Smart Martha Monday.

Today I took Christopher and Joseph over to the church for some prayer time in front of the blessed sacrament and Christopher found a novena prayer to St. Martha.

I was struck by the fact that I have been doing these posts for a long long time and haven't once thought about asking St. Martha to intercede for me. I am going to make an effort to remember to ask her for her prayers each time I post a new Smart Martha Monday post.

So from last week:

1) Go to pray at the church for one hour on my own.


I did this on Thursday. I am going to make Thursdays between 4-5 my time for prayer at the church every week. It fits in well with all the other after school activities. 


2) cut out my new dress.


Not done. I decided it was more important to go through the boys room so put my sewing aside. 


3) Get onto skype and talk with some friends


I had a chat with Cathy on Wednesday night. It was great. Hoping to get on more this week. 


4) Go to bed each night by 10.30.


Didn't do. I had a couple of later nights since I needed to check boys sugar levels and Joseph needed eye drops 4 times a day for conjunctivitis. I usually gave him his eye drops at midnight. 


5) Go out with Steve for coffee date.


Didn't go out but had some take away with just Joseph on Friday so I did spend some time alone with him. 


This week I want to do the following:


1) We need a new improved diet. I always notice when we are eating lots of fresh fruits, vegetables and less processed food that the boys sugars are much much easier to manage. I want to do a new menu plan that has more vegetable based main meals. Just about everyone likes eggplant parmigiana. I want to get a few more meals like this that we can eat regularly. If you have any suggestions please post them in the comments. 


2) Declutter something. Since starting the boys room over the weekend, I have the buy. I think I need to declutter our bedroom. Especially our walk in robe. 


3) Take Christopher and Joseph to mass each day. 


4) 1 Holy hour. 


5) Paper work. I really need to go through all our paper work and get it up to date. There are some things that I need to fill in and post off that have been sitting there for a long time. 


Pop over the Therese from Musings of a Mom who also joins in Smart Martha Monday. 

Weekend Wrap up.

We had a great weekend here.

On Friday night Steve and I went to mass and then got take away for tea since there was only Joseph and us at home. 

It was nice to come back and enjoy the peace and quiet in the house. That night, we watched Surrogates.

Saturday morning we were up early for mass and adoration. Every other weekend, Steve goes and empty's the St. Vinnie's Bins and takes the clothes back to the shop. While he went and did this, I started cleaning out the boys room. 

I have decided we need to have another de clutter in the house and started at the beginning. The boys room, is the very fist room from the left of the house and also the smallest bedroom. Having three boys in there has been a challenge. I decided it was time to go through everything and get back to basics. After spending quite a few hours in the boys room this weekend, we have 3 bags of clothes for St. Vinnie's and 1 extra bag of rubbish. 

I am going to keep on going through the rest of the house whenever I have a few spare minutes. 

Last night I spent a fair bit of time catching up with some blogs that I haven't read for a long time. I also started playing a new game on facebook called collapse. A fun game and maybe just a bit too addictive. I will have to watch how much time I play it. 

I hope you all had a great weekend. 

Stylish blogger award.

Thanks so much to Vicky from Creating with Wisdom and Esther from A Catholic mom in Hawaii for passing on the Stylish blogger Award to me. I love both your blogs and feel very privileged to have this award passed on from you.

Editing to add, Lisa from Are We There Yet, also gave me this award. Thanks so  much Lisa. Your blog is another must read that I hate to miss. 

For this award, I need to tell you seven things about myself. 

I have been blogging for so long, it will be hard to come up with 7 things I haven't already said about myself. 

-1-

I believe God gave Steve and I 8 children because it was the only way I would learn the virtue of patience. 

-2-

I like to play sudoku. I try to do at least one a day to keep my mind active. 

-3-

I am not a very good housekeeper. 

-4-

Just about every morning I have eggs on toast for breakfast. 

-5-

I like to listen to The Priests when I am doing house work. 

-6-

Next January, Steve and I have been married 21 years. I love being married. 

-7-

I decided yesterday that we are not going to buy soft drink on a regular basis any more. I really love drinking soft drink but it is so bad for me and the children. They drink a lot because I do too. We are going to have it for special events only from now on. 

