mid-week trip to the zoo

                We had friends of our girls visiting this week, while the boy was back in Illinois visiting a friend of his. We took the opportunity to take a fun field trip to the zoo, with morning Mass and confession to start us off right :) at our beautiful Cathedral Basilica.

 

 

The zoo was deserted pleasantly peaceful and the girls were able to run and goof around as much as they wanted. The keepers were more then happy to explain things and give mini lessons on the animals as they were cleaning the cages and walking the animals outside. I would recommend a mid-week winter visit to your local zoo.


Preach the Gospel at all times. If necessary, use words. - St. Francis of Assisi

this moment...

                                                          {this moment}

. . . . . . . . . .

{this moment} - A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savor and remember.

to join in the fun, head over to SouleMama and link up

Preach the Gospel at all times. If necessary, use words. - St. Francis of Assisi

rethinking.....

Has anyone else seen this???? Easy Peasy, an all-in-1 homeschool curriculum???? While reading Jennifer's blog this morning I saw a link to easy peasy. Even though I was happy with our school plans for the remainder of this school year I though I would pop over to see what it was all about. And I love it! The more I looked the more I thought this would be perfect for our family. I am currently looking at adding in some of the lessons into what we are doing now, and we will be using this curriculum starting in June!

Preach the Gospel at all times. If necessary, use words. - St. Francis of Assisi

                                                                 ~Amy

Book Review; "Please Don't Drink The Holy Water"

"Please Don't Drink The Holy Water (homeschool days, rosary nights, and other near occasions of sin)" written by Susie Lloyd, published by Sophia Institute Press. "Please Don't Drink The Holy Water" is absolutely the funniest book I have read in a long time! Mrs. Lloyd will have you rolling on the floor and at the same time wondering if she has been watching through your living room windows.

Mrs.Lloyd's book is completely relatable with chapters like; The Top Ten Things That Resist Societal Change, The T.V. Starved Family, My Other Car Is A Home School Bus, Family Prayer: An Occasion of Sin, and Family Vacations (and other ways to punish your kids). You will find your self laughing out loud for the mere fact that what she has written happened to you just yesterday. Mrs. Loyd talks about the struggles that Catholic home school moms go through on a day to day basis, but you do not need to be a home school mom to enjoy this book. Mrs. Lloyd writes about topics all moms can relate to, such as; Halloween, do you go secular, ignore it or go some where inbetween.

She gives every thing at a face value, no sugar coating it in this book, which makes it that much better. All the while not putting any one way of doing things as "better" then the other, just different and what works for their family. Which is very much appreciated. After reading tis book you will be recommending it to everyone you know, buying it for gifts and rereading it often. If you are a first time mom, or seasoned mom of 10, you will love this book. And don't forget to check out Mrs. Lloyd's other book "Bless Me Father, For I Have Kids".

You can purchase this book here.

I wrote this review of Please Don't Drink The Holy Water! for the free Catholic book review program, created by Aquinas and More Catholic Goods, your source for Baptism Gifts and First Communion Gifts.
Tiber River is the first Catholic book review site, started in 2000 to help you make informed decisions about Catholic book purchases.
I receive free product samples as compensation for writing reviews for Tiber River.

Stash Bash 3/30/12

I had some help with my stash bash this week. She is making a pilgrim dress to go along with her history lesson. I have decided that with each main time period she studies we will make a costume to along with it. I easily have enough in my stash to accommodate at least through the rest of the year.

I ended up sewing around this mess all day :( I just didn't feel like clearing  it away. Mainly because there is no where to put it. I have 2 closets dedicated to my sewing stash, and 15 storage tubs in my storage unit filled with my stash. Can you say support group???

I finished this cute dress with matching hair bow to take to market over the summer. 

Same for this boy's romper. It will be for market, as soon as I get some snaps for the legs.

I am thinking about making a bunch of these in different saints. And a Jesus, Mary and Joseph. 

This is for a sweet little girl over in Michigan I know. As soon as I finish the bloomers.

Have a blessed weekend!!
And don't forget to head over to Crunchy Catholic Momma to see some more cool and fun posts on stash bashing. There are some really awesome ideas!!

Preach the Gospel at all times. If necessary, use words. - St. Francis of Assisi

A garden for Mary

I posted yesterday, that I was reading A Book of Saints for Catholic Moms  Mary was the first saint, in this really awesome book. Each chapter has suggested activities to do with the kids, and Mary's was a Mary garden. January in Illinois, probably not the best time to start a garden. We needed a new center piece for your dining room table, we have been changing it according to the season or holiday and the kids have been making them. So we decided to make Mary be our center piece and make her a rose garden.

First we got our supplies, the large pink octagon is the base for our roses, the green circles are our leaves and I used my quilting ruler to trace 4 inch squares out of construction paper, the little slips left over I threw in our bookmark box.

 we rounded the corners then drew a spiral in the squares, cut along that spiral and rolled it up, gave it a pinch and then glued it the our leaves.



 We used the dessert plate to make Mary's garden 2 tiered.

 We glued our roses on to the base, I put a book on top to hold them down in the glue to make sure they really stuck.

 She said "mom, let me take your picture, you look beautiful" how could I say no to that :)

I sprayed a little craft glue all over it when we were done to be sure the roses really stuck, and the girls sprinkled glitter on the bottom roses. It was a fun afternoon craft and a wonderful center piece!

St. Mary pray for us

Preach the Gospel at all times. If necessary, use words. - St. Francis of Assisi