Novena: won't you STILL join us?

Do you mind continuing the prayers asked for here ?

After we finished the novena to St. Joseph, we started up again ... and on Tuesday (April 7th) of Holy Week we got an offer on the house in Colorado!

Actually, we received THREE offers on the same day. They were pretty good offers and we chose the best with a closing date of May 11th (exactly two months after we started that novena to St. Joseph and five days into a novena to Servant of God, John Paul the Great).

We started the process of canceling utilities, autopayments and HOA fees and were all set for next Monday's closing. Yesterday evening we got an email from our realtor: the buyers ran into a snag and needed to postpone closing. Thank goodness we have a realtor who is pretty tough -- the powers that be wanted to push closing off to the end of May but he pushed for sooner. So, now we've got closing pushed back one week.

On the 18th of May -- which happens to be Servant of God John Paul the Great's birthday -- God willing, we will close on the house.

Please continue to pray to both St. Joseph and John Paul the Great for us as we head down the homestretch to finish off our Colorado adventure and really begin our Virginia one!

THANKS!

YES!

The good Archbishop of Denver, Most Reverend Charles Chaput, wrote a wonderful column last week. Go ahead and read it and think about it and let me know what you think!

Thoughts on a ‘new beginning,’ and an old truth

A friend of mine begins each new day by praying briefly over the Ten Commandments—and not just each Commandment individually, but also the way in which our tradition structures them. The first three Commandments outline our relationship with God. The remaining seven proceed from the first three. They establish our duties to one another. There’s a very good reason for this. The First Commandment—I am the Lord your God; you shall have no other gods before me—is the bedrock of Judaism and Christianity. All of our Western beliefs about the sanctity of life, human dignity and human rights ultimately depend on a Creator who guarantees them. In other words, we have infinite value because God made us, and no other human being or political authority can revoke that infinite value. Only God is God, and there is no other God but the God of Israel and Jesus. Every other little godling that poses as an answer to human suffering and hope—from Wicca to fortune telling to pop psychology to political messianism to cult spirituality—is finally an impostor and a road away from God’s light. Only God is God. There is no other.

I mention this because we live in an age that sees itself as scientific, reasonable and enlightened. In a sense it is. It’s certainly true that science and technology have improved the quality of life for millions of people. But as C.S. Lewis wrote in “The Abolition of Man” and his novel “That Hideous Strength,” science doesn’t necessarily kill off superstition or barbarism. In fact, the three can get along quite comfortably. As the Christian moral consensus has declined over the past century, and science has made spectacular strides, people haven’t become more logical or morally mature. The opposite has happened. The 20th century was the bloodiest in history, and today the occult is flourishing in developed nations—especially among young people who’ve lost the vocabulary to understand the gravity of the forces they play with. Knowledge is merely knowledge. Power is merely power. Nothing inherent to knowledge or power guarantees that it will translate to wisdom or justice or mercy.

I remembered these things as I read, and reread, some lines from President Obama’s inauguration speech:
“We will restore science to its rightful place, and wield technology’s wonders to raise
health care’s quality and lower its cost. We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories. And we will transform our schools and colleges and universities to meet the demands of a new age. All this we can do. And all this we will do.”

I then compared them to the opening words of another text, “Dignitatis Personae: On Certain Bioethical Questions,” issued last month by the Holy See:

“The dignity of a person must be recognized in every human being from conception to natural death. This fundamental principle expresses a great ‘yes’ to human life, and must be at the center of ethical reflections on biomedical research, which has an ever greater importance in today’s world.”

The world sees our new president as a man of intelligence, confidence and promise. He needs our prayers. He arrives at, and he helped create, an important moment in American history. But what he does with it remains to be seen; and what exactly he means by “[restoring] science to its rightful place” when it comes to embryonic stem cell research and other troubling bioethical issues will help define the moral character of his presidency—or the lack of it. Only God is God. There is no other. The rightful place of science, like all human activity, is in the service of human dignity, and under the judgment of God’s justice.

Not bad, eh? It's not hard when someone explains in these easy terms!

Bless you, Archbishop Chaput!

House: We need a miracle here y'all!

Dear prayer warriors ....

9 months ago I came to you with a prayer for our house in Denver to sell as dh had just accepted a job helping to start up a brand new high school here in Virginia. We're loving the school and being in Virginia, but we still haven't sold the house in Denver.