I want to pass this award onto the following bloggers.

Nikki from The Roman Road. 

Ebeth from A Catholic mom climbing the pillars.

Jamie from Lord, Make Me a Saint.  

Jeanne from A Peaceful Day.

Christie from Garden of Holiness.  

A little Fun.

This is doing the rounds of facebook with my friends and I thought I would show it here.

I got Lazy, happy, patient and elegant.

What did you get?

Nearly Wordless Wednesday.

Here is Joseph on the way to Whyalla last week. He was starting to get cranky so I gave him the phone with some Abba music on and he was settled for the rest of the trip.

Smart Martha Monday.

Here are the things I had on my list last week:

1) Family day in Whyalla. 

We went to Whyalla on Thursday and had a great time. 

2) Post something on here each day since we are on school holidays. 

Done except for Saturday when I really couldn't  think of much to write. 

3) Sort out boys linen.

Done. I went through all the linen for our younger three boys. Sam is old enough to take care of his own on this. I went through and decided what was worth keeping, what we needed to get rid of and what extras we needed. Now Tom, Christopher and Joseph all have two complete bed linen sets. 

4) Prepare for our party this weekend. 

Done.

This week my goals are:

1) Go to pray at the church for one hour on my own.

2) cut out my new dress.

3) Get onto skype and talk with some friends.

4) Go to bed each night by 10.30.

5) Go out with Steve for coffee date.

Therese from The Musings of a Mom also joins in Smart Martha Monday. 

Weekend Wrap up.

 Another big weekend here in our household.


Steve and I started the day yesterday driving to Whyalla to help Daniel pack up his gear to move. Steve dropped me off at Spotlight and I did some shopping then walked back to Daniel's place I actually took a wrong turn and ended up taking 1 hour to walk what should have taken me 15 minutes. The exercise must have been needed.

At Spotlight I bought some fabric and patterns for me. I am going to make myself a couple of summer tunic tops and a dress for church. Here is a picture of the fabric and patterns.

In the afternoon, I did a lot of preparation for our party today. We went to mass last night.

Today we got up early and did more party prep. The party started at 1.00. We had a great time with our family and friends.

Tonight I was finally able to get onto skype and speak with my sister in Singapore. It was great to catch up with her. Steve has fixed the microphone and camera on our laptop so hopefully we will be able to use skype a lot with many of you.

I hope you all had a good weekend too.
Therese.

Quick 7.

Thanks so much to Jen from Conversion Diary for hosting 7 quick takes each Friday.

-1-

Our car hunt continues. We have driven a Hyundai Getz, a Mitsubishi Colt and a Mazda 2. Steve and I both like the Mazda 2 the most. 

There isn't that many of them for sale second hand and the ones that do come up seem overpriced to us.

We are not in any hurry to buy a new one so we will keep our eyes open for a second hand one and save a bit more. Maybe at the end of the year we will have enough that we can buy a new one. 

-2-

Today Steve turns 45. He and I went out for a coffee tonight to celebrate. Joseph got to come along since he had a three hour sleep this afternoon. 

-3-

School starts again on Monday. 4th term only has 9 weeks.  Christopher and I will be doing a lot of one on one work this term. 

-4-

For his therapy, Joseph's physio said a tricycle would be good to help strengthen his legs. I have been looking around for a good one that is not plastic. Yesterday I came across one on Ebay that was the right price and bought it. It will be a Christmas present for him probably since he has a scooter that we can use until then. 

-5-

On Sunday Steve and I are having a joint birthday party. It would have been good to have it in the middle of the holidays but Tom was on diabetes camp so we couldn't. I am still looking forward to having our family and friends over. 

-6-

Tomorrow Steve and I are driving over to Whyalla to help Daniel pack up. He will be working his last day with One Steel on Tuesday and moving to Adelaide. 

He has applied to study teaching in Adelaide and will be working at Hungry Jacks while studying. 

-7-

Why we are in Whyalla, I will be visiting Spotlight and spending some of my birthday  money. I am going to get some linen fabric for a summer dress and a couple of patterns. 

Scooby Doo Live

Today we took Tom, Amelia, Christopher and Joseph over to Whyalla to see Scooby Doo Live. What a great show. Everyone sang along and Joseph enjoyed clapping every time they asked us too.

