If you HEART Huckabee ....

....please click this link.  

~Peace

Very Interesting Catholic Political Blog

AnarchoCatholic

The three of them are all law students, married and two of them have kids.  There is alot of really cool stuff here, and plenty to ponder.

~Peace

Goodbye Christmas :-(

Well, I am done putting away all the Christmas stuff.  I put it all away, today, BY MYSELF!  That included 2 faux trees and dragging the real one outside as soon as I had put all the ornaments and lights away. Not to mention all my Rankin-Figures etc....It was tiring. At least, though, it was good exercise because I was up and down 2 sets of stairs all day.  Listening to 2 Muse Cd's helped ALOT! I was blasting the heck out of them.  You could hear it on the street. :-)

Most of the house has returned to it's former self. I clean as I go and put stuff out as I return Christmas stuff to the boxes.  So, it's looking pretty good...just really barren.  Now I am off to the shower as it was raining today and about 60 something degrees so I am pretty sweaty.

Autumn even managed to do her Click n Read phonics ANNNNND some Cool Math 4 Kids, so I am feeling like we all were very productive. Woo Hoo!  I love these kind of days.

~Peace

Muse Bliss

I love his hair (though he's brunette again, this is from a few years ago). I used to have a purple slanted bob in the mid-eighties. I love the words in this song.

Muse Unintended/Jane Eyre/Awesome pairing!

Bands I love ALOT!

Okay, so I have cancelled the Near Circle I had created for Alternative Rock Fans. Instead, I will continue to post on music, because it is a huge part of my life. Following are the bands I have been listening to alot lately.

Up top is MUSE.  I am utterly addicted to them at the moment. There are the best band I have heard in ages.

Underneath in the left row:  The Shins, The White Stripes, Snow Patrol, Coldplay,  in the center middle is Interpol and in the right row The Raconteurs, Jet, The Killers.

Really great dialog about Attachment Parenting in Catholic Families

I found this article by reading a post in the Organic Learning blog that is in one of my near circle groups. I have always been an AP parent. And interestingly, I found that using AP with my kids syncs better with Catholicism than Protestantism (I used to be an Evangelical). On the whole, I think AP fits in perfectly with Christianity, and people like the Ezzo's totally freaked me out and made me really angry....to the point where I would hide their books when I went into bookstores. But the more I have read by JPII (which I have been doing in my FAMILIA group) the more I see how AP blends so beautifully with Catholic teaching more than any other Christian theological vantage point.

I, too, like Danielle Bean. I peruse her blog often, and I imagine I will continue to do so. I don't have any books by Gregory Popcak, but I have friends who do. So, I know of him. I really liked the points he makes in the above post (click on the title to get to it). I do, however, own most of William Sears' books, have met him, and several years ago had a fabulous talk with his wife, Martha, on the phone. She actually directed me to a great article at the Christian Research Institute, an evangelical website, on just how unbiblical and dangerous the Ezzos parenting methods were.

What I really loved about the above exchange, however, was how polite they are to each other. I also benefitted greatly from the discussion of integral procreation and how God gives us the gifts of children, not just timing. This is important to me because I have wanted another child, DESPERATELY, for 5 years. I have stopped charting for over a year...and still no baby. God really is in control. My dh and I have a son with Bipolar Disorder. God knows how much time and energy he takes from us and out other 2 children. If we are blessed by God to have another child someday, I will know it is because God KNEW that Ben needed all that extra time from us...and that another little soul might have suffered needlessly if brought to our family any earlier.

Being Catholic and a parent who practices AP are all about TRUST in God and the way He created us to be. What else is there that would encourage Saintliness other than that?

~Peace

Muse - Hysteria US version

This is one of my favorite Muse songs. This is from Absolution (their last CD).
The current one Black Holes And Revelations is spectacular too. Gosh! They are just flipping amazing!!!

Muse - Map of the Problematique 4Music

I cannot get enough of this band. They are just BRILLIANT!!! Of course, the drummer is a TAMA man! Go to Youtube and watch all 5 of their 4Music videos. They are soooo good live. (Can you hear all the cool 80's New Wave undertones in this is awesome tune?)

Lost in Transitions

This morning was back to school for 2 of our kids.  Andrew was back to being a Senior at our local High School and Ben was supposed to go back to the special needs elementary school he is attending this year (next year the plan is for him to come back home).  

