October and beyond

October begins my favorite time of the year: cooler weather (we pray), fall activities (including lots of baking), and several holidays. It all kicks off with the feast of Saint Therese who is very important to our family. We celebrated this morning by venerating our first class relic of Saint Therese, going to mass, and out to breakfast. As the month continues we will celebrate our anniversary (#3) and my birthday, ending the month with the eve of all Saints. November brings Thanksgiving followed by advent activities and then before we know it we will be singing happy birthday to Jesus. These three months really are the best time of the year!

Despite the stubborn heat that refuses to let up I already made my first round of pumpkin bread.

 

Saint Therese, pray for us

Update

Been so long since I have posted an update. Life has been moving along this crazy hot summer. We are excited that baby #2 is growing well, Paul Thomas will be here in March 2016. Mary Therese is getting big so fast. She turned two in July and is the size of a three year old (tall like daddy) and talks like a four year old. We are amazed at her incredible verbal skills but then again her mother isn't exactly quiet so this should be expected. We've taken several trips to the river and had a great time in June traveling up the west coast in our RV on our annual Modesto trip to see our nor cal friends, two of whom will be baby Paul's godparents. Our days are spent swimming at the pool, doing art and play-dough, play dates with Mary's friends, and diapering and re-diapering all the stuffed animals (someone is well prepared for her new role as big sister). Work is still going well for Eric and we are thankful he hasn't had to work on any of the brush fires that are sending so many brave men away from their families. My sweet mom had emergency gallbladder surgery a month ago and to our surprise the doctors said she nearly died and is one tough lady. We already knew she was tough and we are thankful every day that she is still here with us. Mary and I have spent time at the house keeping her company as she heals and Mary is very excited that Grandma's boo boo is getting all better. Please keep her in your prayers as she continues to recover. Please keep myself and baby Paul in your prayers as well as he continues to grow bigger and stronger and mommy hopefully continues to feel better. Here are a few recent pictures for you :) All our family and friends remain in our prayers.

Big Sister and first picture of baby brother

Loving life on the road in our RV

Our little TT turns 2T

It's a Boy

Love our river trips

"watch this"

Recently Mary has frequently been saying "Mommy, watch this" and then she does whatever it is she wants me to see. When I get excited and say how wonderful or fun or proud I am of her she beams with joy. She wants nothing more than for mommy to be proud of her. What an amazing gift this current stage is. It overflows my heart with joy whenever I hear those sweet little words: "mommy watch this." They can come at times that are not always convenient but no matter what I am doing I stop so I can watch her and acknowledge and praise what she shows me. Her desire to make me proud is so pure and wonderful and I pray it will continue because it will greatly help in her moral formation. As she gets older she will hopefully make choices that will make Eric and I proud of her. She will hopefully look to us as her moral guides. And then hopefully one day that desire to make us proud will transfer to her perfect heavenly Father and she will desire nothing more than to make God proud. The parenting style we have chosen can be demanding and sometimes questioned but these moments are exactly why we chose this path. Mary is so beautifully attached to me that nothing else comes first. Her attachment has led to this desire to please me. We are approaching 2 and still have had very little discipline issues because her trust in me is so deep that it doesn't take much to correct her. I recognize that the challenges with behavior may come but I pray that throughout her whole life and will always have that little voice inside her of saying "mommy, watch this" and so make choices that she knows will make me proud.

Just a fun picture because she is too cute!

C-Section awareness month

Apparently April is C-section awareness month (who knew?). C-section mama's will always be very near to my heart because only we know the pain and grieving that comes along with such a birth. I saw this article posted and reading it brought tears to my eyes. It speaks so much truth. We often praise unmedicated, vaginal births and we absolutely should. We forget though to consider the strength that is required of a woman who in most cases has her dream birth suddenly taken from her. C-section for me is still painful, not physically but emotionally. Reminders that I did not hold my daughter for the first two hours pierce my heart like a sword. The agony of knowing I was unable to even see her due to the effect of the medicine even now bring tears to my eyes. I didn't put her down for several months after because subconsciously I was seeking to make up for the loss of the precious time. I see my scar daily and it reminds me of the sacrifice that was made for her. It is a painful reminder of all the things we did wrong and all the ways I feel responsible for ending up on an operating table. In the end though our births belong to God because the children we bring into the world are ultimately His. I pray for the healing of all my fellow C-section mamas. May we all find peace with our birth.