Wordless Wednesday: Joseph loves our bed.

He pulled everything off and jumped in.

Hoodwinked too.

Our family movie for tonight. It is great so far.

Smart Martha Monday.

On my list last week, I had:

Pray for one hour in front of the blessed sacrament. 

I did a half hour at the Cathedral yesterday since we got to mass 30 minutes early. 

Sort out our paper work:

All done. I have even put in all the paper work for our tax to be completed. 

Sort out boys linen. 

Not done. I actually forgot that it was on my list. 

This week I want to do the following:

1) Family day in Whyalla. 

2) Post something on here each day since we are on school holidays. 

3) Sort out boys linen.

4) Prepare for our party this weekend. 

Therese from The Musings of a Mom is also joining in Smart Martha Monday. 

Quick 7.

-1-
Today Tom left for diabetes camp. He is going to be away till Sunday afternoon. I hope he has a great time.

-2-
Steve and I are car hunting. We have a little carolla that is starting to cost us a lot to maintain. We have decided to sell it and get a newer car. At this stage we are looking into getting a Hyundai Getz.

-3-
The first week of school holidays have just flown. We had Steve's parents down on the first weekend and I spent a fair bit of time researching new cars since they left
.
-4-
The weather has been very overcast and dreary lately. Steve and I were hoping to get a bit of exercise in but only walked last weekend. I really hope next week is warmer and we can get some walks in.

-5-
The photo up above is my cute photo for the week. Joseph's cousin put him in this box and pushed him around. Joseph really loved it.

-6-
Next Thursday we are taking Tom, Amelia, Christopher and Joseph to see Scooby Doo live. They are all very excited about it.

-7-
Friday is Steve's 45th birthday. On Sunday we ate having a double party to celebrate both our birthdays.


Don't forget to visit Jen ay conversion diary for other people's quick 7.

Wordless Wednesday: Watching Prince Caspian

Tasty Tuesday: My new pie maker.

Today my pie maker arrived so we had cheese and Bacon pies for tea.
Ingredients:
Shortcrust pastry
Puff pastry.
1 extra large onion diced
1 kg beef mince
300 grams Bacon diced.
1 cup gravy
Cheese.
Fry onion, beef and Bacon till cooked. Add gravy and stir till gravy thickens.
Prepare pastry to go in pie maker. Put shortcrust pastry in bottom of pie maker. Put filling in pastry and top with cheese. Put puff pastry on top of pie. Bake in pie maker for 6 minutes. Take pies out and enjoy.

Smart Martha Monday. (On Tuesday).

I was going to do a post last night but time just got away from me.

My list from last week is all done.

I cleaned out the storeroom, went to Adoration and did Leanne's meme.

On my list this week:

1) Pray for one hour in front of the Blessed Sacrament.

2) Catch up on all our paper work.

3) Sort out boys linen.

Therese from The Musings of a mum is also joining in Smart Martha Monday.

Weekend Wrap up.

We have had a great start to the holidays here. On Saturday it was my 45th birthday. When my mother was pregnant with me, I was due on the 5th of October. She wanted to call me Therese Angela after St. Therese and the guardian angels. Back then, the feast for St. Therese was on the 3rd of October and the feast of the guardian angels, the 2nd of October. Since then, St. Therese's feast day has been moved to the 1st so now my patron saints feast is on my birthday. 

For my birthday I am getting a new pie maker and bread maker. Daniel asked me during the week what I wanted and I said a pie maker. They come in two and four. The two was cheaper but I asked him to give some money towards the 4 and I  ordered it. I am hoping it will come early this week. It will be great if it come tomorrow. 

I also ordered the bread maker from eBay. This is from Steve and our younger 4 children. When Steve was studying, we made our bread every day. After many years of use, the belt broke and we decided that we had had enough of bread making for a while so never replaced the belt. I don't think we will be making our bread everyday but I will make hot cross buns, yeast buns and pizza dough with it. 

Since it was my birthday, Daniel cooked tea for the family last night. He cooked Apricot chicken and it was delicious. We haven't had Apricot chicken for a long time. I think it will be one to put back onto our regular meals. 

