Think about this.

A Friend of mine opened his wife's underwear drawer and picked up a silk paper wrapped package:
'This, - he said - isn't any ordinary package.'
He unwrapped the box and stared at both the silk paper and the box.
'She got this the first time we went to New York , 8 or 9 years ago.
She has never put it on , was saving it for a special occasion. Well, I guess this is it.'
He got near the bed and placed the gift box next to the other clothing
he was taking to the funeral house, his wife had just died.
He turned to me and said:
'Never save something for a special occasion.
Every day in your life is a special occasion'.

I still think those words changed my life.
Now I read more and clean less.
I sit on the porch without worrying about anything.
I spend more time with my family, and less at work.
I understood that life should be a source of experience to be lived up to, not survived through.
I no longer keep anything.
I use crystal glasses every day...
I'll wear new clothes to go to the supermarket, if I feel like it.
I don't save my special perfume for special occasions, I use it whenever I want to.
The words 'Someday...' and 'One Day...' are fading away from my dictionary.
If it's worth seeing, listening or doing, I want to see, listen or do it now...
I don't know what my friend's wife would have done if she knew she wouldn't be there the next morning, this nobody can tell.
I think she might have called her relatives and closest friends.
She might call old friends to make peace over past quarrels.
I'd like to think she would go out for Chinese, her favourite food.
It's these small things that I would regret not doing, if I knew my time had come..
Each day, each hour, each minute, is special.
Live for today, for tomorrow is promised to no-one.
If you got this, it's because someone cares for you and because, probably, there's someone you care about.
If you're too busy to send this out to other people and you say to yourself that you will send it
'One of these days', remember that 'One day' is far away... or might never come...
No matter if you're superstitious or not, spend some time reading it.
It holds useful messages for the soul.

our new floor!!!!!!!!!!!

The hard board going down.


The new floor covering.


Tom and Joseph think it looks great and are both very happy.

Our weekend.

Friday:

Joseph crawling around.



Saturday:

Every Saturday morning we have a big cleanup around the house. Every child has a job to do and Steve and I run around making sure they have done them.

In the afternoon, the girls and I went food shopping. Madeline came home and coloured her hair. Daniel came over in the late afternoon and we spent the evening sitting around.



Sunday:

The weather was absolutely brilliant. We took Tom, Amelia, Christopher and Joseph to the park with a couple of Amelia's friends.

We also cleaned out the family room/home school room for our new lino to be laid tomorrow. Here is the room all cleared out. Tomorrow when the lino has been laid and we have everything back in there, I will take more photos.

My three favourite Catholic prayers.

A while ago, Therese from The musings of a mom and Epsilon from All the little epsilons tagged me for a meme.

This year, I haven't done many of the meme's or passed on many awards that others have given me simply because I am not blogging nearly as much and I have forgotten to post them. I wanted to post this first and apologise. I really hope that no one has been offended at my lack of passing on or posting of memes. I really do enjoy doing them most of the time.

I think I have also come across a way to remember to post them on. I am simply subscribing to the comments and keeping them in my inbox till I do them.

So now onto the meme.

My first favourite Catholic prayer is:



The Divine Mercy Chaplet.

2) The St. Michael the Archangel prayer.

3) The Holy Rosary.

I tag the following bloggers:

Paramedic Girl from Salve Regina.

Honey from Mile to Go.

Erin from Seven Little Australians.

Angie from Gaza Clan.

Christie from Garden of Holiness.

Friday Flashback

I couldn't miss Friday Flashback this week. It was my 4th blogiversary this week. On the 23rd of August, 2006, I started this blog with this post. It has been such a wonderful way to make new friends and let others stay in touch with what is happening in our lives.

Thanks so much for following along with this blog and for all the support you have given me. Without my followers and friends, I don't think I would be blogging still.

I'm back!!!!!!!!!!!

I have missed blogging so much but my family has to take priority. I am hoping we are organised enough now that I will be able to blog regularly.

So it is over two weeks since I last blogged. I looked back through photos to update you all.

Two weekends ago, we went to Bill and Linda's for Daniels 16th birthday. Here is Daniel with his cake that tasted just as good as it looks.