Well, Ben, as anyone who knows our family knows suffers from Bipolar Disorder.  Let me assure you, he is suffering...and so are we.  Ben has a very hard time with transitions.  Now, there are lots of folks out there with kids who have terrible transitioning abilities.  Most kids with Autistic Spectrum Disorders, and ADHD don't really do well with transitions.  Bipolar kids (and adults) are "off the map" with their inability to handle transitions and, like Ben, become Lost in their own rage and anxiety over Transitions.  So even though we have been talking to Ben about how school was starting this week, this morning, you would have thought he has never heard of school before.

Ben just flipped out with so much anger.  He was yelling and screaming at us.  We would ask him calmly to go and collect himself because we were not yelling and screaming at him and wanted him to try and treat us with the same respect we were treating him with.  So, he would stomp off, yell, come back , yell, stomp off, yell, come back, yell (and think you get the picture).  After about 90 minutes he started calming down and I made him breakfast.  Then he said he was ready to go.  On the way to school he fell asleep in the car and I brought him home.   I got him up into bed and then something  else started him off ( a puppet show he can't attend).  So the screaming and stomping started again.  For another hour it went on.  Finally, because I knew his brain was exhausted from all the upheaval, I got him to lie down and rubbed his head and snuggle him and he was out. He slept about 3 hours.  He had already had a good nights sleep.  That nap was because his brain had a huge emotional seizure the size of Mt. St. Helen's, and desperately needed to turn off and reboot.

Well, he is awake now. He has had lunch and now wants me to play Guitar Hero 3, so I am on my way downstairs. My only hope is that this "run through" today will reduce his need to freak out tomorrow. 

This is the last year he will be able to attend this particular school (because next year is Middle School and there is NO WAY we are going to send him there).  So, for our sanity, and for Ben's exposure to transitions to things that he isn't always happy about but through which he learns he won't die without us near him 24/7, he needs to finish out this school year.  But after being away for over 2 weeks...there was really no way we thought he wouldn't completely lose it over going back.

Did I mention I really want to take a nap!

~Peace~

This WAS me 20 years ago.

Oh, how I wish I looked like that still.  I know it's vain, but darn, I was a hottie!  Was, of course, is the operative word here. I am 41 now.  This pic was taken when I was 21, in 1987. I miss the 80's!!!  My New Year's Resolution is to try and recapture a little of the girl I was.  I was a size 6 back then, now I am a 14.  I think I would be happy to settle on a size 10.

~Here's to a Peaceful (and maybe a little thinner) New Year!

Good Luck Huck!

Congrats to  Mike Huckabee for winning the Iowa Caucus last night.  It is about time this really cool guy pulled out ahead.  I think it is a real shame that there a many homeschoolers out there who have completely and unfairly stereotype Huckabee as the choice for Evangelicals.  My husband is friends with someone very high up in the music industry, in L.A., who has always voted for Liberals, and has said that he loves Huckabee's position on music and the arts to much that he is going to vote for him.  If some of you homeschoolers out there hate the idea of people prejudging you because you homeschool, why would you turn around and do the same thing to Huckabee just because he is an Evangelical?

I am a conservative Catholic with very liberal ideas regarding education therefore I am committed to unschooling, and the only guy getting my vote is Mike Huckabee!

~Peace

Man vs. Wild -- High School Edition

That's MY boy!!!

Muse | Starlight

JT has got it right. These guys are AWESOME!!! I really love Muse!

What I got for Christmas

I really only ever want one thing for any gift giving celebration, and that would be books. I got a bunch of them. I did get, however, a pair of really cool earrings from my Hunny. They are made from 2,000 year old glass mined in Israel. They are very neat. I love them alot. I am not big into jewelry, so I will probably wear these earrings forever. The only other jewelry I wear is my Crucifix and Miraculous Medal. However, I need to get a sterling silver chain for them as I snapped it off again. I didn't realize it was on the outside of my sweater. When I pulled it over my head I heard the telltale pop! It is a good thing they are only about 6 bucks!

So, here are the books I got.

My very own copy of John Taylor Gatto's Underground History of American Education!!! (I like rereading sections of it, and there is only ONE copy in all of the Fulton County Library System...a shame!)
Homeschool Your Child For Free. Yes, it is 7 years old and many links are dead, but many are not, and I have already found very cool and fun websites for the kids that would have covered the cost of the book.
How Children Learn by John Holt. I have never had my own copy. Now I do. Yipee!
The Out of Sync Child Has Fun (Activities for Kids with SPD). This has tons of fun ideas for things to do whether your kid has sensory issues or not.
How To Get Your Child To Love Reading and Best Books For Kids Who (think they) Hate To Read. Both of those title should explain what I am going through with Ben and Autumn. I want to find ways to help them to enjoy, and maybe even come to love, reading...without much coercion on my part. So, hopefully, they will be helpful.