I have a couple of video's to share from our weekend. 

here is Joseph, our star basket ball chapion. 

Here he is this morning in his new overalls. These were given to us by friends last year and I put them away until they fitted him. I had forgotten them until I cleaned out the storeroom this week and found them. Today it was a bit cooler here so I put them on him and took this video. 

In a couple of weeks, Steve and I will be having a joint 45th birthday party. We went out this afternoon and delivered invitations to friends that live locally. 

This week we will be on holidays. I have lots of sewing planned. 

I hope you all have a good week. 

Therese. 

Patron Saint Meme.

Thanks so much Leanne for tagging me for the Patron Saint Meme. 

When I first read the meme at Leanne's blog, I thought it was the same one I had done back in 2008. I went back and looked in my archives. I found that the meme I did in 2008 was a bit different. There was something in common with both meme's though.

They were both in August. I remember thinking I could post from the archives and do the meme on the same date as I had back in 2008. On that Monday I posted a Smart Martha Post but I didn't do the meme. I know I intended to do it that week, but from reading this post, I remember just how busy life got for us around the end of August and then the meme was forgotten.

My fist meme that I did on August 22 2008, can be found here.

That meme asked:

What picture would I use for my holy card, should I make it to sainthood, and of what cause(s) would I want to be patroness of?


The new meme asks

Assuming you are a saint, and your cause has been executed, your miracles confirmed, your date on the calendar established, all that is required is select that of which Holy Mother Church will name you Patron(ess).For this meme, you must name your patronage and then tag 5 other people who would like to play along. Link your answer to your nominator's post.

 So back in 2008, I thought I could be the patroness for mothers that hated washing and that a photo my uncle had taken of me when I was about 8 or 9 could be my Holy Card

Now still in 2011, I think I still would want to be the patroness for mothers that hate washing. I still hate it just as much as I did back in 2008. I know that I need someone in Heaven praying for me that I can move that mountain of washing each day. I am probably more organised with my washing now though than I was then.

I am tagging the following 5 people for this meme:

Esther from A Catholic mom in Hawaii 
Easter from Passionate about life

(These two ladies were the ones that originally tagged me for the patron saint meme back in 2008. I wonder if they think their patronage should be the same now too).

Nancy from Be Not Afraid
Therese from The Musings of a mom.
Suzy from Scraps of Sunlight.

Wordless Wednesday.

Smart Martha Monday.

I really should read what I have on my list before the day I have to report on them.

I did have the best intentions when I said I would do Leanne's meme but completely forgot about it.

I guess I will just have to put it on my list again this week.

I started cleaning out the fridge (when I looked at my list). I prayed the rosary a few days but not every day and I sent out invitations.

This week I have on my list:

Leanne's meme. 

De clutter our storeroom.

One hour prayer in front of the blessed sacrament at church.

I hope you all have a good week.

7 Quick Takes.

-1-

This weekend, the girls and I are off to Whyalla for a girls weekend away. We will go shopping, eat out for tea and have some girl bonding time. 

-2-

Today was Tom and Amelia's sports day at school. I took Christopher and Joseph over there just before 12.00. We had a great time watching them all compete. Their team came in fourth but they had lots of fun. 

-3-

Joseph's physiotherapy is going really well. We can see a great improvement in his walking and control. This week, we are going to be working on strengthening his stomach muscles. 

-4-

We have had lots of summer weather here this week. I cannot wait for it to be warm every day. I really love summer. 

-5-

I haven't sewn very  much at all since Joseph was born. Now that Tom and Amelia are back at school, I should have more time to do some. I have quite a few plans for some summer dresses for myself and some summer outfits for the younger children. For some reason, my older children would rather buy their clothes. 

-6-

It is now 8 days till the feast day of St. Therese. I was told about a novena prayer that was starting yesterday so have started it. If you want to join in the novena you can find it here. 

-7-

Today I went over to the church on my own for a prayer hour. I have told Steve that I want to try and get over there once a week for one hour. It was great to be alone with Our Lord and not have any distractions or any one talking to me. I thought the time might drag but it went by very fast. I am looking forward to doing this each week. 

Don't forget to drop over to Jennifer's blog for other people's quick takes. 

Cooking bandit.