Right now we're leasing a town-house but with little ones, renting is quite stressful as every ding, bump or spill on the carpet is nerve-wracking. Our lease isn't up until June, but in March we need to tell our landlord whether we want to continue renting.

Also, we will need to do the long-haul drive to Denver this summer to work on the house if it hasn't sold by then. Altho it would be GREAT to see our Denver friends ... we'd rather they visited us here!

We've started looking at our options here and because the market is very depressed here, we have some great options -- both in-town homes or out in the country a bit with some land (and thus, space for the boys to get out all their excess energy). There are some really great places but we are stymied until we can sell our home in Colorado. We have been such "nomads" for the last dozen years that we'd like to put down roots, figuratively and literally here in Virginia.

So please, please join us in prayer that we're granted a miracle and someone wants to buy our house for a fair and just price and SOON! Also, that we're able to find a good house here, for a fair and just price, and that we're able to help a family out here in Virginia by buying the house they need to sell.

As always, we pray for you and yours daily ....

Christmas: on the ninth day of Chrsitmas ...

... my true love gave to me ...

a lovely morning Mass together than a few hours back at the "ranch" as it were and then he and I spent the afternoon reveling in the glorious Winter sun and driving around the foothills looking at possible houses/property once our house in Denver sells.

It was so much fun putzing around ... spending time together ... looking at homes that would be wonderful to finish raising our family and then retire to ... homes with amazing views ... homes with lovely history ... homes that could accommodate our family now and then later too!

But, we still wait for Denver to sell, so for right now ... it was just a beautiful afternoon out and about ...

Finishig up with an easy dinner or baking frozen pizzas and eating leftovers from our feast over the last few days ... watching another Foyle's War and just enjoying being home for Christmas Break.

A great ninth day of Christmas!

Musings, meditations and a bit of whining ...

... as I sit here at 1:50 am ...

the house is silent... we've brought in the New Year and I'm catching up on my reading of the Magnificat for this evening. Fr. Cameron (OP, of course) has some great meditations in this issue.

But what really strikes me and mine tonight is the example of Simeon and Anna -- both of whom waited and prayed ... prayed and waited for God to answer their pleas. They never gave up ... just kept praying the same prayer and it was answered with the birth of Jesus in a Stable in Bethlehem!

We have waited since end-of-March-2008 for the sale of our home in Denver. We have prayed novenas to St. Joseph, beseeched the help of Mary and prayed directly to God ...

... but our house still remains un-sold.

But tonight (or rather, this morning), I find hope ... hope in trusting that God will answer this prayer in His time ... not in mine! As Fr. Cameron puts it:

What at first seems like refusal on the Lord's part is in fact an invitation to greater ardor. Jesus blesses us with the chance to show Him how much we rely on Him and how little we can depend on ourselves.

In other words ... when we've done all we can ... all we have left is prayer and asking God to take over!

Please join us in praying for God's will to be done in the sale of our house in Denver!

Where should we go today?

Well, if you're my kids with friends from Denver who have a relative on-staff at the White House .... you go to the White House for a one-and-a-half-hour personal tour on an overcast Sunday afternoon!

Here's a photo-essay of the lovely children who got to go where none of the rest of us have been ....

String Bean, Bam-Bam (who went and had coffee with Dad as he was too young to go in), LegoManiac, and our two friends from Denver
String Bean, Kotch (who took the other pictures) and LegoManiac
Ready to go already!
Maybe one of these days, one of mine will be in the White House ...

Was I a bit saddened not to be able to go? Well ... yes and no. I would have loved to go and see the Nation's leader's house, but sending the kiddoes off with dh allowed me almost six hours of getting lots of writing done!

Weekend: Fun-filled and exciting

This past weekend was one of those we'll remember for a long time ...

1. We've been doing a PGWodehouse/Jeeves & Wooster unit for the last month or so -- reading marvelous stories, watching fabulous Jeeves and Wooster videos. On Friday night -- yep, St. Athanasius' feast day -- we started watching "Wodehouse Playhouse" which are hilarious 30 minute shows done in the 70s by BBC actors John Alderton and Pauline Collins (who are married in real life) and introduced by a 95-year-old Wodehouse. You have got to see these shows!