Last, I got a book that should prove to be informative, funny and comforting to my pathetic soul
Saints Behaving Badly (The cutthroats, crooks, trollops, con men, and Devil worshippers who became Saints). I figure if they can make....so can I!

I didn't get fiction, because that stuff I don't mind checking out of the library or finding at Goodwill. Non-fiction that I may use over again, I like to own. My next purchase is going to be:
The Unprocessed Child.

So, thank you to my husband and MIL Carmel for my wonderful books!

~Peace~

Word of the Father Now in Flesh Appearing...

...O' Come Let Us Adore Him, O' Come Let Us Adore Him, Christ The Lord!



MERRY CHRISTMAS!
~Peace & Love,

Holiday Greetings

The following letter came to me via email from one of oldest and best friends, Mig (above). I don't know if she wrote it but it is AWESOME and I wanted to give her the credit. Enjoy!

To All of Our Democrat Family/Friends:
Please accept with no obligation, implied or implicit, my best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low-stress, non-addictive, gender-neutral celebration of the winter solstice holiday, practiced within the most enjoyable traditions of the religious persuasion of your choice, or secular practices of your choice, with respect for the religious/secular persuasion and/or traditions of others, or their choice not to practice religious or secular traditions at all. I also wish you a fiscally successful, personally fulfilling and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted calendar year 2008, but not without due respect for the calendars of choice of other cultures whose contributions to society have helped make America great. Not to imply that America is necessarily greater than any other country, nor the only America in the Western Hemisphere. Also, this wish is made without regard to the race, creed, color, age, physical ability, religious faith or sexual preference of the wishee.


To our Republican and Libertarian Family/Friends:
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Lostapalooza!

I'm lost in Season 3 of LOST. I have never watched it on TV, only on DVD. Robert, Andy and I got into it over the Summer. Finally, we got our newest installment of Netflix discs the other day and it was the first 3 discs (of 7 ) for Lost: Season 3. Their arrival was perfect timing as Andrew is out of highschool for Christmas break....(I refuse to say Winter or Holiday)...and it is one of Andrew, Robert and my favorite shows. So, it's parent-bonding time with Andy. Woo Hoo! If you ever have some time to kill and want to watch something so oddly compelling...this is the show for you. I gotta run and find out more about 'The Others'. (Oh, and the cute guys on the show are fun to watch too!!)

~Peace~

Control

I hung out with Sara (next to me in middle photo) a few days ago and helped her with her blog. She sees me as a blogwiz (of course the very idea would make my husband explode with laughter). Regardless, I was totally psyched to help her. So now she has a picture of her family and some coolio widgets etc...I even got her on nearcirlce and she was really excited about that. I LOVED helping her. I really had fun.

(BTW, Andrew doesn't really drink. He's not 21 yet. However, he was making fun of all of us at a dinner party we threw over the weekend. He said 'Hey, look this is what happens at a 'Catholic dinner party' and took the picture of me and Sara and the one above us which was a pic all the bottles of wine. Then he had me take the pic of him pretending to drink Tequila through a funnel. Admittedly, our friend John, was making some killer Margaritas! So, when it comes to Christmas parties....Catholics do have more fun!)

Sara and I always have these winding, stream of consiousness, theological, pedagogical and just plain cool conversations. We were talking alot about CONTROL. . She has also blogged about it at her site Those That Wonder. So we were chatting about how, maybe on the surface, some might think that moms like us, who are really into our Catholicism, might be automatically stereotyped as the controlling, authoritarian, structured type of moms. Not me though...nor Sara really either. I really don't believe that my Faith gives me any right to control my kids. I have a *right to raise them*, but *not control them*. I am to do my best to instill our family's faith and values. I try to live my life in a way so that they will come to understand what I (and their father) believe is truly important and worthy of wanting...their Catholic Christian Faith. I want my kids to learn to control themselves. Robert and I have to show them how to do that by the way that we control ourselves. If my kids only control themselves because of external pressure exerted on them from us, or others around them, how are they going to live as adult who can make their own decisions? I want my kids to be able to internalize the way we live and what we believe so that they learn to control themselves from the inside out. So, how does *that* happen?

So far, around here, it happens through lots of conversations some calm (and some not so calm sorry to say) and acting out examples of how one would accomplish things like getting their point across or what they need, even what they might want. It is so true that the expression "Do what I say, not what I do" will not get you far with your kids. They are watching us...THEY ARE WATCHING US! I have to admit that most every crappy, naughty, selfish thing I have seen my kids do or say, they have seen me do first. I think if maybe parents admitted that to themselves things with their kids would get better. So, the way I help my kids THE MOST with interalizing all the virtues so that they can live them is for me to live a virtuous life in front of them more often than I am doing now. And that is hard because I am everybit a sinner as they are...more so because of age.

