tour

We have had quite the adventurous weekend! Here's the update on our adventures in being tourists in our own backyard. It helps when your backyard is already a tourist attraction.

All of the picture credit for this post goes to my friend Katie. She actually brought a camera that doesn't also make phone calls.

We live in an area that people travel from all over the world to visit. Part of the perks of living here is getting to do those touristy things whenever we get the hankering. 

Our friends, Erin and Alex, had gotten tickets as a birthday present a while back, and it was time to put those to good use! Three of the five group members had never been to Alcatraz before, and no one had taken the night tour.

Before getting on the boat to the island, there are mandatory photographs with an Alcatraz background. We made one with a real Alcatraz background.

 On the night tour, the ferry boat takes a slightly different route and goes the long way around the island. It means you can see more of it that is too dangerous to approach on land.

Like this area where you are almost certain to get Tetanus. 

 It's also entirely worth it for the sunset viewed from the bay.

The island has gone through a lot in it's history, and most of it has left marks that persist. During the 1970s there was an American Indian occupation of the island. Graffiti from that time is still found on the dock and on the water tower.

Once off the boat, you begin the night tour with the same audio tour visitors during the day experience. The English version is special because it is narrated by former guards and prisoners of Alcatraz from it's time as a federal prison.

Most of the cells are missing some of the standard issue furniture that would have been present when it was functional. Things like beds, sheets, cups, etc. But some are still maintained to give you an idea of what the cell might have looked like in the 1960s.

One of our special talks on the night tour was a demonstration of cell door opening. The roar of all of the doors sliding open, and the silence following, were haunting.

Matt demonstrating the listen and walk of the audio tour in front of one of the isolation rooms.

 It was an unusually warm night, but it can get very cold out on Alcatraz. If you plan to try this, we strongly suggest bringing a fleece jacket. That's the real reason so many people by San Francisco sweatshirts.

What it looks like to see San Francisco from the rock. According to the guides, when the wind is right, you can hear the sounds of the city (cars honking, people talking) from Alcatraz.

 The real perk of doing the night tour is getting to see areas that are not normally open.

For our tour, the main specially opened area was the Hospital.

Some of the famous inmates, like "Birdman", spent more of their time in this area than their cell.

Operating Room

 The last boat left at 9:25pm. Matt took pity on my history loving soul and took the earlier boat back to relieve the babysitter (I think he loves me!)

We might have had a little fun waiting for the boat. 

I saw this before catching the boat over. Cool, it's a model. But when we came back it had LIGHTS! It even has a moving light in the lighthouse, just like on Alcatraz. Now I'm impressed.

If you do get the chance to see Alcatraz while you are visiting San Francisco, make sure to reserve the tickets far in advance of your trip! Even for day tour, but especially for night tour. We had to make these reservations (October) in July.

But it's popular because it's really cool, and so far my favorite touristy thing in the city.

Sightings of Mr. Bad Attitude

Linking up with This Ain't the Lyceum for another round of 7 Quick Takes!

It's roughly mid-term time in this here college town. I always know it's here by sightings of a beast I like to call "Mr. Bad Attitude".
Mr. Bad Attitude has many distinctive behaviors.

1

He can be found obsessively washing 5+ loads of laundry in the apartment wash room. 

Yes, he does need ALL of the machines. 

No, he can't possibly hold off on one load.

2

He finds all unexpected noises irritating, but especially the laughter of kids. This creature has been known to slam his window in a huff with the not-so-whispered swearing just to drive the point home.

3 

One would think this means the creature is holed up in his den studying, but this is contradicted by the theme songs of all of the Netflix binging. This is ascertained by the clear sound coming through the walls.

4

Occasional sightings occur in daylight, but these are sad sights. He is normally looking a little lost, and clutching a large coffee and maybe an energy drink. He appears unsure if he meant to go to class, sleep, or cry.

5

Sometimes he can be found in the beer aisle at Safeway on a vain search to find the beer he loved on study abroad when he made straight A's! You refrain from commenting. Very very much effort is expended to refrain from commenting.

6

You begin to suspect this is like male PMS. Maybe it just needs the right food? Maybe you can make cookies and leave them outside his home!

But then you worry he might be gluten free. And maybe sugar isn't the thing to give for this particular ailment anyway.

7

Then the glorious day comes when all is silent on the western front. Exams have been taken! Rejoice and be glad!

The happy happy day is announced by the early morning scuffling of packing and the slamming of doors in the rush to catch the airport shuttle. 

That day is today my friends. Raise your coffee mugs to all those who have survived their scrape with Mr. Bad Attitude! 

He'll be around again, but for now I can let the kids play as loud as they want and do laundry without any of it getting put, badly, on top of the machine. Freedom is here!

Living Faith: It's Gotta Be Shared

Linking up with Blessed Is She and #BISsisterhood to talk about Living Faith.