2. We went to the Rockies game on Saturday night; it was the pitcher's debut and the poor guy didn't do too well and we had to go to the Bull-pen quite a bit that night -- as did the Dodgers, so the game seemed to go on forever (but then, we'd gotten there 2 hours early to watch batting practice).

We were able to see the beautiful home-runs hit by Holliday and Hawpe! Since it was Catholic Schools night, the good Archbishop Chaput threw out the first pitch -- and he looked pretty good! Even better, Kotch and her high school chorus group sang "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" during the 7th inning stretch. I'm thinking this is the closest any of mine will come to actually doing something on a major league baseball field!

3. On Sunday, we were able to attend Confirmation Mass at our Parish with our most excellent Archbishop Chaput -- he gave a phenomenal sermon and did a great job with the 8th graders who received this sacrament. Our Church also placed a large "10 Commandments" memorial that the Archbishop blessed (after having chatted with the confirmandi for almost an hour).

4. We didn't stay for the reception after Mass but instead headed out for a picnic! Yep, we actually had weather yesterday that was sunny and in the 70s! We're hoping we don't see anymore snow ... but then, this is Denver and you just never know....

Hope your weekend was as nice as ours.

Denver: EUREKA!

I FINALLY have the answer for all those who want to know how we can leave beautiful, dry, sunny Denver:
These pictures were taken this morning -- that is, May 1st at 10:00 a.m.! Yep, that would be snow on the Feast of St. Joseph the Worker: "May Day" has long been dedicated to labor and the working man. It falls on the first day of the month that is dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary. Pope Pius XII expressed the hope that this feast would accentuate the dignity of labor and would bring a spiritual dimension to labor unions. It is eminently fitting that St. Joseph, a working man who became the foster-father of Christ and patron of the universal Church, should be honored on this day.!

St. Joseph, the Worker and Foster Father of Jesus, please pray for us --

particularly for a timely sale for a fair and honest price!

Colorado: Yep, this is April!

Taken this morning at 6:15 a.m. -- hard to imagine we're more than half way through April! Of course, it's supposed to be in the 70s this weekend (after being in the 80s on Tuesday!) ...

I guess the adage is true: "If you don't like the weather in Denver, wait an hour as it'll change"

Colorado: This is APRIL??????? Updated at Noon

Yep, still snowing at noon today ....

Colorado: This is APRIL???????

Believe it or not, these pictures were taken this morning, April 10, 2008 at 6:45 a.m.

... and it's still snowing over an hour later! Spring in the Rockies I guess.

Anniversary: 10 years of bliss and adventure!

10 years ago, on the Feast of the Annunciation (March 25, 1998) a 5-year widow with two children said "I do" to a man with three children of his own. We decided to build a family together, under the patronage of various saints, but particularly under Our Lady! And we've been having adventures ever since:

9 different countries visited
8 years of homeschooling our various children
7 road trips back and forth to the south-east
6 different mailing addresses
5 children with us on most of these adventures
4 houses bought/sold AND 4 schools we've helped to start-up and expand
3 babies born for a total of 8 children in our family
2 different continents lived on
and
1 wonderful, day-long date just us two to celebrate our 10 years of marriage -- morning Mass at our parish church, visit to the Denver Art Museum's Inspiring Impressionism followed by an amazing lunch at the Museum fancy-schmancy restaurant, tour of the historic Byers-Evans house, a tour of two historic churches -- St. Elizabeth of Hungary and Holy Ghost where we were able to participate in the Divine Mercy chaplet -- and capping off with the best Southern Barbeque I've had in a long, long time at Jim & Nick's in Stapleton.

Here's a picture of us last year at the High School Prom where we chaperoned (and my first ever prom!). It was an especially nice anniversary this year as, with Easter so early, we're all on Spring Break this week and so will continue to "party" with the kids thru the rest of the week.

City Living: Trash Day

So here we are in what many say is a "second tier city" -- not one of the biggest cities but definitely not a town. Trash day is once a week, with recycling every other week. The recycling bins are great -- nice, big, hearty plastic bins on wheels that the truck just comes along and picks up and dumps and moves on. It's amazing to watch how quickly they can recycle two weeks worth of our recyclables (and the bin is ALWAYS full to the brim!).


Now, what about the trash cans? We have a metal can that we line each week with a plastic bag -- this keeps things nice and clean. When we put our can out on the curb, we tie off the bag so the trash man can simply lift the bag out of the can and toss the bag (and all our week's trash) into the big truck. Sounds simple, easy, neat -- doesn't it?


