another boy?

    This weekend Ron took us all out to a camping area--we played in the lake, canoed, fished, rode bikes, hit baseballs, and ate only what we could cook over a fire.  It was pure delight.
     Relaxing by the lake, Ron and I had our routine conversation about whether we should have another child--after all, little Annie would probably do well to have a play mate!  A year of challenge for us (pregnancy is just so hard) contrasted to another wonderful littler person!
     But the odds are against it for now.  Hard really means "too hard" for the time being--the uncharitable kind of hard.
     We laughed, though, at the thought of another girl.  What if we had 5 girls plus Jake!
     Then it hit me, clear as day.  I realized why we have never had another boy.  The saint that has impacted me the most, perhaps in my whole life, was Alphonsus di Liguori.  I'll have to explain his one quote that changed my life another time.  But yes, he was life changing for me.  This weekend, it all became clear: we keep having girls so that I don't have to name our next child Alphonsus!  
    

highlight of the week

     The best thing that has happened to our family in the past week is Ron's friends' prayers for his Mom.    As I mentioned last week, his friends offered to pray a novena--a nine-day prayer--for Ron's Mom (her physical and spiritual needs).  Every day, Steve emails all the guys participating, including Ron, and gives a reminder.  "Today is day four!  Remember to pray!"  Ron tells me about each one, and our family joyfully prays the prayer too in our nightly family prayers.  These prayers are happening at the end of days full of time with Donna and Ronnie; we have had almost every evening meal with them and spend long hours enjoying Donna's company.  The novena at the end of our day is a perfect fit, and my experience is one of great relief to be trailing behind, joining in the strong effort of others.
     Well the other day, when Ron and I were talking after the kids had gone to sleep, Ron confided in me, more relaxed and happy than I have seen him in a long time.  He said that Steve had emailed, saying: "Remember, today is day seven!  And if you are getting irritated with my emails, then just pray a little harder!"  Far from irritating, Ron has been gifted to the core by this effort.  A little humor is also, apparently, just what the doctor ordered.    

you are loved

     Since yesterday, I have been thinking about when and how I came to know that I am loved.  By the time I was fifteen, I was not at all clear about that point.  My interior self was decimated and I felt decidedly unloved and unworthy of love.  I was not close with any of my parents at that time, all of whom my inner self was listening to, to hear whether I was loved.  On a deep level, I heard only silence.
     At sixteen, I spent the summer at my grandmother's and we spent much of the summer at her church.  There, along with many messages that I was not so sure about, I heard the message that God loves me.  God, they said, created everything, and the whole world was like dust in his hand.  And yet he calls us to be in a close relationship with him in which he would lavish us with his love.  It took a long time, but I was really touched by this message.
     That next year I spent a lot of time alone, and I read the book of Isaiah, chapters 40 and following, over and over.  The message was to me like the first moment of a sunrise: pure light breaking upon the darkness.  It was the most loving, gorgeous message I had ever read.  I still read it more than any other part of the Bible, and still recall the truth of God's affection for me.  "Because you are precious in my sight, and honored, I love you," (43:4).  At first, I did not really let the message in.  But I kept reading.  It took at least a year for me to even begin to own it.  Slowly, I let this message be louder in my ears than those of other people.  Eventually, the message broke through my very tough, thick wall of defense that I had built around me.
     Interestingly, it took 15 years before I ever moved on to consider other messages of the Christian faith.  When I was 28, I began to realize that I should perhaps start thinking about becoming more forgiving, or more gentle, or learn how to deal with anger in God's way.  I bought some Christian books, and began to read other parts of the Bible that were directive about our behavior.  But think about it: I spent almost 15 on the first, most important message of the faith, the message that God loves us.  It took almost as long to correct my prior view as it had taken to form it!
     There ARE other messages that are important to the Christian faith.  As Christians, we should be loving and generous and honest and forgiving.  But without knowing that we are loved, we cannot do these things well.  It is the critical foundation upon which all else is built.  The message of God's love was so important for me because, when the earthly message crumbles, the divine message can replace it and improve upon the best of earthly messages.  There is no earthly person who can love us with the grandeur and generosity of the Creator of the world, the Creator about whom they say, "God is love."  There is no love that compares with the height and depth of the love of God.  When this love has been received by us (which for me was no easy feat), then other people's likes and dislikes of us are suddenly less important.  If God is enamored with us, but some friend or relative is less so, God's love wins out.  Hence the walls and defenses do not need to go up.  I learned to stay undefended, unguarded, and trusting.  Then, with the tool of humility in hand (another challenge I still face), I began to learn to see where I have been unlikeable or have had poor behavior, and then adjust it and say "I'm sorry."  But still, walls and defenses can stay down.  It has been for me the spiritual path that transcends the worldly options and that has saved me from the private world of darkness in which I had previously been stuck.  It is a sheer gift that God rescued me from it, and I am so, so grateful!  All the good of my life since then comes from this one source.  I am forever changed in every way by knowing that I am loved.    
     A last point: much of Christianity makes no sense unless it is clear that this is the foundation of it--to give each of us divine love.  It is not supposed to be an institution or a set of doctrines--unless they are seen as being in the service of lavishing us with love.  For me, sitting in church is my favorite place to be, because there I am fortified and restored in intimacy with the one who loves me with infinite love.  Then I can do all things I am called to do.  But Christianity would seem strange indeed if it were not for this love affair going on!  Furthermore, God lets us take 15 years or 50 years--whatever it takes--to learn this foundational lesson.  He lets us remain a little rude or grudge-holding or whatever while he lets us soak in his love.  That explains why so many people call Christians hypocritical.  It is almost built in to the faith.  It is not a faith of perfecting people.  It is a faith of LOVING people, imperfect people.  While it is less attractive from the outside, it is more wonderful on the inside.  This is why I am especially compassionate for people who leave the faith for NOT being loved well by people in the church--being loved well was the point!  I imagine they have a rough road to receiving God's love in an intimate way.  Yet this is the prize, the pearl of great price.  Everyone has their own path to this pearl, and I am more grateful for this aspect of my life than any other.    
    