Tom asked to help with tea tonight. I was. making quiche so decided it was a good dish for him to learn. This quiche is so easy, I think he will be able to make it next time without supervision. Here he is with the quiche before they went in the oven.
Tom named himself the cooking bandit. I think it suits him.

Happy Birthday Dad.

My dad would have turned 76 this year if he was still living. It will be two years in November since he passed away.


Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon him. May the souls of the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace. Amen.

Smart Martha Monday.

My list from last week:

I did exercises with Joseph every day but I don't think it was twice a day like I am suppose to try and do.

I just did the home school meme. 

I kept up with my blogging schedule and read 99% of the blog posts for blogs in my reader. When I was looking at my reader earlier, I only had 30 or so unread.

I  missed prayer a few mornings but we did get to mass each day and I got to confession on Saturday. 

This week. 

I am going to do the meme that Leanne tagged me for a while ago. Sorry I haven't gotten around to doing this yet Leanne. I actually forgot that you tagged me for it. Then I read Vicky's post and remembered that I had been tagged too. 

Send out some invitations. 

clean out our fridge. 

Pray the rosary daily.

I hope you all have a good week. 

Home School meme.

Thanks so much Vicky, for tagging me for the home school meme.

One Homeschool Book You've Enjoyed.  


My favourite would have to be Designing Your Own Classical Curriculum.  This book would have to be the one that helped me the most when I first started home school. I would say this is the book that gave me the confidence that I could educate my children myself. 


One Resource You Wouldn't Be Without. 


I think the internet would have to be the one. I keep in touch with other home school families and have loads of bookmarks with resources. 


One Resource You Wish You'd Never Bought. 


Not really sure if I can think of one. I cannot think of anything we have bought and not used. There have been programs that I have bought and thought I won't get this again simply because the program hasn't been suited to my children's way of learning. 


One Resource You Liked Last Year. 


I loved the Tutor System. I will be using it again next year for Christopher I think. 


One Resource You'll Be Using Next Year. 


The Tutor System and The Phonetic Zoo. The Phonetic Zoo is a spelling program. Right from the start of home schooling, I have really struggled with how to teach the children how to spell. In May this year, I did a search for something new and came across The Phonetic Zoo. I bought it and we started it straight away. It is by far the best spelling program we have had. Tom and Amelia both said they hated this program but the results were fantastic. They really learnt words and remembered them. 


One Resource You'd Like To Buy. 


An I Pad or Android Tablet. 


One Resource You Wish Existed. 


I don't think there is any resource that I have wanted and haven't been able to find. I do wish though there were more home school families that lived close by. I really like the idea of doing activities with other home school families. 


One Homeschooling Catalogue You Enjoy Reading.  


I don't have any home school catalogues. 


One Homeschool Site You Visit Regularly. 


All the home school blogs that are in my reader. 


I am not going to tag any other bloggers since this meme has been going around a bit. If you want to do the meme and haven't been tagged, let me know in the comment box and I am happy to tag you for it. 

weekend Wrap up.

Yesterday was the first weekend of no Saturday morning netball. This has taken up a lot of our Saturday mornings for a long time.

Steve and I started with Mass and Adoration. We take one child with us each week. This week it was Christopher's turn to come. 

Since we didn't have netball, I did my menu plan for the week and then went food shopping. 

In the evening we got to church early so that we could go to confession before mass. 

On Friday, I received a text message from our video store saying we could hire any new release for $1.95. Steve and I decided to take up this offer and hired The Rite. 

We both enjoyed this movie and recommend it. It wasn't as scary as I thought it would be and they did a good job portraying exorcism's accurately from what Steve and I have heard about them. 

Today was a sunny day. After lunch, Steve and I took Tom, Amelia, Christopher and Joseph over to Rotary Park. 

Joseph's physiotherapy is coming along nicely. One of the exercises we need to do with him is get him stepping up steps with his left leg first. Usually when we approach a step, I make him stop and put his left leg up. Today while we were at Rotary park, I noticed that he was stepping up with his left leg first on his own without any prompting from me.

Here he is on video going up the steps to slide down the slide. 

We just have two weeks of school left and then we will have two weeks holidays. I am looking forward to them. 

I hope you all have a great week. 