Sidenote: I do not condone showing off your scar since that is a bit immodest but I love everything else in the article.

Why homeschool?

I recently posted a blog from Matt Walsh about homeschooling. His was a blog about a very specific benefit of home schooling, to reduce government influence on your children. The article spurred some very lively discussion which I love but some were getting tripped up on the tone of the blog so I decided I would take to my own blog to share my thoughts. I hope you all will continue your discussion here.

So here it is, why we plan to home school and why we think all Christian families should consider it as well. (Don't stop reading yet...)


The benefits of homeschooling are well documented. I could go on and on about how they excel in school, high graduation rates , how well prepared they are for college, and how well adjusted they are, but that's not exactly what I want to talk about here. I want to specifically address first why home schooling can save you from the dangers of public school. as this was the topic of the original article I posted.

First let me lay out for you what specifically are the dangers of public school.

Students spend on average 7 hours a day, 5 days a week, for 13 years at school. To think they aren't being influenced and formed by their surroundings during such a large amount of time would be naive. One of the biggest dangers in public school is the information that will form them, most recently directed by common core. Be sure that the government has its agenda and their beliefs are reflected in the curriculum, see this example as one of many. Children who attend public school will receive formation from the government. I see this as a huge danger in this country that is becoming more and more morally depraved and anti-Christian. Can a Christian family counteract the teachings that contradict their faith? Sure, but it will be a challenge. Children look to their teachers and peers for so much guidance and we ourselves tell them to respect their teachers. At young formative ages it it will be tough for them to distinguish between what they are supposed to believe as true from a teacher and what is false. This can be confusing for a young child. We plan to home school in part reduce that confusion. No they will not be sheltered from the whole world so some influence will undoubtedly be there but not sending them into that potentially confusing world for the majority of their awake hours will certainly help.

Intellectual formation is not the only type of education students receive in school. Plato said that education is the acquisition of virtue. The information being taught to students will without doubt be taught through the lens of the teacher. The personal beliefs and biases of the teacher will come through their lessons. As a teacher I know this to be true first hand. It is also not uncommon to find schools directly seeking to give students moral formation. In many cases this may be great. Teaching kids to be honest and kind are wonderful lessons but we find countless examples of moral formation in the public schools going beyond teaching the golden rule and many of these teachings do not mesh with the goals of a Christian family. This danger is much more pressing than when this generation of parents was in school so we may not realize the degree of severity. There are some amazing teachers out there no doubt but even they are limited in what they can say. Parents are the primary educators of their children and home schooling can help parents better realize and live out that role.

Another reason we want to home school and believe other Christian families should consider it is that absence of God in the public schools. Children need to be completely seeped in the faith to soak it all in. We want our children to know that God is the primary focus of everything they do. If God is void at school they will have a huge part of their life compartmentalized away from the most important aspect of life. By home schooling we will be able to let everything our children do very directly be for the glory and love and God. We will be able to talk about Him throughout the day and even stop to pray often. How great for Catholic children to be able to stop and call upon Saint Thomas Aquinas to help them when a math problem seems too difficult. How important it will be to have God and His plans be part of history class. As an adult I had to go back and rethink so much of what I learned in order to fit God in. We want our children to have Christ always in mind throughout their whole day, no matter what they are doing.


One of the largest reasons we plan to home school is to guide the type of peer influence our children will encounter. Sent to public school parents lose some control over who their child will spend time with. Absolutely parents can still maintain some influence by getting to know other students and their parents and limiting their child's interaction with those who may have a negative influence. What happens though when in a class of 30 kids their is not another child with similar values to your family? Children needs friends and we know those friends do influence them. Even as kids a young as toddlers are influenced by their friends. The first time my daughter pushed was right after playing with another kid who pushed her. As her mom I taught her that pushing isn't nice but that one exposure required several teaching moments to undo. Peers can have a negative influence. I saw it happen many times as a teacher. Teens would make poor choices at the influence of their friends. Thankfully I also saw how positive peer influence can also be. Students who wanted to make morally good choices would band together and encourage one another. So what does this have to do with home school? As parents who school in our own home we will have much more influence over who our children's peers are. Eric and I are blessed to have several families with the same faith who will also home school and be a great source of friends for our children, friends who will be a positive influence and reinforce what we teach at home. This is the area where we get a lot of push back. We often hear that we can't shelter our kids. That is not our plan, our plan is to guide them on the right path and introduce them to the right peers, something that will be much easier when they aren't away from us when surrounded by a mixed group of peers who may or may not be a good influence. We also hear that we have to send our children into the schools to bring Jesus there. We completely agree that Christian families need to engage culture in order to positively influence the culture but we do not believe that a 7 year old is ready to be that example on their own. Formation is required first. Home schooling will allow us more opportunity to form our children in the faith before sending them out to witness on their own. Surrounding our children with peers who have the same beliefs will help them see that their family is not the only one who acts in certain ways that often times are very counter cultural.