Mammals

      We have been learning about mammals in home school recently.
     Over a leisurely family breakfast this weekend, Jake said, "Dad, do whales have hair?"
     Ron replied, "Well of course they do.  That's why they carry brushes in their purses."  Four girls dropped their jaws, looked at him with puzzled faces, and a whirlwind discussion ensued among them.  Ron quietly slipped out of the room.    

skirting the issue

     I tried to makes skirts for the girls last spring--almost a year ago.  But I got stuck with my sewing machine.  After lots of work, I have finally gotten unstuck.   Look at what I made this weekend!

     I LOVE to sew on a sewing machine.  Donna Heinz, Grandma Honey's niece, taught me how to use one.  I now use a different machine, but I still use all she taught me.  I have also taken an afternoon tutorial at our craft shop.  Now I'm on my way.  But honestly, it has taken me A YEAR to makes these 3 skirts!

Sainthood

    Leigh said, "Mom, when I get older, I am going to become a saint, like Jacob and Mary are."  She thought about it and added, "And like you and Dad."
     I said, "And Clare!"
     She looked away, smiled and then said, "Well, a LITTLE bit!"
     I broke out laughing.  Then I said, "To be a saint, you need to start obeying more.  When Daddy and I tell you to do something, you need to say, 'Okay Mom!  Okay Dad!'  You also need to stop whining, and start asking NICELY for things you want."
    Looking me very seriously in the eye, she added, "And I need to stop picking my boogers!"

making books

     Yesterday, I decided to trick the blues by reconfiguring the school day--I made the whole day an art project day.  The kids made books.

     It was the right thing to do: Clare and Leigh got to be front and center (unusual on a school day) and their behavior improved dramatically as a result.  Jake and Mary worked on their composition and drawing skills, and so it was great for them.  The baby was sleeping her sickness off--so we all got a little change of pace!
     As they were working on their books, I was hoping to get a chance to work on my composition skills soon!  I have a book/essay in my head, and I have dictated on voice memo.  But I am eager to write it out.  It is personal testimony and philosophical theology all at the same time.  There seems like no chance to work on it--this project is tenth in line, behind a writing project I am already committed to, filling the dirt in my raised beds, cooking, bills, multiple business items, and laundry!  But sometimes, just scrapping the plans and making a book is the thing to do!  
 
        

Good Friends

     As Ron's Mom is failing in her health, Ron is struggling in many understandable, human ways.  Yesterday, he received an email from his friends in Louisiana: Steve Phillippi, Cory Hayes, Mark Sanborn, Todd Russell, Chris Baglow, Robert Simpson and Danny Burns.  As a group, they announced that they would be praying collectively for him a Chaplet of Divine Mercy, offering a Mass for him and his Mom, and that they desired to help him in any way, to come to Dallas to help or to open their doors to Ron or any of us in his family.
     They said in this joint email that Ron has hopped in his car and driven to see them for all sorts of occasions, and that they desired to repay the kindness in whatever way that would be meaningful (not that none of them has never "hopped" in their cars and come to see us!).
     It is downright touching to see this group of men pull together, become their best selves (they are all GREAT selves all the time anyway, in our opinion!) and offer literally everything they have to give.  Self-donation is a touching thing.  Friendship, equally so.

