Strep Throat

My five year-old woke this morning with a "sore voice". So, rather than cleaning house (which needs it desperately), we took a trip to the doctor. He has strep (his "betrothed" is sick from school today also hhhmmmm....). The principal of the school is having a big party tomorrow after school for her birthday. I am afraid he is not going to make it to the party. Which means I cannot go and take the little ones with me. Oh well, I was looking forward to it because this year the school got all new teachers and a new principal and I could not feel more happy about where I send my kids.

Back in Action

I woke up at 5:30 this morning and started to panic because Anna had an appointment at the orthodontist and I hadn't made plans to have someone pick up the other kids after school. I am really getting frantic and as I am in the shower I realized that today was Sunday, not Monday! I was awake about 15- 20 minutes before I realized what day it was! Well CCD went great today. We covered a lot of ground and I sent a sheet home of the basics that they are going to study for ten minutes every night. It will be easy to tell who is doing their homework because they are going to have a quiz probably every week. I am so proud of them. We went over to church to pray a Rosary and they all are so much better at genuflecting. Nice and slow and paying attention. Sometimes all it takes is to explain how and why we do what we do. Also, the kids who usually are more quiet are starting to talk up and answer questions more and more. Wow! What a difference a week makes. I am off this afternoon to Adoration. If I was a good mom I would take some kids with me. I do sometimes, but it is so nice to have that quiet time.

Volleyball

My daughter Anna is in volleyball. It is my favorite school sport, but they changed the rules and I am having a fun (not really) time trying to figure it out. I will. Eventually. Anna is pretty good but, she hurt her shoulder so is having to serve underhand. This is her first year at the public school and she loves it. The Catholic school here got all new teachers and principal and it is wonderful! My kids always liked school, but not because of the teachers. Now, they are begging to go early and talk all the time about their day. I have never been so happy with the education my kids are getting.

I Wanna Give Up

Last year I taught CCD to 7th and 8th grades (I also got the 6th grade halfway through the year) and it went great. I was so looking forward to doing it again. But, so far the past two weeks have been horrific. Yesterday I made someone cry. I don't recall ever feeling like such a rotten person. I do not know how to make this situation better. I mean these are great kids and anything they do not know that they should, I do not blame them at all. They are well-behaved and really want to know this stuff, but I only get them for one hour and 15 minutes a week, and you can only cram so much and expect it to sink in. At what point does one know when to throw in the towel?

Kids

This is my 12 year-old daughter, Anna Catherine.

This is my 11 year old daughter Mary Elizabeth.

This is my 16 year old son, Mark Anthony. This picture was taken right after he shaved his head for his uncle who has brain tumors.

This is Christopher John. He is 5 years old.

This is my baby Monica Theresa who will be two in October.

This is Joseph Michael who is eight, and Cecelia Grace who is four.

Dog sitting

Joseph is now here to spend a couple of days while Fr. goes on retreat or whatever it is he is going to. He is a Welsh Corgi and is such a spoiled dog, but he is really sweet and fun to have around. He loves to play with our two kittens more so than he does our dog Blackie now. Oh, and he loves food more than any animal I have ever seen.

One of Those Days

You know when you wake up and get the kids ready in plenty of time and things are going along quite well and you just think the day is going to be easy? Doesn't happen here too much, but that is what happened today, or so I thought. It was picture day at school. And we were there early. I am usually on time barring some unforseen problem. However, my daughter had morning preschool (she usually goes in the afternoon) and I didn't leave as soon as I needed so I was 10 minutes late to Mass. I swear father was laughing at me! Anyway, I got over messing that up and came home and did a little housework. Then I go to church for awhile and at a quarter till 12 the preschool teacher comes in. I was supposed to pick Cecelia up at 11:15, but I thought it was 12:15! I really hate feeling stupid. You think I would be used to it by now.