While we were there, we meet Mr and Mrs Adept. It is great to put a face to a name.

On the way home, the rain started and we saw this over on the horizon.

Joseph is going really well. He commando crawls around the floor all the time now. I cannot put him down and come back and find him in the same position.

I have a DVD of the Priests. I got this when I was pregnant with Joseph and listened to it a lot. I have started to listen to it more because I have found it is very soothing for him. He likes to listen to it and be in my sling. I am sure it remind's him of being in the womb.

My favourite song from the DVD is Benedictus. Here it is for your enjoyment.


Oh and here is a photo of him that we recently took. This was just after his bath. He loves crawling around in his birthday suit.



Home school is going really well too now. I have had to have a good look at our program because I was feeling so burnt out by all that was going on with having a baby and lesson plans to do. I asked some good friends to pray for us because I was feeling so overwhelmed by it all and everything has seemed to fall into place since. I have changed our schedule around a bit and bought some new curriculum aids that have made teaching a bit easier. I think it will only get better now. Joseph is becoming more and more independent of me and doesn't need to be held all the time now.

time for a break.

I am going to be off the internet for another short time. Life is just too demanding for me at the moment and I don't have the time to devote to my blog or to read other blogs. I am missing everyone but our family needs come first. I will be checking email each morning if anyone wants to contact me or ask for prayers for anything.

Before I go, here is a video of Joseph for you all:




I also have this link to share with everyone. Steve has made a catechism game called Mario Catechism. He is looking for children to test it and give him feedback on what they think of it. It is still in the testing stage but if anyone is interested in playing it you can go here to download it. Please let us know in the comment box if you have downloaded the game and what you think of it.

Tom and Amelia. Week 3 links.

Go here for Amelia's journal writing.

Go here to hear about the play Tom wants to do.

A good nights sleep.

Thanks so much to everyone that has offered prayers for Joseph. I am pretty sure he has turned the corner and i s on the road to complete recovery. He had a great nights sleep and is still in bed. Hopefully today I will be able to get some photos taken of our new home school/family room.

Therese.

Joseph.

Joseph has been pretty sick.

Last week he was a bit off and then he got a new tooth. On Sunday night he was pretty unsettled and I spent a lot of time trying to settle him to sleep. Yesterday, I couldn't put him down at all without him crying. We went to the doctor in the afternoon and he could see something in his ear. At first he thought it was an insect. He wanted another doctor to look and this doctor seemed to think it was a black hair. They decided that maybe he should have some ear drops to get it out.

We came home and Joseph had two lots of ear drops before bed. I was up with him a lot over night because he just couldn't settle without me. He wouldn't eat and seemed worse than he had during the day.

Today Steve took the day off since I had such a wakeful night. We went back to the doctor since Joseph was seeming worse. The "hair" isn't there anymore but he certainly is still feeling very off so the doctor decided to start a course of antibiotics. I really hope this helps and that he will be much better in the next couple of days.

New room.

Steve has worked so hard finishing off the family room/home school room. Today we will have our first day working in there. We are still waiting for the lino to be laid but it is organised enough that we can work from there.

Photos to follow tonight as long as Joseph is co-operative and lets mum sit on the computer.

Hopefully I won't be like this tonight.

Why I am a Catholic.

I think most Catholics would have seen this video. It is one of my favourite ones on youtube.

Over the weekend one of my friends on facebook left a status update saying that the Pope is the Antichrist.

I am not the only Catholic friend that this friend has so quite a few of us challenged the statement.

This status update ended up becoming a discussion about the Catholic church and their beliefs especially about the bible alone vs. the bible and oral tradition.

At the end of the discussion, I offered to send two people that were asking questions a copy of the book, surprised by truth. I asked them both to pm their addresses to me so that I can send it out to them.

I know that one of the two I have offered the book to reads my blog so I really hope she takes up my offer. I think the journey towards heaven is a long long road. We all make choices that hopefully lead us to God but we all stumble too. I know with the help of others through prayer, we can all become better Christians. I will be praying for both these friends and hope you will all join with me too. I also ask them for their prayers for me.

Therese.