{a review} prayer pillowcases, aka, the dream whisperers

Now I lay me down to sleep,

I pray the Lord my soul to keep,

May God protect me through the night,

And wake me with the morning light.

I relished those lispy-whispered prayers when my girls began saying them, first because precious, duh, but second, because it meant that they were finally, finally going to sleep. And I could finally, finally go to sleep.

But God laughs at our plans, right? And chuckle He did when He graced me with a child who doesn't like sleep and another who struggles with vivid dreams spawned by an overactive imagination.

We follow a routine of blessing the girls' room, blessing their sweet little foreheads with holy water or oil, and praying for the protection of their angels and St. Michael as they go to sleep. We've found that this comforts scared little imaginations in the middle of the night.

And then I went to Edel and was gifted with a Prayer Pillowcase in the fantastic swag bag they gave us. My girls were enamored with it. They wanted to take it out immediately and play with it, but I'd already mentally gifted it to a goddaughter of ours. As the girls kept begging for it, I realize what a gift these pillowcases could be and how much every precious Catholic child would love them.

I contacted Prayer Pillowcases and a sweet lady named Leane didn't think me crazy and agreed to do a review with me.  Leane was not only professional in our correspondence, she was personal. She was a friend (holla Mystical Body of Christ!).

She told me to have our girls pick out a saint pillowcase each and she would send them our way. I figured Molly would go the standard route of St. Therese and Ellie would follow suit and pick St. Joan (their beloved favorite saints, respectively). Nope! They surprised me and asked about the saints they didn't know and fell in love with some new stories. I sent their choices to Leane and she graciously and promptly sent me their pillowcases.

I was going to play a guessing game to see if y'all could guess the saints, but then I realized my photographic skills included taking pictures of the names of the saints on the pillowcases. Easiest game ever.

Pretty happy!

Or really happy - look at that face!

Or really, really, really happy.

Molly fell in love with the prayer that was on St. Kateri's pillow. My sweet little girl struggles with being timid and afraid to try new things. I can tell when she's scared because she tells me, "Mommy, I know God is with me so I'm not scared. Nope, I'm not scared. God is with me!" I can't tell which touched her heart more - St. Kateri's story or the prayer on her pillowcase which focuses on courage. Either way, she has a new favorite friend in Heaven, thanks to her beloved pillowcase!

Elisabeth picked St. Cecilia because she said she was beautiful. I'm not about to question a four-year old. She's grown in her love of St. Cecilia and her story and I've finally learned how to spell the name Cecilia, so it's a win-win-win.

What I particularly love about these pillowcases is that the prayers on them are written with children in mind. The prayer focuses on the virtues that the saint lived in her life, all while helping the child overcome common struggles of being, well, human and figuring out this big, sometimes scary world. And the words are simple for a young reader to read, understand, and hold close to her heart.

After I forced the kids to take too many pictures without the pillowcases being out of their packages, the girls were finally allowed to put them on their pillows.

New game. Who can tell if my children loved them?

I tried so very had to get a picture of both girls with their pillowcases prominently displayed. Little hands and big pillows don't mix. BUT in good news for everyone out there, it means that if you have a big pillow, these pillowcases have got you covered (ba dum ching...pun definitely intended). But for real - our pillows are bigger than the standard size and these pillowcases leave plenty of room for a bigger size if your head desires anything more than flat.

If only this meant she was sleeping. Instead, she was scooting across the floor. Isn't that what you do when you get a new pillowcase?

Prayer Pillowcases doesn't brag about this on their site, but their goodness is multi-faceted. Not only do they provide their owners with a beautiful place to rest their heads, but they provide religion lessons for homeschooling mothers who have no idea what they're doing. 

Poster Catholic homeschooled children. Also, be still my heart.

Religion lesson for the day - listening to Glory Stories CD of St. Kateri and St. Cecilia (which coincidentally are on the same CD, which we didn't know before this!) and drawing pictures of their new Heavenly friends.

My husband asked if I was going to blog about any negative aspects of the pillowcases. I told him I didn't have anything negative to say about them.

I might have something. It's tangential, but I have to be honest.

These pillowcases do not enhance any artistic skills of one's children.

Ahem.