But does our trash man do this?

Apparently, our trash man feels the need to fling our can onto the street after it's empty .... with a plastic can, this is not too bad an idea as the cans are a bit flexible and they bounce rather than crunch.

But this is what happened yesterday when our trash man decided to fling our metal can:


You'd think a car or truck had hit our can -- but I can state for a fact that this was not done by a car or truck but by our trash man as I was home when the trash man cometh and this is how he left it!

Why can't our City Trash just give us cans like the recycle bins? We certainly pay enough in city and county taxes for the weekly chance to have our bins bouncing all over the street. This would save the trash truck lots of time too as they have the mechancial arm to pick-up, dump, drop all in one fell swoop!


BTW, we HAVE to have a metal can because in our "second tier city" we can't kill the squirrels which are so hungry they gnaw through the plastic cans and into the garbage bags ... not a pretty sight.




But our squirrel problem will be the subject of a long post at a later date -- I have a strategy up my sleeve to rid my household of the dreaded squirrels!

Birthdays and field trips

Yesterday was Columbus Day -- one of those weird holidays that banks and feds get but very few others. But, lo and behold, this year dh got Columbus Day off. But, even better, it was dh's BIRTHDAY so we were able to celebrate in real style ....

First, early morning tea/coffee for my dh and I ... followed by presents from the littles. I had taken them to the dollar store and they each picked out something that linked with Dad:

• Bam-Bam got him a set of metal cars so when they have car races, Dad has his own cars


• String Bean got him a 250 piece jigsaw puzzle that shows a little girl harvesting from a garden (something SB LOVES to do with Dad!)


• LegoManiac got him Peeps -- my dh, who has done lots of food science coursework, think Peeps are second only to chocolate as the best candy. And they're wonderful for Peep-wars!

We then walked to daily Mass. When we got back, we had to do a few car races and Peep-wars (while I cleaned up and did some laundry) than it was off for a day of adventure with Dad.

We went to the Denver Zoo -- which is a great zoo (if you can ignore the totally non-scientific "evolution is fact" signs scattered throughout the primate area. Dh and kids went on Friday and bought a season pass ... with the size of the zoo this makes great sense as you just can't do it all in one day. We rode the carousel and zoo train, saw the elephants and coatis and just generally had a grand time (even if they weren't selling any kettle corn for us to eat!).

We then popped over to the Denver Museum of Nature and Science (which is basically next door) and had some lunch and then checked out the Native American and Egyptian exhibits. BTW, dh was impressed by the kids' knowledge of egyptology (we've been studying ancient Egypt this year). Another exhibit that dh hadn't seen is the "Russian Gem Sculptures" -- about 20 sculptures carved by Russian emigre Vasily Konovalenko, depicting Russian folk life. Very cool and easily missed as it's tucked away on the 3rd floor of the museum -- but definitely worth the hunt to find!

We ended the day with dinner and chocolate cake -- and finished watching the movie, Saint John Bosco. This is an Italian dramatization of the "apostle of the youth's" life story -- and had the family enthralled througout the 200 minutes running time! It's dubbed into English so we didn't have to "mess with" subtitles. Definitely a great family video.

Just all and all a wonderful real learning day to celebrate dad's day-off and his birthday!

Today, the Church celebrates ...

... the Feast of the Annunciation, when Mary gave her YES to God and the World was changed forever.

I love this image of the Annunciation that I found on the Internet -- but I don't know who did it. Any guesses from my readers? It's absolutely lovely with the blues and reds. It is also one of the few Annunciation pictures where Mary's head is slightly above Gabriel's head -- showing that she truly is Queen of the Angels.

For a field trip we went to one of the older parishes here in Denver -- Annunciation Catholic Church -- was established in 1883 and the current church dates to 1891 or so. The stain glass windows are amazing! We came home and did a stain glass craft -- a couple of those suncatcher kits where the plastic melts within the metal frame and looks like stain glass! These are much harder to do than they look but the kids are pleased with the results so that's ALL that matters. They also understand a bit about how careful glassworkers had to be to get the real stain glass windows to look so good so many years later.

[NOTE: the Feast of the Annunciation is March 25th; when it falls on a Sunday (as it did this year) the feast is moved to Monday. It's also dh and my anniversary, so we have double to celebrate!]