A final reason I will touch on for why we will home school is something that could benefit any family, not just a Christian family. Children who are home schooled have the opportunity to receive more one on one teaching time. Rather than being 1 in a group of 30+, a home schooled child will likely receive lots of individual and focused teaching. This allows the parents to identify and address any issues, especially disabilities that could go unnoticed in a larger classroom setting. This also allows the parent to tailor the education specifically to the student. A student may excel at math and so can move up faster or may struggle in reading so can be moved along as a slower pace. A more personalized education can be had in a home school setting.

Now, let me be clear, home school doesn't work for every family and parents need to decide what will work for them. An analogy for that is that it would be great if every dad could coach their t ball team but not all dad's are able to and there are other coaches who are good or maybe even better than they are in those situations. If you aren't going to home school a great option is a private Catholic or protestant school (depending on your faith). There your children will more likely be taught morals consistent with your own. It won't necessarily be perfectly in line but better. The peers will hopefully come from families more like yours though not necessarily. Private school (especially a good catholic school) is a great option but doesn't come without its concerns as well. I taught at a great catholic high school but not every teacher perfectly taught the teachings of the church and many of the students were not the friends or influence I would chose for my children. So private school while not perfect is what we see as the only other option other than home school which we see as the best option for our family. Home schooling also has its challenges (topic for a whole different blog) and we will be ready to face them.

If you decide to send your kid to public school that is your right, I just ask you to be aware of the challenges they and you will face. Don't naively assume you can counter act what they are taught or that their peers won't influence them. Be ready and be active in your child school so you know full well what you will be fighting against.

You sleep how??

I never thought that the parenting choice I would get the most questions about would be how we sleep. My Facebook newsfeed is exploding with vaccine debates and don't you dare tell people I turned my daughter's car seat forward at 1 year but those are not what we get the most questioned about. What seems to in some cases shock people is Mary sleeping in our bed. I have wanted to write about this topic for a while not and I didn't want to just write a piece defending why it can be really good for babies (you can find that info here). I want to write a more personal piece about why it has worked so well for our family. Co-sleeping is a personal choice and it won't work for everyone, each family has to decide what will work best for their situation. For us co-sleeping has been and continues to be such a gift. I want to answer the most common questions we get and explain why we love sleeping with our little girl.

Objection 1: It's Not Safe
By far the most common comment we here. This is due to a lot of misunderstanding and misinformation of which the AAP is partially to blame. The short answer is that co-sleeping is perfectly safe when done correctly, info here. If not done correctly, like most anything, it can be dangerous. For us we sleep in a king size bed which leave plenty of room for everyone and I have a bedrail on my side of the bed so Mary is always safe from rolling off the bed. I can say first hand that the idea that a perfectly healthy mom will roll over onto her baby seems crazy. I sense Mary's every movement. I even heard her little breathing patterns when she was very little. Trust me you will not roll over onto your baby. Thankfully the AAP is looking at changing their statements which may help gain better understanding of this potentially great parenting practice, info about that here

Objection 2:You and baby will never sleep
No studies or links for you here. All I can say is that because of co-sleeping both Mary and I slept and still sleep very well. Yes she nursed frequently but I could just turn on my side, latch her on, and go back to sleep. She would nurse and then drift off herself. She is now night weaned and sleeping amazingly either in our bed or on her own mattress next to our bed.

Objection 3: Your kids will be weird and overly dependent
This is the oddest comment we get. I'm not sure why sleeping with your parents when young will make you weird. Sleeping with them at 15 is strange yes but a baby or toddler sleeping with their parents seems natural and is the practice of the majority of the world. Mary had not developed any strange ticks or grown an extra limb from sleeping with us. She also isn't clingy and anxious. She is a well attached child who is also very independent. We believe that co sleeping has actually helped her become independent and confident. She has a healthy attachment to Eric and I and knows she is safe in this world so doesn't fear exploring and trying things on her own. I believe co sleeping is one factor in her amazing attachment.