St. Kateri

St. Cethelia, aka St. Cecilia.

But they do inspire a modernized version of Butler's Lives of the Saints, coming to a store near you nowhere in the near future.

Playing Mario with Daddy and new friends. This was not staged, promise. They love these pillowcases this much.

These pillowcases have quickly become beloved treasures of our girls. 

We try to surround our children with toys that point their hearts and imaginations toward Beauty, and Truth, and Heaven, because after all, this earth is just a stopping point before we go to our Heavenly Home and we want our children on the right path. We're surrounded by so much junk in this life - TV shows, songs, toys, and clothing that threatens to drag our children's souls down to their base level rather than elevate their souls and hearts to God. 

These pillowcases are on the forefront of fighting that battle.

Elisabeth (the overactive imaginer) has told me that she's woken up at night scared, but she just prayed to St. Cecilia and she felt better and went back to sleep. Molly's told me that, when she wakes up, she says her prayer to St. Kateri, and when she's done reading at night, after I tuck her in for the night, she sits up again and says her St. Kateri prayer again. 

Joining us on our road trip two weeks ago were Jaggie - beloved kitty friend, and St. Cecilia pillow, taking up much room in our tiny car, but much-required by it's adorable owner.

My motherly heart sings at the joy that my girls are learning, through the simple gesture of having a saint's picture on their pillows, the comfort of turning to Our Lord and His saints in moments of need.

And y'all - my motherly heart also sings at the quality. Seriously. I've washed them and they look just as good as they did when we unwrapped them. These are the real deal. They are adorable and well-made. They're all made in the good ole USA, too, using a Direct-to-Garment process. The ink is non-toxic and completely safe for those precious little heads sleeping on it. 

As the holidays approach, definitely keep these in mind for the children in your life. Our Lord commanded to let the little children to come to Him. The folks at Prayer Pillowcases have truly taken this to heart and made a product that helps lead little souls to the comfort of Our Lord, His Blessed Mother, and His saints. 

I'm going to pretend that my godchildren's parents don't see this because they are wonderful gifts.

Oh! 

And BONUS quality about these pillowcases: If you're anything like my uncrafty self and dread Halloween and All Saint's Day costumes, take heart that Molly's dressed up as St. Kateri at least half a dozen times and insists on dressing as her for Halloween (x2 for All Saint's Day, thank goodness). So pick a saint whose look is easily made into a costume and gift your child a pillowcase today, before October hits. :)

Go shop-happy and visit the kind folks at Prayer Pillowcases! They have free shipping, fantastic customer service, tons of options, a personalization option, and are really, really well-made. 

They have this Catholic mama stamp of approval. Which is pretty much a laity-version of the Imprimatur. 

One more thing, because I can't get enough of these pillowcases and I want y'all to know how much I love them:

For those family members and friends who kiddos are at their local Catholic school, there is a fundraising option! Move that World's Not-So-Finest aside and use these instead. They are fantastic AND CATHOLIC!

Laity-impramatur over. Go shop. 

7QT: in which I brag about my better three quarters

One.

This is what it looks like having a six-year old. This was taken at 6:30am, after we had dropped Joseph off at the train station and I toyed around with the idea of being lazy. I put a load of laundry on our bed, switched over laundry, came back and found this miracle of miracles. 

I've seen a series of blog posts hosted by a mystery blogger about having a seven-year old in the house and how it's changed the dynamic of the family. I agree - every baby should come with a six/seven-year old holding her. 

BUT, I don't remember the blogger or the name of the series and my internet search is turning up creepy results so I quit. Which means the second half of the take is useless to you, but I've talked to my people and I'll update when I find out what blog it is. 

Update: The Rhodes Log! My people came through.

I can't even remember life before Ellie turned about one and it's still sketchy before she turned two. I'm praying that if God blesses us with another little one one day, I'll actually remember those early years. 

Two.

This is what it looks like to have a competent six-year old. And a pile of unmatched sox. This blue contraption is something every family needs to own. It's an investment that is priceless. It gives you the gift of free hands while your children slave away. 

Three.

