Advent

This past Sunday, of course, was the first Sunday of the season of Advent.  Advent marks the beginning of the liturgical year, and this year's Advent is even more exciting, because it ushered in the new Mass translation.  This Sunday was actually our Traditional Latin Mass day (offered once a month in our area), but I was so excited for the new translation, I also went to Vigil Mass Saturday evening.  The most awkward part was remembering to say "And with your spirit" instead of "and also with you," but even with that, the changes were no big deal, and much to the dismay of dissident catholics everywhere, the Church didn't implode and we uneducated lay people managed to understand the Mass (even with "big" words like "consubstantial!")  We attended TLM as usual the next day, and again, it was so lovely and refreshing to see how much more faithful the "new" translation is.

Luckily, Advent hasn't been commercialized and secularized as Christmas has.  The downside is it can be more difficult to underscore to children that Advent and Christmas are two different liturgical seasons.  Advent is meaningful and important, and deserves to be celebrated and appreciated for what it is, a time to prepare our hearts and souls for the coming of our Lord, rather than treated merely as a necessity to get to Christmas.  It's a deeply spiritual time and I personally feel it's very important to reflect that in our daily lives during Advent.  It does not take much time or effort to develop a simple Advent lighting ritual in our homes.  We have a wonderful book of Catholic Devotions that has many devotions for the liturgical year.  It has many wonderful devotions for Advent that we use every day.  Every evening we gather as a family to light our Advent wreath and pray.

 (O Come O Come Emmanuel, a beautiful hymn based on the December 23 Antiphon)

Another way I like to honor Advent is by holding off on the tree.  I would personally prefer not to put it up until December 24th, but my husband and children like it up earlier, so we compromise by putting it up on December 17th, with the start of the O Antiphons.  We may decorate with evergreen and simple lights, but I try to hold off on the things that are explicitly Christmas-y.  And of course, there's always the nativity!  We set up our nativity, less the baby Jesus and the Magi, at the start of Advent (although this year it isn't up yet, as it's packed away and hasn't yet been found!)  I love the look of the nativity scene during Advent, with Mary and Joseph patiently awaiting the Christ Child.  

We are so blessed in our Catholic faith to have two thousand+ years of  rich tradition to draw off of.  What Advent traditions does your family observe?

Happy New Year!

I hope it's a good one for all of you!  I had to add in our Christmas picture, since I hadn't posted it before.  Aren't they adorable?!  I love them all so much, thank you, God, for blessing me with them!

I decided that one of my new year resolutions should be to make at least two blog posts a week.  So see, already succeeding at at least one of my resolutions!

I'm also using Good Reads to track one of my other resolutions, increased reading!  Please add me as a friend if you're also a user.  Right now I'm reading The Dark Tower by Stephen King and Eat Fat, Lose Fat by Sally Fallon and Mary Enig.  I'm thinking of starting a separate blog for the traditional foods weightloss, it's a pretty involved lifestyle and has followers of all types (who might not care about reading about my kids, faith, homeschooling, etc, but would be interested in commiserating with others follow EFLF!)  We'll see.

My little man is not so little anymore!  He was weighed on Monday, coming in at 10lbs 12ozs and 21 1/4 in!  That means in a month since birth he gained over 3 pounds and grew 2 inches.  Yowza!  I must be making pure cream!

Isn't he handsome in his little sweater vest?  He was getting dressed up for the "baby sprinkle" that my friend (and neighbor!) threw for us.  So nice of her!  It was a nice day.

38 weeks 1 day

I hate that I'm feeling so impatient and done being pregnant, considering I still have 13 days until my due date!  I didn't start feeling like this with the others until around my due date.  Maybe that means he'll come early?  HA!  I wish!  Oh well, there's nothing I can do about it but wait.

Yesterday I took the girls out to Fair Oaks Farms for the day. Tyson worked the night before so he was sleeping, so I asked grandma if she wanted to come along and help me keep the kids wrangled.  It's only about 45 minutes from us, but we had never been!  The girls had a great time.

Of course, as usual I forgot my camera, so I had to use my cell phone!

Where the cows are milked.  The girls called this the "cow merry go round!"  I don't think Riley could see much of what was going on, but she's a happy camper and loved the bus ride.  We got to ride all around the dairy farm on a tour.  We also got to see a baby cow being born at the Birthing Barn!  Apparently mom had some trouble because two people attached tethers to the baby's legs and yanked him out (it seemed like it took forever and it was painful to watch!  Poor mama).  Grandma asked Bailey later if she had learned anything, and she said "yeah- cows having babies is disgusting!"  (She refused to look, she preferred to look at the one that was already out!)

Rory and I conquered the "string cheese maze" while her sisters bounced on some huge pillow thing.  She cheated, though!  Going under the ropes :)

So that was yesterday.  Today we're going to Latin Mass with Bailey, then dropping her off at grandma's with her sisters and doing some baby shopping (STILL no student loan, but we got some money from a class action law suit against Tyson's former employer, so at least I can get a changing table and a few other things!)  Then out to dinner sans kids for my birthday, which is tomorrow (I will be 28!)  Tyson finally got our bedroom painted and I've got most of the baby's clothes washed and folded in a box, so I'm excited to get a changing table and get the room all set up for him!

I did get some canning done, a few more pints of pickled peppers and a couple pints of peach butter.  So sad I didn't get any tomatoes this year, but oh well!

School's Here!

Well my two oldest survived their first week of school!  Bailey is on her third year of homeschooling, and Riley entered Kindergarten at the local public school.  I know it seems strange to have one in public school and one homeschooling, but it's what works best for them for this year.

I was worried sick about Riley.  She's seriously visually impaired (she had an evaluation from Indiana school for the Blind and her vision is so bad she'll have to learn braille) and mildly developmentally delayed.  It's a small rural school, and while they have had special needs kids, of course, they've never really had any kid with such a significant visual impairment.  And of course, she's still not completely potty trained because of her stroke, and it's embarrassing for her.  She got tearful when I dropped her off the first day, but when I came to pick her up she said she had fun, and she seems to be enjoying it!  Check her out on her first day, isn't she adorable?

Bailey had a pretty good first week of third grade, too!  Generally 9 year old whining and about some things, but overall she did a good job, and I think she enjoyed most of her books.  I was worried I might have tried to take on too much, curriculum wise, but we were able to get everything done in a total of about 3 hours, which seems like a good time for a third grader.