Mary's Masoches

     Mary and Jake started a home business last week.  They told me it was called "Mary's Massages" and Mary was going to hire Jake to work with her, giving massages.  I told her it was a brilliant business plan, since her company has a built-in clientelle (me).  When I came across the written document she had formed, it said at the top, "Mary's Masoches."
     Well this morning was a nightmare homeschooling experience.  Everything I taught yesterday went out the other ear, and their work today was as though I had not even shown up for school yesterday.  Incensed, with a baby crying on my knee, I wailed, "Perhaps I will have to send you all to a public school or to Faustina Academy.  If you cannot learn here, then I will have to send you where you can learn."  Then I blew out of the room to put the miserable, whimpering, snotty baby down for a nap.
     When I came back down and faced Jake and Mary, I apologized.  I told them that I will find a better way to deal with my frustrations.  Jake looked at me sheepishly and said with a cracking voice, "We just don't want to go to Faustina."  I assured them that they would not have to go there, that going there was not the real solution, and that the better response was to figure out how to improve their retention of information in this environment.  But, I acknowledged, there are students at Faustina that daydream or fail to absorb lessons for any number of reasons.  Jake and Mary visibly relaxed, and then Jake even broke out into a slight smile.  I asked him what was so funny.  He said, "Well, now Mary and I don't have to give you what we were going to offer you so that we would not have to go to Faustina."
     "What was that?"  I asked.
     "A $20 gift certificate to Mary's Masoches."
      

crinkles

     Clare said to me recently, "Mom, how did that man get such big crinkles on his face?"  I said, "They're called wrinkles, and they came with age."  She replied, "Oh, so does that mean that you are getting some age too?  Because you have little crinkles all over your face!"
     I considered being sad, astonished or disappointed, but really, I like getting older.  I like feeling more established.  Being young was stressful for me: I did not know what I thought, and was always reconsidering everything I believed, and I just did not feel comfortable in my own skin.  Now, I still have many outstanding questions that I typically reflect on, but I am settling into my own skin--obviously, since crinkles are appearing!

belladonna

    Hoping belladonna really does work for nasal congestion--so far, this homeopathic remedy has not made a difference, although my tendency with it is "too little, too late."  So I'm trying to turn the corner and get better at administering it.
    Made scones and biscuits today from Babycakes, my new gluten-free cookbook from Amy-Beth.  Oh me, oh my!  LOVE THEM!!!
    I also made bouillabaise for dinner--that just warms the heart no matter how cold it is outside!  And ALL FOUR of my kids (who eat table food) love it!  I am always astounded, but Jake is the champion mussels eater.  He has likes mussels since he was three or four.  Wow.
      

disgusting!

     Annie has a cold--her first cold.  I got slimed! (check out my shirt)

     Mary and Jake are almost proficient at all 50 states.  But today, Mary recited, from north to south: "Minnesota, Iowa, Misery, Arkansas, Louisiana."  Isn't that cute!  Misery, U.S.A.!

     In other, more serious and yet great news: Annie's birthday (May 1) falls this year on the day of mercy, divine mercy Sunday.  In my opinion, it is one of the three greatest celebrations of the year, along with Christmas and Easter.  It is the Sunday after Easter.  To top it off, John Paul II will be beatified that day.  We are going to have a PAR-TAY!  (Come one and all, who is interested!)  

gardening from scratch

    I spent four hours at a veggie gardening class at our local garden center today.  I came home, brimming with seeds, ideas, and newly acquired insights about growing all sorts of vegetables and fruits in my new raised beds.
    After telling Ron all about it, he said: "Katie, it's like our whole life is from scratch: you are learning to garden from scratch, I am learning to hike and camp and sail from scratch: so much of what we do is being rediscovered from the ground up."
     "That's the thesis of my bog!"  I said.  "Did you know that?  Have you read that?"  He had NOT read that, which I think is sort of adorable.  Yet he came up with the same wording that I have used, on his own!    
     It all feels so new.  The gardening, the child rearing, the home making, the cooking, the spiritual life, the  educating, the lumber yards, the tilling, the composting.  It is thrilling, riveting, and exciting, like a brand new car.  You just want to be in it a little more, and so you take an extra whirl around the block just for kicks.  I've never had a car I felt that way about, but that's how I feel about trying a new gluten- free recipe or making a new compost pile.