This same six-year old wrote me this note today and it made me a little wispy-eyed. She began drawing me 100 hearts underneath, decided to cross them out because there wasn't enough room, draw them on the back, but cut it down to ten hearts and label them 10, 20, 30, etc. because she thought I would be more impressed with the multiples of ten. I appreciate that. And underachiever with a good reason. Just like her mama

Four.

I have a lot about Molly and have to throw a few about Ellie in here, too. She's been keeping up with Molly's lessons pretty well and is eager to catch up with big sis. She's determined to read and read right now. She's also super good at math. 

And since Fr. Mozzie ruined the whole "make a copy of the worksheet" thing I wanted to do, I've had to handwrite her worksheets. In pink, of course. She loves them and excels at them. She's a precocious four-year old but has the attention span of, well, a four-year old and doesn't stick around for lessons too long. I'm good with that.

Five.

A few weeks ago, we were torturing ourselves by school supply shopping with the brick and mortar crowd when Ellie screamed out, "POPE FRANCIS!" I stopped and looked around (and consequently almost got trampled but I digress). She directed my attention to the above picture. She was so excited to show me the picture of where the Holy Father lives. 

I love having precious, though misinformed, Catholic babies who know more about Rome than the US. 

(PS - to the state of Texas who may be reading this, we have begun our required Good Citizenship course.)

Six.

If I'm going to quick-take about the two littles, it's only fair that I quick-take about this guy.

He's brilliant, and loving, and patient, and on the fast track to sainthood because he's married to moi. 

And sometimes he's annoying because he wears his socks like this, simply to be annoying.

With sandals. 

Seven.

But fashion disasters, aside, he's great. And he has a blog where he writes about things way smarter than the things I write about and in a way that is easy for his fellow attorneys who are agnostic, atheist, Protestant, liberal, aggressive, and lost to follow. Because that's what he does in his spare time - he dialogues with non-Catholics to flesh out their questions and concerns about Holy Mother Church and our beautiful Faith. Unlike his less charitable half, who hides in the shower so I can read a chapter in my latest book without the kids interrupting me. 

So, go visit his blog and flex those brain muscles a little today, k? Great.

Go visit Jen for more Quick Takes and pictures of a GORGEOUS vintage dress that I want.

on homeschooling

I went dark. Again. That whole keeping you on your toes thing.

Or I'm a homeschooling mother who has no idea what I'm doing and can't plan and schedule for the life of me.

Or there is so much bad going on in the world right now that it puts me in a Bad News Coma. It makes me close the computer and curl up in my bed with my girls and a good book. Lord, have mercy on this world. It's too much.

Or all of the above, except the first one.

I sometimes/often/all the time get anxious about the goings-on in the world.

Remember how Sherlock Holmes (I'm talking BBC not Sir Arthur because let's be real) was described as not being uppity, but genuinely just not understanding the way the rest of the world thinks? I've come to realize that's us. I just don't get it. I don't get how the culture in which we live can just continue to seep further and further down the Crevice of Gross and everyone is okay with it. My husband met with some acquaintances for a beer recently and tried to bring up anything other than sports with them. Nothing. Not that they didn't want to talk about it - they literally hadn't even heard of the goings-on in Iraq. Hadn't. even. heard. How is a person okay with that?

In good news, when I get overwhelmed with homeschooling and think that I just can't do it, all I have to do is flip open my computer, see the news, and then suddenly, I'm revived and I'm convinced there is no better option for our two precious, innocent daughters.

There is a light in my world and I cling to it tightly, especially as I watch too much darkness overtake so much of our culture.

Those eyes. Swoon.

The pride and timidity about the first time without Mommy as a teacher. Be still, heart.

I am not an academic genius, though my husband might be able to claim that. But guess who's in charge of their learning? Moi. So my method is clinging tightly to Our Blessed Mother, who most certainly played a very large role in the education of the Child Jesus. And passing out worksheets while listening to an audiobook.

No one, aside from our Heavenly Father and Our Blessed Mother, loves my children more than my husband and me. No one knows their emotional, spiritual, academic, and social needs better than we do.

Sound advice from a dear friend.

We know there are struggles we have and hurdles we have to overcome. We know there are people that doubt our choices because of how timid our daughters are.

Let me lay this out there for you:

I've you've had doubts about our choices, we've doubted more.