Nearly Wordless Wednesday

I had to video this. Joseph is only sleeping but the music was pretty loud.  I couldn't believe he could fall asleep with all the background music. I videoed it so you can hear how loud the music is.

Smart Martha Monday.

On my list last week:

Blogging Smart Martha Monday, a video or photo and finally a quick 7 or weekend wrap up post.

I did them all. I did the video a day early. I was going to schedule it but decided to just post it straight away. 

I probably only read about 40% of the blog posts in my reader. 

I did get to daily mass each day and took Christopher to play at a park after it. 

On my list this week:

Do the meme Vicky tagged me for. 

Continue with the blogging schedule. 

Pray every morning. 

Do Joseph's exercises every morning and afternoon. 

Quick 7.

Thanks so much to Jen from Conversion Diary for hosting 7 Quick Takes each week. Be sure to drop over and see what others are writing about.

-1-

My mother is all settled in assisted living now. It has been a long month for my brother sister and I getting it all organised but we are finally there.

-2-

This week Tom and Amelia's school had wheelies day. Everyone had to take something to the school on wheels. Tom took some roller skates and Amelia took a scooter. Christopher, Joseph and I went over for the last hour and there was a huge obstacle course for the children to ride laps around. Christopher had a go on Amelia's scooter. Tom didn't want to ride the roller skates but had a go on the scooter as well. I spoke with Amelia's teacher and he said she has settled in really well.

-3-

The school also had dress up today. Tom went dressed as a Mexican and Amelia went as a Chinese girl. Here is a photo of them both.

-4-

I have a new favourite meal. Chicken Fried Rice.  Go and try it. I highly recommend it and I am sure we will be eating it regularly.

-5-

Tomorrow Amelia plays in the grand final for netball. She is very excited. They will play Shamrocks. We hope they will win but runner up is pretty good too.

-6-

Does anyone know if there is a way to remove the amount of followers from my dashboard? I have a bit of love and hate to it. I find I get worried when someone stops following me and wonder if I have offended someone. I really hope though that if anyone were offended that they would let me know.

-7-

I have been enjoying playing Words With Friends from Facebook. I love scrabble and have learnt quite a few strategies for the game. Paramedic Girl from Salve Regina is a champ at this game. I am yet to beat her but at least she isn't doubling my score any more. 

Port Augusta

I just saw a promotional video from our city council of our town and thought I would share it with you.

Smart Martha Monday.

I missed Smart Martha last week and I cannot remember if I did all the things from the week before. 

I have decided I need to make a new schedule for blogging and reading my favourite blogs. Blogging is probably the one thing that gets neglected when life becomes busy. I want to capture our family moments though and have written things to look back on so I have decided I will put blogging on Monday, Wednesday and once over the weekend on a schedule. 

I am going to do Smart Martha Monday each Monday. On Wednesday, I will post a photo or video from our week and over the weekend I will either do a Quick 7 or a Weekend Wrap up. 

Setting it on a schedule should help me get to blogging more. 

I am also going to start reading blogs in my reader each evening. I had over 1000 unread blog posts the other day and I had to mark all read. Today I only have 28 new posts to read. If I do it each day, I am sure I will get to most of them. 

My other aim for this week is to get to daily mass with Christopher and Joseph. Now that Tom and Amelia are at school, our home school timetable is much shorter. I have promised Christopher everyday that we get to mass, we will call in at a park on the way home for a play. It makes it a bit more appealing for him to go along. 

I hope you all have a good week. 

Happy Fathers Day

To all the fathers that read my blog, I hope you all have a great fathers day. Steve had a great day. He got lots of chocolates and we baked some cakes to have for dessert. I also cooked some yummy chicken fried rice for tea.

I am still alive.

I have had so many things to blog about but haven't had any time to sit at the computer for the past week. I was pretty busy last week getting everything ready for Tom and Amelia to go to school and we had two trips to Adelaide.

On Thursday, Tom and Christopher had a check up in Adelaide so Steve and I drove down for the day.

On Saturday my sister was in Adelaide so I went to down to see her and help her and my brother clean out of mum's unit. Brigette came down with me.

Monday was Tom and Amelia's first day at school. They have really enjoyed going every day and we have established a pretty good morning routine at home.

