Ordinary Time

It's kind of another ingenious stroke of God to organize the happenings of Christ's life to allow us some "down" time between the major events (perfect, as always). Some of us call that "Ordinary Time" and while it's never ordinary to live in this world as a Christian, it usually means we're not in major preparation for Easter or Christmas...still, life being life, there are always "extra"ordinary moments.

Things break...

Our house is over 100 years old and, yes, there are always things needing to be fixed. It is a solid house, though, so it's usually something that can wait...not so with modern conveniences. Around Christmas, our dishwasher developed a crack in the basin, turning our kitchen into a small lake each time we ran it. (it made me laugh a bit because we seemed to have the same problem growing up...my mom claimed it was good because she got to mop the floor and wash the dishes at the same time...I need to work on that kind of positive attitude!).

We were able, after a few weeks, to have a new dishwasher appear and fix that problem. Truthfully, I didn't mind it all that much because DH and I spent 30+ minutes every evening over the dishes, talking about our day. Perhaps that was the point.

Next up, the oven. Thankfully, it was only the coil that cracked and not something more dire but it was dramatic when the coil broke and burst into flames for a few moments. Fast forward another two weeks and that, too is fixed. In the meantime, I was reacquainted with the joys of crock-pot and on-the-stove-top cooking...lots of good things to be had there!

Crock-pot ham with mustard/brown sugar glaze. Yum.

Chicken Soup was perfect for the snow on Saturday!

 Taking a break...

We are, thankfully, in a hiatus from Catechesis of the Good Shepherd. I'm not thankful for missing the classes because all the kids love it and I have 90 minutes of prep time each week(!) but I don't miss the 40 minute drive in the dark/cold...it's nice to be a homebody for four weeks. During the hiatus they offer family Masses each Wednesday night. It's a great activity because during the homily, Father comes down in front of the altar and talks about the Gospel on kid-level. Our little people love that special time and attention from the priest. This year, the two older kids even have the honor of serving one of the Masses! We had fun during practice on Monday night.

I love the old-time cassocks!

I don't think he's quite ready to be cross bearer

Double-time recessional...time for dinner!

But not from everything...

Friday is a busy day this week. #1 will be competing in her second Geographic Bee and is excited and nervous for the opportunity. They will be home for a quick lunch and we're headed back to Latrobe for the first day of Step Up! It's hard to overstate how much we all enjoy our Fridays during the semester. Yes, the drive is long and yes, the day is longer but it is so much fun to gather with other homeschoolers on a college campus and learn new and exciting things. This semester we're leaning heavily on math and art...sounds good to me!

The end of Fall semester...stay tuned for the new photo!

Getting back to our usual routine will be just perfect because next week is Catholic Schools Week! Yes, I know, we're only an academy ;0) but we're most definitely Catholic so we will spend a good part of our week talking about, reading about, and living out all of the wonderful things that are a part of being a Catholic student (come to think of it, we should all be celebrating Catholic schools week...we're always learning more about our faith, yes?). Stay tuned...I'm sure it will be fun.

Today is a wonderful day to begin discussions on this, in fact, as St. Angela Merici  served as the inspiration of the Ursulines, the first teaching order of women. Perfect! (ahem)

St. Angela Merici, Pray for Us! We are blessed. 

ps - tomorrow's feast is St. Thomas Aquinas, patron of Catholic school children so, there you go. :0)

St. Thomas Aquinas, Pray for Us!