Traditional Catholic living in the modern world
Photo source 
Photo source
Today I tipped over our wobbly kitchen table to try to tighten the legs. I discovered the underside covered in marker vandalism! I was scolding Mary when her brother stalwartly "manned up" and confessed, "I'm sorry too, Mama. We've been sneaking under the table to draw on it."
. . . I sewed the Oliver + S Ice Cream Dress for Mary, now up in a size 3 (which is why the neckline is a bit loose).
We are starting a Charlotte Mason-style Nature Journal--something I've long wanted to do. John now seems just barely old enough to go beyond making observations (something littles start doing at a year old) to recording observations. My goal is to take us out to observe nature and record it in our journal perhaps once a week. Lest that sound too lofty a goal, today we achieved it by going into our own back yard for fifteen minutes. I bet that walking the neighborhood will often suffice. Also I hope to take us on special field trips perhaps once or twice a month. Ideas I have so far (for my local readers) are:
As part of observing, this was the first time I'd ever encouraged John to use the actual color of the object he was drawing instead of a random color. Creativity is great, but learning to observe and record is great too. He asked me to draw some parts (like the above stump, which he decided to label LOG) since he has nascent drawing abilities at four. If you look closely, you'll see that I have nascent drawing skills too, not a whole lot better than a child's!
I also encouraged (pushed) him actually to try to draw things he didn't believe he could draw. We were observing an ant and he said he wanted me to draw it. I suggested I teach him how to draw an ant. You can see his reproduction below and label ANT.
Years ago, we aquired some pretty nice office surplus items, including this huge, magnetized white board, which we have saved and moved with us from home to home until now: we finally hung it!
John used a cookie cutter to make many small hearts out of homemade play dough. He brought them to me as a gift and, when I opened the jar, I asked him why he made me so many great hearts. He said, "It's a jar full of love because I love you!"
Is one book ever enough? Mary fell asleep surrounded by half a shelf full of books, her flashlight piercing the dark, and her grey stuffed kitty. (This scene was actually in the dark, but the camera's flash quite illuminated the room.)
I got some great scores at the biannual mega-children's consignment sale, including this like-new Jumperoo. (Later we figured out how to adjust the height so Margaret's feet touch the ground.)
Who knew that a baby toy would be so entertaining for children two and four, but I can't keep them away from playing with its doodads.
Handing Margaret a random anything to keep her quiet while I was washing dishes
Margaret (4 months yesterday) is now newly interested in toys. She can't manage to grab very far and bring a toy to her but, if I give her a toy, she can hold on to it and put it in her mouth (where everything belongs, of course). This is a good age because now I can hand her toys and "buy" a couple minutes of her being occupied by somthing other than Mama.
I let the kids try out www.Starfall.com and it was a big hit with all of us. I like that the games (which focus on reading skills) do not involve licensed cartoon characters. The games seem really wholesome, entertaining, and educational.
Last weekend we travelled to Atlanta to celebrate Chris' uncle and aunt's golden jubilee anniversary! Above are brothers Keith, Steve, and Conrad.
The surprise party was held at a Chinese restaurant. Mary ate all those little fried crunchy things in dipping sauce, then grabbed a spoon and ate the whole bowl of sauce before I could stop her (my grabbing my camera to evidence the very last spoonful!).
Aunt Holly and many others got to meet Margaret for the first time.
John and Mary sat on Pop-Pop's lap, where Mary tried every single exotic meat dish that was delivered by the waiters.
Aunt Starr must have cried tears of joy for the first ten minutes of the party as she walked around the room, greeting all the guests who had surprised her. Seeing these photos makes me teary because it is so sweet to have been married for fifty years. 
Coming home from Mass, it occurred to me that maybe she was being overstimulated by the scenes flying by outside the window. If while at home she needed to fall asleep in a quiet, dark room, what was the car doing with all its noise, movement, and visual stimulation? That first time, I grabbed my black Maya Wrap and made a tent for Margaret. Immediately she calmed enough to fall asleep over the next few minutes. So, for our four-hour drive home to Atlanta, I borrowed a dark-colored towel to make a tent for Margaret. She went from fussiness immediately to calm and fell asleep all by her little self.I feel like I have such a happier baby on my hands! Margaret's new routine is to wake and nurse immediately, plus nurse happily a couple more times during her alert, wakeful time. During her wakeful time she is full of giggles and smiles. Margaret likes being in my sling as long as we're going somewhere and she's alert, but really her preference is to be held loosely in my lap. She almost never nurses right before going to sleep. It seems that even nursing is too overstimulating for her by the time she is tired, and it would contribute to her screaming. Do you know how weird that is for me as mama and La Leche League leader? Don't all babies fall asleep while nursing? Apparently not! So, as soon as she is tired, we don't nurse, but I do sway her a little, sing a song, tell her I love her and to go night-night, and I walk out. And within one to two minutes, she's asleep, sometimes without having made a single peep. I feel like she and I are much more in tune with each other now.
And that's what it is all about, right?
Now I get to live with the feelings of regret of how I sat in judgment of other mothers who told me about their babies crying before falling asleep. I'm not saying I recommend "crying it out" as a training method, even with a baby who does not want to fall asleep that way. But I no longer see it as a black-and-white situation and I know I judged very unfairly some situations that were probably similar to Margaret's. And how do I know how many resources individual mothers had for soothing screaming babies? In other situations, I didn't believe certain mothers who told me they could lay down their happy babies and walk away.