If you've worried about our choices, we've worried more.

If you've talked about our choices with a loved one, we've discussed it more.

We survived Day 1 of co-op on a Holy Day of Obligation. Ice cream was non-negotiable.

But we also know triumph. 

The triumph of watching our child mastering a concept.

The triumph of seeing her meet a goal that she's worked hard at for days or weeks or months - the moment when a light-switch goes on in her heads and she just gets it.

The triumph, no, the joy, of watching her overcome herself every single day in order to sacrifice for her sister, or for her education, or for her holiness.

The triumph of watching her grow in wisdom and virtue.

The triumph of getting the community pool all to ourselves because public school is back in session.

Our field trip to Dollar Tree resulted in...

A science experiment which required goggles so they could swim underwater. Or I just found them for $1 each.

Blue-eyed beauties with their swimsuits on inside-out. And backwards

And because it's Five Favorites Thursday, I'll throw in my five favorite talks that convince me homeschooling is our best option, over and over again:

Five - terrifying. Just terrifying.

Religion lesson for the day. Overachiever.

Four - bear with me, it's a long, long Lenten Mission, but it's amazing and stresses the importance of songs and stories in the shaping the faith and education of our children.

Hmm...how to turn this photo. I can't figure it out.

Three - entrust your children's education to the avowed Protector of The Faith. We pray for his protection daily, as we begin our day.

We also love the scapular.

Two - how a battle fought centuries ago encourages me to homeschool, I'm not sure, but it does. Listen for the win.

Catholic nerdom in the house.

One - the most influential talk on homeschooling I've ever heard.

Field trip to the great outdoors....or Hobby Lobby because it's August in Austin.

We're not claiming that our girls will grow into the brightest, kindest, holiest children ever to grace the earth. We often hear the argument that we can't protect them forever.

But I can introduce them to age-appropriate lessons on difficult subjects by a proper authority. And pray really hard that they go the way of Provers 22:6.

That's all we're doing and that's all we're promising to do - teach them about our big, fascinating-but-sometimes-scary world with the greatest amount of love that we can.


Link up with the delightful Heather for more favorites.

in which I let you know who we are because I never have

A couple of new readers have reminded me that not only family reads this now, so they suggested I start from the beginning of our family life.

Here's a little background that I started and shockingly didn't finish:

How we met, part one.

How we met, part two.

I'm nothing if not a blogging quitter-quitter, chicken dinner.

(During this time, Joseph worked for the Dallas DA's Office and I went underground [and by that, I mean I dug just deep enough to use initials instead of real names? Like that's going to stop a criminal going after the guy pushing the paperwork and his family?]. Sorry for the confusion - not going back to change names to protect the ridiculous!)

Aside from that those, I guess I haven't given much background. 

My name is Melanie and I like warm hugs.  Not really. I'm pretty touched out by the end of the day by little hands who love warm hugs. To be clear, I love those little warm hugs, but you need to not give me a warm hug after 8pm because I will curl up in a corner and ask you to please please please just leave me alone for five minutes or my life might come to an abrupt and painful end.

But I digress.

I was born and raised in El Paso, Texas, which I lay little to absolutely no claim to. Just before I turned sixteen, we packed our bags and moved to Arlington, Tejas where I lived until I graduated from being an annoying punk teenager, at which point I moved to Lubbock to attend Texas Tech (hence the love here on ye old blog)...where I continued the trend until I was probably a junior in college.  Memories of all pre-kid days have fled my memory, so this part of my life is short. 

Let me sum it up for you:

From EP to Arlington to Lubbock to DFW to Lubbock to DFW to Austin with a few side trips to Houston.

Nowadays I'm a homeschooling, stay-at-home mama of two beautiful, perfect, huggy little girls, ages six and almost five. 

I also fail at selfies. It's a short arm thing.

So instead I send my sister photos like this to make sure I don't have Texas hair. I did, for the record.

I read like books are going out of style (which, thanks, Kindle, they kind of are) and reward myself for doing a mundane chore or breathing by reading another chapter or seven in whatever book I'm currently devouring. 

I sew poorly but I mean well and I'm slowly improving if you don't look closely at my stitching.

