St. Luke...Pray for Us!

It's become a tradition to dust off the baptismal candle and celebrate with our children the feast day of their patron saint.  St. Luke's feast day is on October 18th.  For 2013 we were able to celebrate on the actual day and went with the Thank Goodness It's FRY-day theme.  We tried making our own potato chips and bloomin' onions, threw some tots and mozzarella sticks into the fry daddy as well and popped some corn dogs in the oven.  We topped the feast off with DIRT- that delectable dessert that every child loves...well, the gummy worms at least.  We were practically asking for a heart attack- but hey, at least St Luke is the patron saint of physicians that should give us  little help right?!?!!  Luckily only one injury was sustained... that day anyway.

Sliced his thumb while operating the mandolin to perfect the thickness of the chips

Helping with the DIRT

Finishing touches

Schafer Boys-Fun times with cousins

A teaching gift- doctor set with various implements

His "periscope"

A few weeks later, Luke suffered his first "real" injury.  Being the wonderful mom that I am I did not rush him to the doctor.  In fact, the injury happened on a Wednesday minutes before we were supposed to leave for our first play/prayer date with a group of moms and kids.  While standing on the chair and teasing Augustine who was in his high chair, Luke found it fun to give Augustine a few shoves to send him rolling.  Leaning in a bit too far, Luke's perch tipped.  He held on tight crushing his finger between the chair and the floor.   After a visit to STATCare, we wrapped his fractured left ring finger with the metal brace and tape for 6 weeks.  Of course this didn't slow him down.  It took him a few days after removing the brace to regain his full range of motion.

Augustine recently took a similar spill when he was "helping" me make cinnamon rolls and sampling the brown sugar.  I whisked the bag away before he could over indulge which resulted in a fit.  In the two seconds it took me to turn from the table to the counter he tumbled with the chair.  Once again I felt horrible as some blood trickled from his busted lip and bonked nose, not to mention the wailing and stream of tears :-(   After calming us both down and a thorough physical exam to assess the damages I proceeded with the test of "tricks" adapting the "how many fingers am I holding up?" to "Can you find the ball?", "Come on Augustine...let's dance. Dance! Dance!",  "Do you want some milk?", "Say Please."  " Where's your spider?  Itsy, bitsy spider went up the water spout..."  Augustine's performance was top notch complete with verbal responses and hand motions dispelling much of my worries.

I suspect we'll have other injuries and worries to deal with throughout their childhood, but hopefully they'll be minor, few, and far between.  St. Luke, pray for us!

Tea Time

 On January 6th we celebrated my Grandma Francis's 80th birthday.  Even though I had plenty of work to tend to before returning to Walsh for my second semester as a professional advisor I could not, and would not, pass up the opportunity to get together with the family.  Despite having gathered with the big Francis gang numerous times in a few short weeks for my newest cousin Marcos's baptism on Dec. 23rd, our Christmas gathering on the 25th, and my cousin Jessica's baby shower on the 28th we were ready to bust out the party hats again to sing the classic "Happy Birthday" tune two times over for the matriarch.  There was a decent showing and always a fun challenge to see how many people we can fit into a single room.

The picture really only captures about one third of the audience I would guess but it definitely includes the woman of the hour.  My grandparents live in the same house that they built and raised ten children in.  It's a ranch that originally had  three bedrooms and one bathroom.  Although they eventually made bedroom additions there really was only one  full bathroom that 12 people shared for until all the kids were grown and out of the house.  My dad, the oldest boy, had apparently enclosed a more substantial shower in the basement during his high school years to alleviate traffic jams.  Needless to say, all my aunts and uncles survived and are a pretty fun crowd to be around.  The family is pretty dynamic with the original crew, their spouses, their children, and now their children's children  (Luke and Augustine would fall in this category). My two youngest aunts are really only a few years older than me and my older sister Kate who is the second oldest grandchild.  Consequently, I have cousins that are close in age to my children and, Marcos, the newest addition is the youngest grandchild with a handful of great grandchildren that are actually older.  It might seem a little crazy, but mostly it's just CRAZY FUN!

If that's not enough family to make your head spin...I'll just briefly mention that my mom is also 1 of 10 kids.  Imagine marrying in to that!

As a secondary celebration to the gift of Grandma Francis I took the opportunity to share some memories and fun times with my boys.  I took out the miniature tea set that Grandma had got each of us girls one year and made up a tiny feast of our own.  It was as fun as I remember when I was little and the boys enjoyed it too.

The Spread

Honorary Guests

Elegant Pour

The Service.

Let me do it!

Hmmm....I'll try one of these.

Pinky out.

Here I am Lord

1. Water supply pipe corroded and burst at Lakota (our rental house) last night around 11pm.
2. Electricity at our Spangler homestead is on the fritz.
3. I just opened the mail and have been summoned for jury duty.

They say it happens in strings of three.  Needless to say I classify these as a series of unfortunate events.  Ironically, I was reflecting with Pete earlier this week about the readings and homily from Mass on Holy Family Sunday.   Of course, not all that long before...Angel says, 'Yo Mary- you're having a baby boy.  He's God's son. Name him Jesus.' More recently, Matthew's gospel recounts the unstable life of the holy family as they are forced into exile. Angel says, 'Zup Joseph?- Take your wife and newborn child and go to Egypt so Herod won't destroy him'.  After a bit Angel says, 'Hola Joseph, Herod's dead.  Go to Israel.'  Intuitively and forewarned in another dream Joseph leads the family to Galilee rather than Judea to ensure safety.  Of course, the holy family, more specifically the new parents of Holy, Holy, Holy heed the commands/requests without hesitation or delay.  I don't know about you, but as a newer parent myself I find these sort of unexpected announcements and urgent requests to be harder to swallow.  But, hey, that's life.

In the midst of Christmas and all the joyous celebration of our Savior's birth I had never really stopped to reflect on all the added challenges and inevitable hardships that the Holy family was bound to face.  Just like I can easily forget, amongst all the hustle and bustle of preparing for our own holiday parties getting grumpy because Luke is whining about wearing his light up shoes rather than his black dress shoes, that there are people out there that have a single pair of shoes riddled with holes and soles worn thin as they walk around town searching for gainful employment.  Then of course, there is my aggravation over the static electricity in the air that makes me fear a hug from my child or a kiss from my husband as a charged ZAP! stings my lips or cheek because the furnace is working overtime to keep the environment warm and dry, dry, dry. Oh, but wait-... I'm complaining because I have warm and dry shelter? or people that want to be around me and  share their affection?!?!!?

I guess I've been a little on edge lately wondering what exactly God has in store for me and our family.  Where we'll be? Where we'll work?  If we should work? WHEN? I'm overwrought with wonder.   As natural as I feel it is to ask questions, I wonder that Mary and Joseph ever wondered?  How do I transform, or faithfully let go, so that all the wondering turns into pondering.

 And all who heard it wondered at the things which were told them by the shepherds. But Mary treasured all these things, pondering them in her heart. ~Luke 2:18-19