Each day Christopher, Joseph and I have been able to get to Mass. I hope this will be something we will be able to do everyday.

Even though Tom and Amelia are at school, we are still having some RE lessons in the afternoon and are doing times tables and reading.

Last week I also had my blogiversary. On the 23rd it was 5 years since I started blogging. I am so thankful for all the friends I have made through blogging and for all the memories I have captured through it. There have been many times I have looked back through my archives and relived the memories. I am sure when the children are all older they will enjoy looking back and remembering everything that has happened. I think that is the thing that keeps me blogging.

Smart Martha Monday.

My list from last week is complete. I haven't bought everything for Tom and Amelia to start school, but I have a list worked out. I also have a daily schedule to follow once they are back at school.

This week I want to do a zumba workout twice.

Take Tom and Christopher to their check up.

Go to Adelaide to help my brother and sister finish cleaning out mum's place.

I hope you all have a good week.

Quick 7

Thanks so much Jennifer from Conversion Diary for hosting 7 Quick Takes each week.

-1-

Our week has been busy but fun. Amelia and Tom went to their new primary school and meet their teachers and principal.

We were shown around and I am sure they are both going to be very happy there.

They will be starting on the 29th of August. I should have everything organised by then for them.

-2-

Joseph will be starting physio on the 1st of September. We will go and have a play time with the physio and she will video tape him so that she can know what exercises will help him the most.

I have started working with him on his left side and trying to get him to use it more.

-3-

Daniel is having lots of fun in Spain. He went to the Holy Land first and is now in Madrid. We have spoken on the phone a couple of times and sent many texts.

Here a video from the Australian opening.

You can see this video and more at the XT3 WYD blog.

-4-

Fr Gordon McCrae writes a blog called These Stone walls. It is a blog I have been following for a couple of years.

Fr. Gordon is in prison. He was accused of abusing a minor. I believe the accusations to be false because I have read the case notes.

On Monday the 22nd of August, Esther from A Catholic Mom in Hawaii will be starting a novena for Fr. Gordon's intentions.

I will be joining in too. If you feel led to join in, please let Esther know.

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My friend Ellie has loaned me some Zumba video's. I am going to start with the beginners video tomorrow morning. I think my goal next week for Smart Martha will be to do a couple of workouts.

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I haven't really been reading blogs I follow each day in my google reader. I looked in there this morning and saw 500+ unread items. I think I will need to maar and move onto starting from scratch again.

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I recently tried some Lipton Chai Tea Latte's and now have a new favourite drink.

Toy Library Slide

Today Christopher went to the toy library with my friend Ellie, while I took Tom and Amelia to their new school to meet the principal and have a look around.

We went back to the toy library after and Amelia wanted to bring home the slide for Joseph. All four have been on it so I suspect it isn't just for Joseph that Amelia wanted it.

Pay It Forward

Holly From A Life Size Catholic Blog is the hostess for Pay It Forward.

For this weeks pay it forward, I want to share my friend Kirsten's blog.

Everyone say hello to my friend Kirsten from Catholic of Thule. Kirsten and I have been online friends for years. We meet at Steve Ray's message board.

I wanted to share her blog with everyone this week because this week I have received in the mail, two new rosaries. One for me and one for Steve.

I actually ordered these for birthday presents for Steve and I to give each other

this year.

The two sets arrived on the Feast of the Assumption of our Lady. There were a few mix ups and I believe God wanted them to arrive on this special feast of our Lady.

My rosary has carnelian stones and Steve's is made of Black Onyx.

Here is the centre piece of Steve's. It is the Divine Mercy.

My centre piece is The Madonna.

This is my crucifix. I thought I took a picture of Steve's crucifix but must have forgotten.

Mine is a Molded filagree crucifix and Steve has a St. Benedict one.

These rosaries will be treasured by both of us for years to come and I hope we pray many decades of the rosary on them.

Please go and visit my friend Kirsten and tell her I sent you. Oh and while you are there, order a set of her wire wrapped gemstone rosaries.

Smart Martha Monday

My plan last week was to pray every night with Steve and get food shopping and menu planning done before I went to Adelaide.

I did the menu plan but Steve and I did not pray together every night and I didn't get food shopping done either.