     So, gardening idea of the day: buy one packet of radish seeds.  Grow the radishes (super easy), and feed our rabbit (instead of buying rabbit food).  The rabbit poop is used for compost (instead of buying compost).  Use the compost to make an organic salad garden (lettuce and spinach) 9 months out of the year.  So, we are saving on all that organic salad we buy from the store, all that rabbit food, and all that fertilizer.  All with a packet of radish seeds (even though we don't much like to eat radishes).

     Education idea of the day: in my education, "familiarity" was the name of the game.  I was "familiar" with the 50 states, the presidents, and 19th c. continental philosophy by the time I graduated from high school.  But that's why I don't "know" the states and capitals!   Now, at least in the homeschool world, the name of the game is "memorization."  So now, we want our children to memorize the fifty states, the presidents, and the key concepts of continental philosophy.  That gives me the opportunity to memorize all these things for the first time!  Oh, how I love learning them.  I am now downright proficient at the fifty states.   Come on, test me.  I've got 'em.
   Also, new pic Mom just sent us:

Love you, Mom!  (poor Annie looks shell shocked)

  
      

Annie's first word. . .

. . . is, "Jacob!"

Thai-liscious!

I had NO IDEA how easy Thai food is to prepare!
It has been TWO YEARS that Ron has been saying to me that he thinks "we" should get into Thai cooking.  Healthy, lots of vegetables, new and appealing flavors.
For our anniversary, I got 2 cookbooks with Americanized Thai dishes in them, and the promise to start cooking Thai food.  He was thrilled.
Well, today I embarked on my first recipe: Green curry.
Oh my goodness.  So exciting.
Who knew it was SO EASY?????
I had been daunted by all the ingredients I would have to stock up on--mistake.  3 ingredients!  I can handle 3.

Coconut milk, Green curry paste, and fish sauce.

I whisked a little coconut milk with a T. of paste in a large pot.  Then added the rest of the can of milk and the fish sauce (1 T.).  Voila!  That has taken me 2 YEARS!!! :)

Then I added: chopped fresh ginger, asparagus tips, chopped carrots, and a chopped squash.  Finally, a package of fresh green beans.

I think the ginger is key, an the asparagus makes it extra special.  But everything else can be whatever you have in the kitchen.  Cabbage would be nice, and snow peas.

I made a pot of basmati rice, and the whole thing took me 15 minutes.  I just sort of can't believe it.  
  
 

the art of a winter day

How do you do winter when you are seasonally/ light challenged?  My try at it today:

1) I lit a fire--actually, two!

2) I exercised for 30 minutes to keep my metabolism from going into the negative numbers. :)
3) I drank hot tea--green, for a little energy.
4) I crocheted.

5) I sat by a window for half an hour.
6) We did something unexpectedly fun in school--we played U.S. geography quizzes (and I still cannot believe how geologically challenged I am--I still have some states to learn.  Forget about capitals.).  I think tomorrow we might do music or art history or something we should be doing but never do.

I wish I could get up to 10, but see, I am seasonally challenged!  

tilling before the snow

     Snow is on its way.  We made the most of our day outside before a snowy, cold and wet week!

Enjoying Granny and Papa Harville before they headed back to N.M.:

Tilling:

    

Leveling the soil:

And just being cute (at least one of us, anyway)!

Happy January, Everyone!

A Day with Ron

     Happy Anniversary, Ron!  We will be married for 12 years this Sunday, and in common K. and R. Rombs style, we are having a three day anniversary extravaganza, rather than a contained dinner (after all, we are the couple who went on TWO honeymoons--do you all know that?  We changed our wedding date, and kept the originally planned honeymoon (in Turkey) and added another (in Paris) after the actual wedding!).
    This year, in predictable thoughtfulness, Ron anticipated what would be most thrilling for me for a gift: he offered to make raised beds for my vegetable garden.  So we spent all day in lumber yards obtaining the wood, hardware and lining.  Mom and Dad had the 4 older kids, so it was a breeze.

    Then we had an anniversary feast--a picnic meal with Annie--take-in Thai food on the rec. room floor. It was an indulgent feast, talking about our 12 years.  The stories were as good as the food.

      We had begun the day together over breakfast.  Ron asked me: "How many bottles of wine do you think are the equivalent to the amount of water turned to wine in the wedding feast at Cana?"
      I said I imagined six jugs that were large, but whatever was standard for a wedding.
      He responded: "900 bottles of wine.  Think about it.  If we offered 200 bottles of wine at our reception, that would have been a lot.  But He created the equivalent of 900 bottles, after much wine had already been drunk.  The point in John's Gospel is how LAVISH Christ is with His gifts."
     This is Ron at breakfast--wow!  And look at how lavishly he worked for me the whole rest of the day on a vegetable garden that will probably completely fail.  
     A good man is hard to find.    

sadness

     Ron's Mom got terrible news in December--the cancer has spread from the colon to the liver.  This week, Ron went to Houston with his Mom and Dad for the doctor's visit about what to do next.  Perhaps she will outlive the prognosis, but the rough guesses are in months and not years, and she is beginning a new chemo treatment on Tuesday.  She is feeling very bleak, though, and preparing actively for the end of her life.