I hate Pinterest and just found out that Instagram is a not a photo-editing website, so you could say that I'm pretty good with technology. As long as you are lying when you say it. 

I'm in love with the beauty and elegance and reverence at the Traditional Latin Mass and our spiritual lives hinge upon our understanding of the Faith through this rite. It's beautiful.


Joseph, the patriarch of our family, is six-foot-two giant of a German man with a wit and sense of humor to match his height. His speciality is turning the mundane into the pun. He uses his wordsmith skills by day as an attorney with the Attorney General's Office and by night, to discuss subjects far over my head with those wandering about searching for Truth. While we watch White Collar and I laugh out loud over blog posts and Catholic memes. 

It's a yin and yang kind of relationship we have.

My better half with the two-mini better quarters

Joseph has received the fictional annual award for the past seven years for being the absolute most easy-going and loving husband every created, minus maybe his namesake. 

The original saint.

The future saint.

Especially because he does things like this for me. It's called family unity, y'all.

He likes books that are smarter than I can understand, arguing to bring about souls to the Church, playing video games, Euro games, and good conversation. Most of all, he loves Our Lord and His Holy Church and is a faithful, strong leader of our family. I'm blown away by this guy.


We had our first-born eleven months after our wedding day. She came into the world stubbornly and continues her streak today. Molly Rose is our old soul in a six-year old body. She's thoughtful, kind, quirky, silly, stubborn, brilliant, and naturally drawn toward beauty and good.

She's a little shy and a lot perfectionist and working hard to overcome these so she can live it up in Elmore City footloose and fancy-free (I kid - she just doesn't want to be the flower on the wall and is working so heart-warmingly hard to overcome her shyness). She's in first grade and still doesn't comprehend what a grade is. She loves learning and flies through the material faster than my laziness wants to teach it.

Footloose and fancy-free

Her favorite color is pink and her favorite toy is Snood, her stuffed bear that has a Russian accent. Her favorite saint is Therese and her favorite prayer is the Prayer to Saint Michael. She hated sleep as a baby and hates it more now that she has piles of books waiting to be read from the hours of 7:30 - 10pm. The bags under my eyes tell the story pretty well.

Awake and reading.

Awake and adorned.

Awake and starting first grade. (Also, this was our first day of school but pretend it wasn't because this was the best picture I got so I'm going to redo them and fake it til I make it.)

Awake with a sleeping friend.

Seventeen and a half months after Molly Rose made her grand debut, Elisabeth Grace made her own grand entrance. She was a quiet babe and has remained mostly so, but only because her older sister does all the talking for her. She's such a joy - full of laughter and goofiness and quirkiness. I often overhear Molly say, "Ellie, make me laugh." 

And you shall laugh.

She plays it cool most of the time, but underneath her sunshiny blond hair hides a steel-trap that remembers every single thing. She's a brilliant little girl who is starting kindergarten a little early because of her November birthday and because she keeps up with her older sister in her lessons pretty darn well. 

On top of the world

She has a free little spirit and a sensitive little soul, feeling others' pain as acutely as if it were her own. She's quick to make a friend by going up to whomever is in the vicinity and saying, "Hi, I'm Ewwie and this is my sister Moe-wwy. Want to play with us?" as her shy older sister hangs back and admires the handiwork. 

The goof, the cute.

Her favorite color is purple because pink was taken and they refuse to share even ideological things; her favorite toy is her stuffed kitty Jaggie who is a girl because her cousin Aidan tried to play with it once, claiming he could because Jaggie was a boy - Ellie has been adamant every since in mentioning that Jaggie is a girl. She loves Saint Joan of Arc and the Morning Offering. She's our good sleeper and as such, I have dubbed her Golden Child. 

Exhibit A of Golden Child

With new gremlin buys

And that's all, folks.

7 Quick Takes: in which I have nothing of interest to report again

One

My first take was going to be about Kelly's sweet boy and getting him a sweet new ride for the beach. But Catholic generosity blows me away and donations were so forthcoming that the goal was surpassed and Bonnie shut it down.

Soo....

What I'm saying is finding seven things to quick take about is hard and I'm leaving it.

Two

I've lost all sense of self-identity this week. 

