7 Quick Takes

Find a match to this image in my sidebar...click it...and join us over at Jennifer's blog to link our Quick Takes for this week!










Mine are:

1) I am SO BLESSED and excited to hear from people all over this WORLD through our website and blogs. God has connected me to so many wonderful people from Italy, Australia, The Federation of Russia, Asia...and all across the nation of my own country as well! It is just AMAZING!
I LOVE hearing from you all!

2) Along the lines of the above, I have noticed a characteristic of women in Australia. They are FULL of JOY! I wasn't sure for a while, if it was just in my own head, but I have observed this now throughout many blogs like Gae's and Erin's and Therese's...these women simply exude all that is beautiful in a stay-at-home mother's vocation! I'm really blessed by my friends "down under"! Thank you ladies!

3) What are we supposed to do on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays now? No more football :(
Guess that means we'll just have to play some cards, read a few more stories out loud, pop some extra bowls of popcorn, sip some hot chocolate, and enjoy a few movies here at home!

4) I've been pondering the change in the overall family-dynamic of American society lately.
It used to be that a family was seen as an autonomous entity...THE DUDICH FAMILY...THE DIXON FAMILY...THE SMITH FAMILY...the majority of a family's time was spent TOGETHER...now I see families that are more like a whole bunch of individuals, with separate lives, convening under one roof periodically to take care of necessary things. Many families do not even worship together anymore. I hear parents saying that their teens want to go to Church with friends and they like this or that priest better at another Church, etc...Dads eat dinner with work colleagues...older kids eat on the run on their way to their jobs or sporting events...Moms feed younger kids in the car while they rush here and there to whatever it is that seems so much more important that just staying home for a change. I think we, as a culture, have been duped into thinking that the world outside has more to offer us than we can provide for ourselves as family...we've traded in UNITY, COMRADERIE, SOLIDARITY, CHARITY, LOVE, and TOGETHERNESS for Accolades, Prestige, Money, Entertainment, Self-gratification, and Constant Titillation. We need to re-think some things.

5) Now this has NOTHING to do with any of the above...but I just finished reading Frederick Douglass's great speech (given to the white community of America, on July 4th, 1852 ) to Jacob and Laura in our History class as we enter our new Unit on Slavery/Abolitionists and The Civil War.
If you have never read this speech, I highly encourage you to do so. I was in tears part way through, to the point that I had to stop reading for a moment and regain composure. I can imagine the tense, thick air at that long ago event, as this self-educated, eloquent former slave looked those people in the eye and called them to the mat on their hypocrisy...suggesting that they had fleed the King of England's tyrant rule, only to come to a new land and oppress others just as they themselves had been oppressed. There is a book called "A Treasury of the World's Great Speeches". Mr. Douglass's speech is one of many that will enrich and enlighten your students and your families.

6) Speaking of speaking, one of the greatest co-op classes we've ever done was some years ago with our 8th grade students at the time. We offered a public speaking class. One young man in class was so painfully frightened about it, that he would become physically ill before class. The first time we gathered, all he could muster in the prepared introductions that the students were required to give, was "Hello". Thanks to a wonderful and compassionate group of kids...who filled out his critique sheet just like everyone else's (They said, "Well, he might have just said "hello" but he said it with good posture, manner, articulation, and audibility!") and kept encouraging him week by week, he was able to give a full 7 minute speech on St. Isaac Jogues the last day of class!
I encourage you to offer this to your homeschooling students. If you'd like a copy of our Public Speaking Critique Sheet, just email me and let me know. I'd be happy to send it to you!

7) I am VERY glad it is Friday today! And tomorrow is a special day for my son Joseph. He will be receiving the Sacrament of Reconciliation for the very first time. Please keep him and his classmates in your prayers!