Ever wonder why Our Blessed Mother appears to kids more than adults? Because they ARE innocent and less sinful than we are. So why are so many of us out there so desperate to CONTROL our kids and make them better? I don't know because so many of us are NOT BETTER with age, maybe more wise and experienced, but sad to say, we are less transparent sinners (like kids are) and more covert, manipulative sinners. Am I suggesting that kids are perfect, or can't benefit from our experience? No! of course not. I am suggesting that controlling their lives may be more sinful than helpful on our parts. Even Jesus told us to "have the faith of a child". Children are very important to God and he doesn't think they are mindless little brats who need to be controlled and coerced to grow up. Instead he tells us to be like little children. Innocent, trusting, curious, loving, open etc...

So, all that being said, I am trying to control my children less (I don't do much controlling of them to the outside world to begin with, so I am sure the thought of even less control by me is frightening to some). I want to guide them more, show them more (with my actions) how to live...and because they have me for a mom...I will be showing them (unfortunately with some of my actions) how NOT to live as well...but hey! then they will see me go off to Confession. So I *can* win for losing.

I know I will come back to this topic. But for now, I am done pondering in print.

~Peace~

Pre Christmas Purge

I'm back....yeah! How I have missed my blog. Today, I have been doing what I call my pre-Christmas purge. I clean the living heck out of the kids' rooms and toss the broken and donate the unused. It's 12:30pm and I am beat. Autumn's room was a nightmare. I am all for kids enjoying their rooms the way they want to, but when it starts infringing on my property values things have to change. Andrew will be asked nicely (but very persuasively) to clean his room when he gets home. I won't mess with his stuff, but just looking in there is kicking my anxiety disorder into overdrive and I take medicine for that!!!!

I really do think that if I thought we were going to stay in this house, permanently, then I would just shut the doors to their rooms and walk away, but this house is our third in 12 years. I can see us downsizing eventually, so I really do need to encourage the kids to keep their rooms clean and organized several times a year. You know, go in, take stock of stuff, find out what they don't care about, or what is just sitting in a broken heap taking up space. I, by nature, am very "picked up and put away". There is definitely dust that needs to be swept away, and I do need to clean the upstairs toilets, the floors are swept/vaccumed but could use a mopping...what I *really* like is cleared surfaces and no clutter. I am more about neatness and organization than things being sqeaky clean. That's why, even though I am an unschooler, I am not all that great at "strewing the path" for the kids. I don't strew. I hate clutter in my house. I could care less about it in someone elses home, but in mine it actually will trigger depression. Clutter is clostrophobic to me. I don't like small spaces and I can't handle clutter, it makes me feel like I can't breathe.

So the kids' rooms get cluttered, especially Autumn's, but I don't mind because I can shut the door. Mostly she is playing with friends some rich, imaginative game and she needs her room to stay the way she has put it to continue the game the next time. Making her clean it everytime would be tanamount to working on a scarf and a whenever I am done for that day, pulling out all the stitches to start over again. But when Ben has friends over and they pull out every video game while they are gaming...that I ask to be put away before his friends leave. Andrew's is just full of papers, bags, empty candy wrappers/Monster cans...it's is disasterous! Total slovenliness is jus not gonna cut it with me. I can take only so much. However, when he has his own place someday, if he keeps it like a hovel, that will be his business. I am not the mom who would say, "You really need to keep this place picked up!" When it comes to modeling a clean, neat home he couldn't have a better mom, so if being a neatnik isn't in him by now, it will never be.

I will say, though, that the kids really love it when I go to town and clean their rooms. They walk in and go, "Wow!" and suddenly discover new toys/books that they forgot about because they were buried under something. So, in that way it is really satisfying. Plus, it teaches them, without words, that having a place for everything and everything in it's place is actually easier to live in than a cluttered space, because you take so much time looking for where you last put whatever you are trying to fing. My late grammy, G.G., used to tell me when I was a little girl (and I KNOW I got my neatness gene from her) that, "The lazy man works hardest." when it came to housecleaning. And you know what? G.G. was right!

Before I go, I don't want any of you out there ,that may be cluttered moms, to think that I judge you or think less of you. I REALLY DO NOT CARE HOW OTHERS KEEP THEIR HOMES. Everybody has to be comfy in their own spot, so do whatever floats your boat!