I worked out. And by worked out, I mean I biked for about 2 minutes and 48 seconds and did squats until it hurt (so we're looking at a timeframe of about half a squat). 

I don't even know myself anymore. And I can thank Danielle Bean and her fun little book Momnipotent that I got from Edel. I've been poolside each afternoon this week and she compelled, inspired, and guilted me into exercising. 

Let's see how long this will last, shall we? I'll give you a hint of my bet:

Three

Our inexperienced homeschooling family is starting our well-respected and established co-op in one week from today. One week. In one week, I will be flying around the house like a maniac trying to figure out how mothers who send their children to traditional schools (eh....less traditional schooling? because home education is the more widely-used form of education if you're looking at the macrocosm of social history?) do it every. single. morning. Kids getting dressed and us leaving the house before nine am? What sorcery is this? 

Four

I stumbled upon this link this week, probably a week or so later than the rest of the online world. But in case your head was buried in sand or curriculum shopping, here it is for your reading pleasure.

I often (always) find myself saying, "we only have two so far." I recently met one sweet mother of eleven and when she asked if I had any children, I answered my typical "only two" response. She stopped and gently put her hand on my arm and said, "dear, you don't only have two, you have two." I told her that Joseph and I so desperately want more children and then when we married, we expected to be the parents of a dozen children - we told everyone that we would happily take however many children God would deem fit to send our way. This mother reminded me that two is what He's given us.

It was such a small gesture on her part, but I've thought about it a lot.

I'm objectifying my babies!

The lady that wrote the article went to Edel, as well, and probably encountered more than one mama who feels guilty and sad about having few children. In conversations there and after, I've found that there are many Catholic mothers who reluctantly bear the title, "Mother of Only..." and struggle with feeling caught between the world and the Church.

I'm going to make a concerted effort to recognize that, at least for now, God has deemed me fit to be a mother of two little girls (and one precious wee one we didn't have a chance to meet) and only those little souls. 

Who's with me on not introducing myself as "I'm Melanie-and-we-don't-believe-in-contracepetion-contrary-to-what-my-family-size-may-suggest." It was awkward rolling off my tongue anyway.

Five

I'm getting to do a really fun review next week and I'm hoping if I get enough feedback that I'll be able to get y'all a discount code or do a giveaway in the future. So, stop by next week to see some mediocre photos of some really great products! And comment it up so we can hopefully do a giveaway!

Six

It feels weird blogging about fairly unimportant (or actually completely unimportant of you take note of the second take) when so much suffering is going on in the Middle East. Please just write yourself a sticky note, tie a string around your finger, or Siri up a reminder to pray for these poor, suffering souls. I think Heaven is handing out many a martyr's crown lately. 

Seven

On that note, I'm out to go elbow and tackle some people out of my way while I back-to-school shop. Technically, back to school for us was three weeks ago, but I'm never one to turn down a good deal and a weekend free of tax. I'm willing to splurge one dollar on ten bottles of glue (10 cents, y'all. Ten cents.) and fight a few frenzied mothers to be a well-prepared educator.

Once again, visit Jen for better quick takes. 

in which i battle my inner bruce banner and dowager countess

So this weekend was great. It was the first weekend in many a weekend that we haven't had anything on the agenda.

(Sidenote: can you tell I started this on Monday? It's only Thursday. Consider my back patted for my timeliness.)

In a strange turn of events, my parents invited us to go to a bar with them on Sixth Street. The last time we were on Sixth Street is when my remarkable navigational skills ended us smack dab in the middle of the Keep Austin Weird Poster Children convention. Insert locking of the car doors now.

We played shuffleboard, as any healthy thirty-year olds would do on their Friday night and were home in time for our 10pm bedtime roll call. I call that a win-win-win.

On Saturday, we decided to be spontaneous and invite some friends over. Usually the minutes that follow the breaching of that subject resemble the fallout of Waterloo, complete with emotional exile for my poor saintly husband. I become some kind of hybrid crossbreed between Bruce Banner and the Dowager Countess. I want everything to be perfect and lovely and hospitable and I want it like that right this very giant hulking green second.

But this weekend was different.

How, you ask?