This week I am hoping to:

Organise Tom and Amelia's school supplies. At this stage it is looking like they are going to start school on the 29th of August.

Work out our new day to day running routine including what chores each child will be responsible for.

Weekend Wrap up.

I spent the weekend in Adelaide, catching up with family and helping my brother clean out mum's unit. It was a busy weekend but we had time to visit Amelia's God parents and spend some time with my mum, sister and brother.

I will probably be going back in a fortnight to help again. My sister will be there from Singapore too.

Steve looked after everyone at home here while I was in Adelaide. It was a big weekend for both of us. I am glad to be home now. I really hope this week is not too stressful because of the busy weekend.

Quick 7.

Thanks so much to Jen from Conversion Diary for hosting 7 quick takes each week.

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We are having a few changes in our house next term. Tom and Amelia are off to school. I did originally think that we would start them next year but decided to get things organised for 4th term. I have been feeling overwhelmed at all I have to do with home school and looking after the house. I keep on thinking that I am not doing anything 100% and that is what I want to do. I am pretty confident that Christopher, Joseph and I will establish a good routine pretty quickly that I won't feel so overwhelmed by.

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Madeline has been talking about going somewhere as an exchange student in 2012/2013. She has talked about Hawaii and New York. I think it would be good for her to go somewhere that isn't as well off as we are in Australia. Steve and I are going to look into it a bit more. I will keep you all posted on what we find out and if she does it or not.

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I have a new handbag. One of the things I dislike about living in a small country town is the limit we have in stores. I went to both Target Country and Big W and they all had a really small range of bags. They were all overpriced imo too. I bought this one online. It is great. It isn't too big or too small. I fit everything I need in nicely.

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Diabetes SA put on a diabetes camp each year for children with diabetes between the age of 10 and 12. There are a lot of children that apply to go on this camp so not everyone that applies, gets to go. We sent in the application for Tom to go a couple of months ago and heard this week that he can go.

The camp is on the middle weekend of the October school holidays. I will take Tom to Adelaide and stay there while he is on the camp. It will be good for him to meet some other children with diabetes and be at a place that has diabetes educators and Registrars that know how to look after them all. Tom is very excited about going and the rest of the term cannot go fast enough for him.

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Steve's singing lessons continue. We all know the different exercises by heart. He said to me tonight, he has a new appreciation for what Singers go through to become really good.

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Daniel is in the Holy Land this week. He has been swimming in the dead sea, stayed by the sea of Galilee, gone to Jerusalem and Bethlehem. We have spoken a couple of times with him and he is having a great time. He says the traffic there is bedlam. I hope we will see for ourselves one day.

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This week in Australia we had the Census. I did ours on line and it was a great way to do it. I knew all the questions by heart though by the time I got to doing Joseph. It took me about 1 hour to complete. Interestingly, many households didn't complete the online census. They entered all the data but failed to submit. I am pretty sure I submitted because I got a receipt number. I also saw our census guy tonight walking down our street. Since he didn't come to our place, he must have our receipt number.

Wordless Wednesday.

Here is Joseph and our cat CC. CC doesn't normally like Joseph and runs as soon as she hears him. She was happy to sit in the chair with him on Sunday though since Brigette was there too.

Tasty Tuesday: Menu planning.

Since I am going to Adelaide this weekend, I need to get a menu plan for the next 10 days. I already have up until Friday planned so just have to come up with 6 simple meals for next week.

Here is what we will do next week:

Minestrone. I cook this in our slow cooker. I just throw it all together and leave it for 4 hours on high.

Ratatouille. I have wanted to try this for a while. A friend reminded me when she said that she made it with her 9 year old daughter.

Chicken Fried Rice. All of us love fried rice. I thought the chicken would add a nice flavour for a change.

Spaghetti and meatballs. A meal everyone in our house loves.

Butter Chicken. Another favourite.

Pumpkin Soup. With bread rolls. I am going to take Deanne's suggestion and roast the pumpkin instead of boiling it.

Honey Soy chicken noodles. I love Hokkien noodles. I came across this recipe when looking for one to use with them. I am going to try putting them all together in the slow cooker for 5-6 hours on slow. Will let you know how it turns out.