Like most other people, I go through ups and downs of faith. I also have periods where particular aspects of the faith are more appealing than others.

When my husband was traveling, I got really into the Liturgy of the Hours - like really into it. It felt like if I clung to this structured communal prayer of the Church, then I could rely on their strength to get me through the hard parts of the days and nights.

In that time, the part of my faith that was about joining with others in prayer was alive and well.

However, I didn't let anyone see me. I didn't share this expression of faith with the little ones occupied for ten minutes with water and beans in various containers.

Now, I am going to say that I think it is important to do some of your prayer alone. Some things are very intimate like that. But what I was doing was making ALL of my prayer alone.

So I decided to change that.
I brought a bin of quiet (until the 3 year old gets them anyway) toys into my room, and let the kids pray around me while I said the office.

The first two times, John spent a lot of time trying to distract me: playing with my hair, tickling my feet, trying to turn the pages in the book.

But by the third time, they both got quiet during the chanting parts.

By the fifth time, John was trying to match the tones - shyly and quietly off to the side.

By the sixth time, John starting bringing a little book of his own and kneeling down with me (not actually a prayer book, but hey, effort!)

I was listening to him play while I changed the baby the next morning, and John was carrying on a conversation with his stuffed animals that went like this, "First we gotta go into mama's room. It's the CHURCH room. It's where we sing our Jesus songs. Because I love you sooooo much!"

Even though we have been working on learning the prayers, celebrating the liturgical year, and reading bible stories most of his life, what made John really grasp the faith I am trying to pass down was inviting him into MY faith. Into MY prayer.

It's not enough to make "kid-friendly" versions of faith and prayer. What kids really need is to be invited into the living faith of adults. If we are to have any hope of passing down the beauty and richness of the Catholic faith, we must be willing to be role models of adult faith.

It's perfectly fine to have saint crafts and kid level bible stories, just also make sure to let the kids see the faithful adults we are meant to be.

HOMESCHOOL PRESCHOOL: LETTERS B AND C

This is an ongoing series on our homeschool preschool adventures. You can read more about what curriculum we're doing and why here:

What Little Kids Think About Homeschooling

Doing this "letter of the week" type curriculum has led me to REALLY notice how uncommon certain letters are in the English language. I is sneaky. It's a vowel, so it appears often, but is still uncommon as a beginning letter. Therefore our week really centered around ice and insects.

This was one of those weeks where I went off book a lot.

Take, for example, our illustrated letter I. I've decided to save each of the letter sheets and make an alphabet wall in the kid's room (will update with a picture later!) That really only works with making the letter out of, relatively, long lasting objects. Most of the recommendations for I were making the letter out of ice or icing - not really going to work on my wall.

Instead, I had John cut out "ice cubes" out of blue construction paper and glue those onto our traced letters.
I have zero pictures of this because I took the opportunity for longer preschooler activity to make dinner. Sorry, dinner wins.

I have been following the youtube channel What's Up Moms for a while now. One mom made a video back in the summer about ice activities with kids. I decided to try out ice painting!

Each cube is between 1/3 and 1/2 paint and the rest water.

I used some paints I found on the side of the road. Yea college town!

Remembering to put toothpicks in the cubes halfway frozen would make this a lot easier. I just had John wear some latex gloves and he got a solid lesson in what it is to hold something frozen!

I made a black ice paint. That was stupid. John liked to cover all of the colors with black, but I got this picture before he finished his plan of color annihilation. 

Once we finished with the week, it occurred that many of those Frozen (movie) themed activities and food that have flooded Pinterest would be super applicable for this week. Oh well.

We did lots of insect hunts! We found an Insect eyewitness book at the library as a kind of kid field guide, and John carried it with him all over the neighborhood.

Finding the multiple colonies of flying ants was not my favorite part of the week, but John LOVED it.

That is not spilled rice. Nope, nope, nope.

We did learn about the difference between arachnids and insects. John was very interested in the builder insects: bees, ants, etc. 

There is a farmers market on the next block from us once a week, and there is a honey booth. Being Berkeley, the beekeeper brings empty hives, different honeycombs, beeswax blocks, and beekeeper equipment with him to show to curious little kids. John was fascinated by the honeycomb that was somehow made into these perfect little shapes by the mouths of bees. 

There were not too many I books on the list, but John did like Inch by Inch by Leo Lionni.

A bug that is also a measuring tool? John was sold.

Catch the previous installments of this series:

7 THINGS THAT HAPPENED THE FIRST WEEK OF PRESCHOOL HOMESCHOOL

HOMESCHOOL PRESCHOOL: LETTERS B AND C

PRESCHOOL HOMESCHOOL: LETTERS D AND E

YOSEMITE!

PRESCHOOL HOMESCHOOL: LETTERS G AND H