As it turns out, cleaning schedules aren't awful.

Contrary to my free-spirited-cleaning former self, I've been sticking to a cleaning schedule. And encouraging (does that sound better than enforcing?) the girls to follow the one I set out for them, as well. Try not to be floored with my acquired fortitude.

Don't be fooled by these sudden leaps and bounds in the domestic arts. I still panicked because we had no food in the house worthy of being fed to guests. And the above shot is clearly from a computer because we ran out of ink a month ago and I keep forgetting to order more. And since I'm one of those people that will add an item to a to-do list after I've done it just so I can mark it out, you can rest easily tonight knowing I will back-print these lesson plans and daily chore sheets so I can mark off all that we've done over the last month.

Aaaaaand any other subject for 500, Alex.

Gist of my really long story is: find a cleaning schedule that works for your family and you'll be light and happy forever and ever (and possibly won't turn into the Balrog when your husband suggests having a fun and fancy-free evening in with friends).

The above planner is the result of hard work by my husband.

Correction, the above planner is the hard work of myself. It probably took me three hours. When I showed Joseph, he duplicated the exact same thing, only better, in about forty-five seconds. I hate/love him.

This is the result of Joseph's hard work.....

....that I somehow messed up. Notice all the little scary triangles with exclamation points in them? July - the calendar Joseph created for me - didn't have that. Then I decided on an impulse that I would help Joseph out and just quick make the August calendar (again, no ink...why bother?). A couple of little clicks, a few keystrokes, a few neglected kids and hours later (let's be honest) - bam. A calendar filled with terrifying triangles judging me on my computer skills. I'm thankful to know that I just have to show Joseph and we'll laugh a little! We'll talk a little! We'll share a drink and toast! And then he'll fix what I messed up and then redo the entire month of August.

We decided to create this little planner for our homeschooling whims and needs so I can have a paper trail to prove that I haven't completely messed up my children. I had hopes of buying a wonderful Catholic one to remind this well-intentioned-but-forgetful mother of upcoming feast days, novenas needing to be said, and intentions I've promised to pray for, alongside our academic and family obligations. And then I saw the price tag and added that cost to the cost of co-ops and curriculum and my heart fluttered a parting wave to the planner and I told Joseph to go ahead and just work his magic and make me one.

This one includes a monthly calendar (as pictured above, sans scary triangles) with daily and monthly prayer intentions, feast days according to both the modern and traditional calendars (we party like we're Catholic around here); a daily schedule for more detailed planning; lesson plans for each child (as pictured above the above) that has space for our daily chore check-list, a weekly cleaning schedule,  and each child's chore checklist; an attendance sheet so I can prove that we done did school for 180 days, Texas.

I have hopes of including a printed-out set of morning and evening prayers, novenas for each month's feast days, a meal-planning sheet, and a household management section (which will include all or probably none of the following: passwords, frequently-used business information, clothing sizes, etc.). I'll have a binder that I'll put it all in and frequently kiss and pet because its just so beautiful. And all my homeschooling woes will fly right out the window into the clouds that I'm prancing upon when thinking of this planner.

So, Joseph will get right on that for me. Right after we order ink.

seven quick takes: prayers for the middle east, tips for success in homeschooling and making friends

One

Please remember to pray for the persecuted Christians in the Middle East. The Priestly Fraternity of Saint Peter, the order which Joseph and I are closely associated with and love dearly, have called for their apostolates to make today, August 1st, a day of prayer. Happy coincidence leaves Joseph able to visit our beautiful FSSP parish in DFW, so he's able to partake in Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament. 

Meanwhile, back on the home front, I fed the kids cake as part of their breakfast, but I didn't eat any, so there's an equal amount of sacrifice and prayer going on here. 

Two

Molly, our oldest (for my new Edel friends), woke up before anyone else in the house today. I found her quietly sitting at the dining room table, fully dressed in a maxi skirt and tucked-in shirt (her mama's sig look), her hair brushed and adorned with bows and hair ties. 

Six is a good age. Parents of younger children, there is a light - a very, very bright one - at the end of the toddler tunnel. 

And it looks like this:

And it is good.

