Feeling Like I'm Done

What's the most blasphemous phrase for a Catholic mom to utter?  I used to think it was the answer of "I'm done!" to the question of having more children. 

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Unless we physically can't bear any more babies, or have been instructed by medical professionals that we shouldn't try again, we are supposed to be open to the possibility of a new baby.  Even in  our later fertile years.  Even if we already have a gaggle of children.  We might feel like we want to be done, but know that we probably shouldn't say that.  Though we can do our part to try and avoid a pregnancy, the truth is that if we are loving our spouses and not contracepting, we may not be done until the Menopausal Lady sings.

My mom had her 5th baby (me) at age 42 and her 6th baby at age 44.  I am 38.  Do the math and if I'm anything like my mother (and I am) I could still have a couple more pregnancies in this old body.

Back to the Ordinary and How Not to Die

It feels like we have all had a month off from regular life.  With our Christmas break from school/work, then one day back at school, then the rest of the week off for the snow storm, it's hard to believe we are already in the second week of January.  The break was so good, especially the peaceful reprieve from all the sports practices and games.  We were able to get a lot of cleaning and organizing completed in the house (well the cleaning is a neverendingstory) but it feels so good to walk upstairs knowing the kids bedrooms are dusted and vacuumed and drawers all cleared out.  The boys were pulling out lost clothes from under their beds that still had cat hair on them!  The cat has been gone since November!  Eeewww.  I know if I was a stay at home mom everyday, each day wouldn't be so productive, but I really do try and make good use of wintery snow days when they pop up.  I have to!  Our regular lives are just too busy.

And that's where we are now, back to regular life, back to Ordinary Time.  After all the Christmas feasting, we are happy to start some healthy meal plans again (read: no excuse for desserts and treats 24/7).  I am reading How Not to Die and while the first half of the book is a little TMI (not in an inappropriate way, just literally Too Much Info on medical studies) the second half of the book is great on explaining how we should be eating and why.  My brother, who is a doctor, heard I was reading the book and said the author is just trying to convert everyone to veganism.  I can totally see that when I read, but I also truly believe eating a more plant-based diet can't be anything but GOOD for anyone.  I'm certainly not giving up animal products (I'm not sure how to get enough protein without them) but I want to move towards more plant-based meals. 

Christmas 2017 and New Years 2018

I just have to post the photos from our Christmas and New Years or else did it really even happen?  This year I was so into Christmas prep, shopping for gifts was fun (I even crafted a couple!) and I listened to Christmas music nonstop from Black Friday through Christmas day on the radio.  Usually I burn out sometime in mid December.  The Spirit was Strong!  The kids had their Christmas Concert at school...

  

...which is a packed house that can be a little claustrophobic, but in the end, it's a cute performance.  We went to Mass on Christmas Eve at 4 pm, and I think because the Patriots game was still finishing up when people would have had to leave their houses, it wasn't as crowded as years past.  Winner! (As were the Pats!)  We had to take our traditional After Christmas Mass Family Photo,  and I should probably set up a little gallery wall with all these photos through the years, they're my favorites.

Healthy New Year GIVEAWAY!

Over on Instagram, I have teamed up with some friends to bring you a Healthy New Year Giveaway!  We each picked a personal favorite item that helps us achieve our wellness goals - physical, mental, emotional and spiritual - and wanted to share one big package valued at over $200!!  The items are as follows:

Lip Conditioner and Balega Running Socks from @solesearchingmamma

Where Oh Where Did Advent Go?

I know time flies around the holiday season, but with Advent only being three weeks long, this time seemed faster than ever!  I had made a couple Advent resolutions this year and wanted to check in with how it's going.  You probably don't care about my Adventlutions at all, and I don't blame you one bit!  But for this tired old mom's memory sake, here we go:

1) Pray the St. Andrew Novena

This started on November 30 and runs through Christmas Eve.  It's a prayer you say 15 times a day and so far, so good??  I totally missed yesterday's mark, but I think I've made every other day.  I think it's been so helpful to have the prayer as a screen saver on my phone and hanging on my wall at work.  I went to Confession last week and the priest was awesome and basically told me that if I can just make time to pray more everyday, all of my other struggles will become smaller.  You can't {fill in the sin} if you're too busy praying, right?  I know it's true and this 15 times a day prayer is a good start!

St. Andrew Christmas Novena

Hail and blessed be the hour and moment in which the Son of God was born Of the most pure Virgin Mary, at midnight, in Bethlehem, in the piercing cold. In that hour vouchsafe, I beseech Thee, O my God, to hear my prayer and grant my desires through the merits of Our Savior Jesus Christ, and of His blessed Mother. Amen.

Comparing Down (for a Pick Me Up)

It's easy to forget to count your blessings sometimes, especially in times of hardship and stress.  The holidays are known to provide these in abundance.  The grinch had wormed his way into my heart this last week or two and I found myself worrying about buying Christmas gifts and making preparations, packing to go visit family, cooking special treats for school and work.  It's all just too much!  Life is crazy enough without adding all these things to my to-do list.  I'm sure you moms, in particular, can understand.

Each of my kids has an "Advent Family" assigned to their classroom at school, this is a family in need that each classroom buys gifts for.  It's a beautiful thing, to think of others in need at this time of year especially, but as I purchased gift cards for these families, I found myself wondering if we will ever qualify to be an Advent Family.  How close we must be to the requirements, I think, with seven kids and two small salaries from working at a Catholic school.  We don't spend our money on anything crazy, no vacations, no nice cars, no big house even though we could fill it.  We juuuuuust barely get by, between our mortgage, medical insurance, grocery bills, car payment, school tuition, daycare and all the other daily needs required for this family of nine.  We aren't saving for our kid's college - we aren't saving much for retirement - we haven't even been saving for Christmas presents!  How on earth am I supposed to make it all happen?  

Last week, I was driving Andrew to a basketball game and, having come straight from church, he hadn't eaten yet.  I stopped to get him a quick bite at McDonald's and he wanted a breakfast sandwich.  They were 2 for $5 so I bought two, knowing that someone in the house would eat the other one when I returned home.  But do you know what happened on my way home?  I saw a homeless man begging in the street (sadly there are far too many of them around) and I put down my window to ask him if he wanted a sandwich.  He said "Yes, I'm starving" and I handed him my extra sandwich.  Now I don't share this story to brag (in fact, I purposefully haven't shared it thinking it would earn me bonus points for doing a good deed unnoticed!) but I share it now because here I was, thinking about  how little we have, when I could easily give this man a sandwich from my excess.   From my excess.

It's disheartening sometimes to look around and compare yourself, your family, your life, to those who have more than you.  You can feel unhappy and wonder why life is so unfair.  But what if you only compared what you have to those who have less than you?  Suddenly, all the gifts and blessings in your life come into full view and you can see with clarity how much you have to be thankful for.  My husband will often remind me to "compare down" when I can get dramatically hopeless about our financial state.  He will remind me that among our friends and family we may feel that we have the least, but among most families throughout the world, we are rich beyond belief.  And almost all of our riches aren't even the kind you can buy at a store, they are better than anything, they are priceless.  This attitude of gratitude can sometimes be hard to feel, but try comparing down when you're tempted to compare up, and hopefully one day we won't be tempted to compare at all, but instead be happily content with all the goodness in our lives.