I'm so curious to get to know little Margaret as she grows up! Will she mature out of this oversensitivity within a couple of years? Will she always be our delicate girl? Who knows, but I look forward to finding out!
Motherhood Is a Calling (And Where Your
Children Rank)
July 14, 2011 by: Rachel
Jankovic
A few years ago, when I just had four children and when the oldest was still three, I loaded them all up to go on a walk. After the final sippy cup had found a place and we were ready to go, my two-year-old turned to me and said, “Wow! You have your hands full!”
She could have just as well said, “Don’t you know what causes that?” or “Are they all yours?!”Everywhere you go, people want to talk about your children. Why you shouldn’t have had them, how you could have prevented them, and why they would never do what you have done. They want to make sure you know that you won’t be smiling anymore when they are teenagers. All this at the grocery store, in line, while your children listen.
A Rock-Bottom Job?
The truth is that years ago, before this generation of mothers was even born, our society decided where children rank in the list of important things. When abortion was legalized, we wrote it into law.
Children rank way below college. Below world travel for sure. Below the ability to go out at night at your leisure. Below honing your body at the gym. Below any job you may have or hope to get. In fact, children rate below your desire to sit around and pick your toes, if that is what you want to do. Below everything. Children are the last thing you should ever spend your time doing.
If you grew up in this culture, it is very hard to get a biblical perspective on motherhood, to think like a free Christian woman about your life, your children. How much have we listened to partial truths and half lies? Do we believe that we want children because there is some biological urge, or the phantom “baby itch”? Are we really in this because of cute little clothes and photo opportunities? Is motherhood a rock-bottom job for those who can’t do more, or those who are satisfied with drudgery? If so, what were we thinking?
It's Not a Hobby
Motherhood is not a hobby, it is a calling. You do not collect children because you find them cuter than stamps. It is not something to do if you can squeeze the time in. It is what God gave you time for.
Christian mothers carry their children in hostile territory. When you are in public with them, you are standing with, and defending, the objects of cultural dislike. You are publicly testifying that you
value what God values, and that you refuse to value what the world values. You stand with the defenseless and in front of the needy. You represent everything that our culture hates, because you represent laying down your life for another—and laying down your life for another represents the gospel.Our culture is simply afraid of death. Laying down your own life, in any way, is terrifying. Strangely, it is that fear that drives the abortion industry: fear that your dreams will die, that your future will die, that your freedom will die—and trying to escape that death by running into the arms of death.
Run to the Cross
But a Christian should have a different paradigm. We should run to the cross. To death. So lay down your hopes. Lay down your future. Lay down your petty annoyances. Lay down your desire to be recognized. Lay down your fussiness at your children. Lay down your perfectly clean house. Lay down your grievances about the life you are living. Lay down the imaginary life you could have had by yourself. Let it go.
Death to yourself is not the end of the story. We, of all people, ought to know what follows death. The Christian life is resurrection life, life that cannot be contained by death, the kind of life that is only possible when you have been to the cross and back.The Bible is clear about the value of children. Jesus loved them, and we are commanded to love them, to bring them up in the nurture of the Lord. We are to imitate God and take pleasure in our children.
The Question Is How
The question here is not whether you are representing the gospel, it is how you are representing it. Have you given your life to your children resentfully? Do you tally every thing you do for them like a loan shark tallies debts? Or do you give them life the way God gave it to us—freely?
It isn’t enough to pretend. You might fool a few people. That person in line at the store might believe you when you plaster on a fake smile, but your children won’t. They know exactly where they stand with you. They know the things that you rate above them. They know everything you resent and hold against them. They know that you faked a cheerful answer to that lady, only to whisper threats or bark at them in the
car.Children know the difference between a mother who is saving face to a stranger and a mother who defends their life and their worth with her smile, her love, and her absolute loyalty.
Hands Full of Good ThingsWhen my little girl told me, “Your hands are full!” I was so thankful that she already knew what my answer would be. It was the same one that I always gave: “Yes they are—full of good things!”
Live the gospel in the things that no one sees. Sacrifice for your children in places that only they will know about. Put their value ahead of yours. Grow them up in the clean air of gospel living. Your testimony to the gospel in the little details of your life is more valuable to them than you can imagine. If you tell them the gospel, but live to yourself, they will never believe it. Give your life for theirs every day, joyfully. Lay down pettiness. Lay down fussiness. Lay down resentment about the dishes, about the laundry, about how no one knows how hard you work.
Stop clinging to yourself and cling to the cross. There is more joy and more life and more laughter on the other side of death than you can possibly carry alone.
Rachel Jankovic is a wife, homemaker, and mother. She is the author of "Loving the Little Years" and blogs at Femina. Her husband is Luke, and they have five children: Evangeline (5), Daphne (4), Chloe (2), Titus (2), and Blaire (5 months).
This tip on cleaning one's bathroom really might be ridiculous to my readers. But it was not ridiculous to me in my humble state, so I am going to share one of the best housekeeping tips I've ever received.
It has taken three children, but I think I have figured out how to carry a tiny "diaper bag" (just a regular purse--cell phone in the photo for size--that I found at Goodwill for $3).
Last January I sewed John pajama pants. I miscalculated measurements, so they did not fit, plus he was still in a rigid phase of needing to wear matching tops and bottoms, so he refused to wear them.
I meant to tear our seams to fix the pants, but didn't get to it till, well, yesterday. What's six months or so?
Now the pants fit him, so I didn't even have to do a repair. And now John happily wears different pajama tops and bottoms!