Objection 4: You will never get them out of your bed
Well I can't speak much to that one yet since Mary is still in our bed some nights but I can say that I know a lot of co sleeping families and none of them have a child over toddler age sleeping in their bed.


Objection 5: (my personal favorite) Enjoying all that celibacy?
This is the final comment we get and mostly from men (haha). It often makes me laugh out loud. It would not be appropriate to go into detail on this one but no, we have not been celibate for 21 months. I will say that some of the largest families I know are co sleeping families so clearly co sleeping does not equal forced celibacy. It can lead to a natural space between children since a co sleeping baby nurses more keeping mommy's fertility away longer but years of celibacy no.

So there it is. The common objections we get and our answers. 

"Mommy Wars"...Just Stop

I often see articles posted on Facebook talking about something called "mommy wars". From what I gather, "mommy wars" refers to moms telling each other how to raise their children. The feeling behind it is very negative and basically says that moms should keep their parenting opinions to themselves and let each mom do what feels right to her. At the same time I often see memes and status updates chastising others for giving moms advice. I want to challenge all the moms out there to consider something different. When your friend posts an article on Facebook talking about breastfeeding, she is not trying to condemn or judge you for formula feeding. And when you ask in a forum about sleep training, the mom who shares with you an article warning of the possible down sides, she is not trying to shame you or say you are a terrible mother. Perhaps she just wants to share information that she finds enlightening and hopes you may benefit from it as well. And when the older mother in the grocery store sees your baby screaming and comes over to suggest the baby is hungry and you want to shout "duh", consider that she may not be thinking you are an idiot but instead is another mom who has been there and is trying to help. Before you rip out your phone to vent to the Facebook world about that nosy mother, stop for a moment and see her as someone who is trying to walk this unpredictable path of motherhood with you. You see, I think we moms want so much to have it all together that when anyone dares to offer advice our pride kicks in and we suddenly feel attacked. I personally think this whole mommy wars thing is simply not accepting help from the village. I love the African proverb that says it takes a village to raise a child. All those moms giving you advice aren't the enemy trying to attack your little tribe, they are part of the village helping you raise your child. Let's face it moms, we don't have all the answers. And the idea of just doing what feels right will at times fail us. I'm all about mom's intuition and you know your child best but in the role of parenting we will often have to do things we don't feel like doing but we know are best. That's what is so great about humans, we can use our reason to rule our emotions. So let those other moms help you. Let yourself be a part of the great village of mothers. When a mom offers you advice, instead of being annoyed, feeling attacked, and insisting there is a war, consider what they have to say (especially if it comes from a well seasoned mom) and if you decide that their ways don't work for your family just move on thankful that someone cares enough to want to help you in your quest to be the "perfect" parent (isn't that the lofty goal we all set out to attain). You may be surprised how often the input you get truly is helpful. Yes, there are some individuals out there who are judging and aren't very charitable but from what I've seen they are the few while the majority are very well intentioned. Take the advice you receive into consideration and most importantly take it to your knees. The precious child you are raising ultimately belongs to God so go to Him when you receive input and with a humble heart ask Him what is best for the blessing he has given to your care.

A note for when you are the advice giver: if you know a mom does not want advice, let her be and just set an example for her. And be sure that you are indeed giving advice to help and uplift a mother in her vocation and never criticizing her. There is a difference between offering your insight and tearing down a mom who knows she's not perfect so be sure your advice giving is encouraging. And yes, we all have topics we are passionate about so pick wisely the hills you are willing to die on.

Now a note about mother in laws: in mommy forums I so often see moms venting about the mother in law who they insist needs to mind her own business. Unless you have a true monster in law (and I challenge you to be honest with your feelings) then I bet you your mother in law wants to be helpful. She just may know a thing or two about raising a child. In fact, she may know so much that she raised at least one great kid, one great enough that you decided to spend your life with him and enter into the fabulous world of parenting with him. So give her advice a chance. I bet you may find she has a lot of wisdom.

The next time someone offers you (or me) mommy advice, let's see it as an act of love instead of an enemy declaring war. And let's get rid of this whole term "mommy wars." We are in this together so let's help each other along. No one else knows as well as another mother how it feels to have your heart run around outside your body or that aching feeling of wanting to do everything right and the sinking guilt when you make a mistake and realize that you do indeed need that village you are so afraid of.