I Am Supporting Alan Keyes for President

Visit his website and take the Pledge.

Conservative, Christian, Catholic. Experienced in federal and diplomatic service. What more could we want in a leader?

Christmas Meme

Wrapping paper or gift bags?

If it can go in a bag and look presentable, it does. I worked for years when I was in school gift wrapping presents at gift and department stores. Ugh!

Real tree or artificial?

Real.

When do you put up the tree?

The weekend before Christmas. Ideally, it would be Christmas Eve, but we are usually busy with extended family activities that day.

When do you take the tree down?

Not before the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord, after Epiphany.

Favorite holiday theme?

Victorian

Favorite gift received as a child?

A diary from my godfather.

Do you have a nativity scene?

We have three. One we received from my parents when we were first married. The other two our sons can play with. BamBam loves playing with them this year.

Hardest person to buy for?

Giving Tree gift, because I don't actually know the recipient.

Easiest person to buy for?

Our sons.

Worst Christmas gift you ever received?

Ummm, pass.

Mail or email cards?

Mail.

Favorite Christmas movie?

A Christmas Carol (with George C. Scott)

Going My Way

The Bells of St. Mary's

The Bishop's Wife (original with Cary Grant)

When do you start shopping for Christmas?

Thanksgiving.

Have you ever recycled a Christmas present?

No.

Favorite thing to eat at Christmas?

Fudge, cheesecake, shrimp cocktail, pastries.

White lights or colored on the tree?

Flicker flames.

Favorite Christmas song?

Silent Night (but there are many, many more)

Travel for Christmas or stay at home?

Travel every other year, usually.

Can you name all of Santa's reindeers?

Yes.

Angel on the tree top or a star?

Star.

Open the presents on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day?

Christmas morning, but maybe one each for the kids before bed on Christmas Eve.

Most annoying thing about this time of year?

"Holiday music" which has nothing to do with Christ. "Step into Christmas"; "Baby, It's Cold Outside"; "Santa, Baby." Need I say more?

What I love most about Christmas?

Christmas Mass and the sense of peace. Christmas day is always so peaceful.

HT: Dawn

Afternoon Tea

Just discovered from Celestial Seasonings: Candy Cane Lane decaffeinated tea.

Today's snack is artichoke dip baked in phyllo cups, a recipe my sister-in-law prepared as as appetizer at Thanksgiving.

Favorite Films Meme

Go to the AFI Top 100 list and pick:

1) Your favorite five movies that are on the list. This was hard to narrow down.

Casablanca

North by Northwest
The Philadelphia Story

It's a Wonderful Life

The African Queen

2) Five movies on the list you didn't like at all. There were others too!

Gone with the Wind

Psycho

ET - the Extra Terrestrial

West Side Story

King Kong

3) Five movies on the list you haven't seen but want to. Hmmm...

Doctor Zhivago

The Third Man

An American in Paris

Ben-Hur

Mutiny on the Bounty

4) Five movies on the list you haven't seen and have no interest in seeing. There were lots more of these!

The Godfather

The Graduate

On the Waterfront

Schindler's List

Some Like It Hot

5) Your favorite five movies that aren't on the list.

Cars

Toy Story

Toy Story 2

The Quiet Man

12 Angry Men

A Little More ...

My boys are growing! Today was check-up day.

Arch was 57" and 72 pounds. He is in the 85th percentile for weight, and off the charts for height for a nine-year-old.

BamBam was 38" and 28.5 pounds. He made the 50th percentile for height and the 15th for weight. This is great because BamBam was a preemie and small-for-date. He has never been as high as the 15th for weight before. Last year he was at the 5th.

When Arch was a toddler, he used to streeeeetch himself up and sing "a little more - hmm hmm hmm" to make himself taller!

Pope Paul VI on the Domestic Church

CATHOLIC LIBRARY: Marialis Cultus (1974) Annotated

52. We now desire, as a continuation of the thought of our predecessors, to recommend strongly the recitation of the family Rosary. The Second Vatican Council has pointed out how the family, the primary and vital cell of society, "shows itself to be the domestic sanctuary of the Church through the mutual affection of its members and the common prayer they offer to God."[115] The Christian family is thus seen to be a domestic Church[116] if its members, each according to his proper place and tasks, all together promote justice, practice works of mercy, devote themselves to helping their brethren, take part in the apostolate of the wider local community and play their part in its liturgical worship.[117] This will be all the more true if together they offer up prayers to God. If this element of common prayer were missing, the family would lack its very character as a domestic Church. Thus there must logically follow a concrete effort to reinstate communal prayer in family life if there is to be a restoration of the theological concept of the family as the domestic Church.

Snowy Thanksgiving

We had our first snowfall of the year on Thanksgiving morning. DoorMan and Arch went to Mass, then over to DoorMan's brother's house for Thanksgiving dinner. BamBam was running a fever, so he and I stayed home. It was a quiet, peaceful day.

New Book: Toy ABC

I am so proud to announce that my son's new book, Toy ABC, is available for purchase exclusively at lulu.com. You can see a preview of the first six pages there. Arch (age 9) drew a toy for each letter of the alphabet, and I scanned them into my computer and we put the book together. He made it for his little brother BamBam, age 3. Makes a great Christmas gift, if I do say so myself!

Minivan Mania

I finally have a minivan!!!!!

This is very big for me, as I have really, really wanted one for at least three years now. Really.

My car is a goner. We scrapped it.

And all I had to do was to get stuck on the side of a road, in a park with no houses around, with my sons and four fish fry dinners in the trunk, and my cell phone forgotten on the charger at home. And it was getting dark and it was very cold, and the engine wouldn't turn over at all. God Bless stranger Beth, who stopped on her way to walk her dog, and drove back home to call my husband.

My new minivan is a lovely blue which matches Doorman's work van. When we were first married, we coincidentally had matching paint on our cars, too. How sweet!

I will say, that to temper all of this unbounded joy, I had to offer up not being able to pick out, see or test drive my van. Doorman's work van is only a two-seater (and he doesn't let me drive it anyway), so he had to do all of the driving and deciding on my new van, and all the running to the insurance company and the DMV. The first time I laid eyes on it he was pulling it into our driveway all set to go.

By the way, I should mention that new around here means "new to me." No one in this family would dream of paying retail for a brand new vehicle when you can get a used one sooooo much cheaper.

And God Bless Doorman's Mom and Dad! Although they are now with Our Lord, it was their money (which came less than three weeks ago) that allowed us to pay cash for our new vehicle. The money we got (which was a total surprise, we weren't expecting to get anything from the estate until next spring) was within $400 of what we had to pay out. God is good. As my Mom put it: the minivan is like a gift from them. Very nice to think of it that way, and remember them.

Back from Break, and So Blessed!

Well, I am back in the blogosphere, after breaking for 40 Days for Life.

I am thankful for many blessing. I'll post more later. I have a heap of stuff to get through on the dining room table, and the boys will want dinner soon (the change back to Daylight Savings Time not registering with their tummies yet!).