    This house is full of sadness.  It is so hard grappling with the very end of one's life.  She is full of emotion, and beautifully so.  Ron is full of emotion, and beautifully so.  

     Mom and Dad have come to visit us--we canceled our trip to see them because of this news, and so they came to see us instead!  This is a joy for me, to have a house full with Donna and Ronnie, Mom and Dad, our kids, Ron who is not in the office today, 4 dogs, and home movies of Christmas going on in the background.  Lunch was BYOS--bring your own salad.  So it really is all gift for me.  

    

     Mom shared one of her favorite stories of St, Theresa of Avila (Donna and Ronnie are Carmelites, St. Theresa's order).  A biographer wrote the story of Theresa's life while she was still living.  She read the draft.  It was an eloquent recounting of her accomplishments.  Theresa's reaction was very negative.  When the writer asked what could possibly offend her, she said: "You left out the mistakes!  They are the most important parts of my life--they are where God shows up!"  That really is a sublime way to think about and account for one's life.  

P.S.  If you want to see a pic larger, click on it.  To go back the the blog, click on the back space.  

    

40 subjects

     I spent the day organizing homeschool curricula and this next semester, and I realized that on any given school day, I oversee 40 subjects!  Jake and Mary, 14 each, and Clare and Leigh, 6 each.  It made me feel so much better, since I had been down in the dumps about not getting through all of it often enough last semester.  Mind you, they are not general subjects such as "Math."  Rather, they are sub-subjects, such as "Math workbook" and "Math facts drill."  Each task is enumerated (so that we don't forget any of them!).  But still, 40!  

     Amid the crisis of this discovery, Mary made the quote of the day.  We were memorizing a poem, "Christopher Columbus" by Steven Vincent Benet.  It begins:
"There are many queer things that discoverers do, but his was the queerest, I swear!"  
     After 19 wrong tries, Mary's 20th attempt was: "There are many queers who discover things. . . ."
     Not funny AT ALL, I know, but I laughed and laughed until tears streamed down my face.
     Mary and Jake have NO IDEA what "queers" means; they must think their poor mother had cracked (which she had).

well, it happened. . .

     . . . I cannot believe my year's goal was tested so soon, and the need for it exposed so clearly!  Here we are, Jan. 2.!  I was in Mass, and I had to walk right by the person who is most difficult for me in Irving.  We were situated such that I could not avoid her at all; if I did not say hello, it would have been rude.  So I did say hello, as best I could.
     My spiritual goal for this year is respecting others.  This goal has arisen out of last year's goal (2010), which was love.  When I set the goal, I had no idea what kind of love I meant, but Jacob recommended it and I liked the idea of seeking out deeper levels of love.  What happened in 2010 was a deepening of love in some of my current relationships, immediate family and close friends, which was truly wonderful.
    But exposed in this process was a vice: I have a very, very hard time being loving to people whom I meet on the street, or who are not close relationships for me.  I do not respect them as I should.  They are important, real people who should be honored, and I have a hard time doing that, esp. ones who happen to be irritating.  I feel immature in this regard: to be nice when it is easy, but not nice when it is hard is just not who I want to be.  
    So there I am in Mass, and it is OBVIOUS to me that God is saying, "Here you are, it is time to learn to respect B. [this lady]."  The priest happens to be discussing the star of Bethlehem, and he says, "Astronomers in ancient times believed that a star is born when ever a person is born.  A particularly brightly shining star meant to them that a significant person has been born."  I realize that B.'s star is very bright.  I imagine the star of Bethlehem shining over her, and suppose that her star might be just as bright in the Father's eyes.
     I pray after communion for her, and for all the people whom it is not easy to love--the cashier at the grocery store; an irritating waitress.  I think of them all having these bright stars shining over them, and how I should respect them, honor their tremendous dignity, and in so doing, love them.  I ask God to help me see their stars so that my smile can be genuine and my tone sincere.  Because goodness knows, my smile is wiry and my tone is forced!  Good thing I have 363 more days to work on improvement!

happy new year!

 

     Happy Birthday, Annie!  Annie is 8 months old today.  She got her first tooth for Christmas.

     New Year's Spiritual Goal: respect for others, even when it is not convenient.  I have got a LONG, LONG way to go on this one!