Three

Speaking of the six-year-ex-fetus above, this is beautiful. Pro-abortion advocates simply cannot deny the humanity of a child in the womb. They can deny humanity and personhood to that baby, but they cannot deny that that child is a human. 

Four

One of the Facebook groups I'm in has a thread discussing a book club. 

4.1 - I used to be in a few book clubs and I miss it. Any local takers?

4.2 - I need something that doesn't involve me wanting to curl up and rock back and forth and deny that I ever read the words that have forever been seared into my memory. 

I've been reading Unbroken, can you tell?

The first part of the book is absolutely doable; the story is woven into a fascinating tale and the author makes even the most mundane parts of Louie's life sound incredible. I burned through it. But then he gets to Death Island. And I just can't follow him there. 

I've long since had a problem with reading non-fiction because this stuff really happened to a real life person. I know this is obvious to everyone else in the world, but I just can't seem to remember this fact until I'm living in a perpetual state of anxiety attack; it takes about a day worth of nausea for me to realize I can't dodge the storm cloud hovering over my psyche and the cause is the non-fic sitting before me. Back to my happy lit it is.

Five

Speaking of happy fiction....here's something that borders on fiction, with how infrequently it happened in the last year.

Behold, our school calendar, so craftily put together.

Pintrest domination.

I had ambitious plans, a la Shower of Roses grandeur, to have our calendar background to coordinate with the liturgical year colors, and then I remembered that Jessica Gordon I am not and I just quickly pinned the calendar to a plain old background and patted my crafty little back.

We've done two weeks of school. Two weeks, y'all. I did skip a day because...closets and house blessing....but I made up for it and we finished our first two weeks. Holla at the homeschooling queen. 

Six

I should note that the first two weeks of school are solely focusing on the core subjects (reading, writing, arithmetic, religion) and look like this: 

• Wake up at a decent time
• Eat a decent breakfast
• Let mommy drink a cup of coffee, for the love of all that is holy
• Get dressed and do chores
• Fight over doing chores
• Fight some more over chores
• Finally sit down to study
• No, you can't have a snack
• Get through morning prayers and religion lesson
• (Am I teaching them enough religion? That went really quickly....)
• Start calendar time 
• Grimace that my children still STILL don't know the difference between year and date
• Survive that lesson
• Math lesson that drags on and on and on because the four-year old insists on doing it, too
• Reign in impatience at Saxon 1 because it's teaching the same thing over and over
• Remember that this is foundational math and not beat head against the wall
• Feed the natives lunch
• Clean up from lunch
• Consider a nap and desperately wish for one
• Remember this is real school and get back to it
• Give my children a handwriting worksheet and read them a saint story
• Sing a song and call it music
• Tell my first grader to read to my kindergartner while I hide in a quiet place in the house
• Collapse on couch and convince myself homeschooling is the best option

As you can see, our days aren't hectic and it's probably less than most families do, but we survived two weeks, so shake my hand and pass over the gold medal, because I'm proud. Look for updates on the other fifteen subjects I felt were necessary for our kindergartner and first-grader to learn, as I'm supposed to be starting them next week or so. Emphasis on the so.

Seven

We had our parish priest over (did I mention that seven thousand times?) and he kept asking us if we knew "so and so" and we'd say...."Um, no." After about five of those answers, he said he was determined to get us connected with the Catholic community in the Austin area. He said it's hard to get plugged in, but once we do, we're *in.*

So, connecting us he's doing. I got an email from him the next day, cc'ing half a dozen other families, introducing us to them.

His intentions were good, his intentions were good, his intentions were good.

I already have a reservation on a that hole in which I can hide next Sunday, don't worry.

But props to the parish priest that encourages/forces a congregation to be a family. 

I've long waxed eloquent on our other parish priest (we kind of jump between two parishes...welcome to being a Latin Masser), Fr. Moses, for coming up to a group of us talking after Mass and quietly saying that there is a new family at the parish and we will go introduce ourselves to them, thankyouverymuch (and I think his eyes were giving the subtle hint that this was under pain of severe penance the next time we entered his confessional). I really, really appreciated that from him. And I think the new family did, too. I've been that new family....we are that new family. Vom to being that new family who now has friends. -_-

Check out Jen's post for better quick takes!