Author - Lorri

Unexpected

I was going to tell you how my shamrock cookies turned out.  And about what happend after the Rite of Election all those days ago.  And about how one of my friends is moving away in a couple of weeks, and we’re moving in a few months, but I can’t because I’ve been laid out flat.

I’ve been sorting through the house, getting ready for that move because it’ll be here before you know it, and that’s how I got hit upside the head and had to send the kids out to play and started typing in run-on sentences.

I found The Notebook.  No, not the novel, but The Notebook I had to start keeping when Rebecca died.  I couldn’t remember anything at all and there were just so many details to keep track of, so I had to write it all down.  And I kept that notebook with me always, so it became a journal when I had too many thoughts in my head.  The worst sorts of memories are in this notebook, funeral details, the wording of the memorial service invitation, notes and questions for the hospital’s attempt to stonewall explain the situation.

It’s a generic, green steno notepad, but when I picked it up I was pretty sure what was inside.  I should not have read past the first page. I should have closed it and moved on. Instead, I skimmed through it.  It was like breaking my heart all over again.

So here I am again, feeling like I’m going to fly apart into a million pieces and trying not to throw my shoe across the room because I’m really angry and I can’t fix it and nobody can and death sucks and the only reason I’m not going to throw my shoe isn’t out of a maturity I’ve gained through life’s experience, but because it is a wooden Hannah Andersson clog and it would break whatever it hit.

And now I have no good ending for this post, because really, what else is there to say?

Cover Me…

…I’m going in.

Yes, it’s that time again.  The crock pot is happily cooking our corned beef and cabbage, the children are finished with school, lunch has been eaten and I can no longer avoid making shamrock cookies.

I don’t know why I do this to myself.

I have a friend who is gifted in hospitality.  She has 6 children, homeschools and otherwise puts Martha Stewart to shame.  I was telling her all about how much I hate making sugar cookies, and I still make them a couple of times a year to torture myself make my children happy.  I’m just that kind of mom.  I let them watch a Rollie Pollie Ollie movie during the Disney Channel’s Movie Time Monday yesterday, instead of finishing school, too.  I so totally rock.

What was I saying?

Oh yeah, my friend, the super baker.  She thinks I might be rolling my cookie dough out too thin. She doesn’t live on base anymore, so I can’t have her just pop on over to show me how to properly roll out cookie dough. I’m pretty sure she’d do that for me, but she’s now 20 minutes away.  Some friend.  Just because her house had mold issues and rats in the backyard, you’d think she’d have stuck it out in anticipation of my cookie making needs.  Not so much.

So I’ve stalled long enough.  The children already caught me mixing up green dough, so there’s no turning back now.  If I survive, I’ll be back to tell you the last part of our Rite of Election Story.

Answers, I’ve Got ’em!

My blogging friend, Sandy, asked me to help her better understand my post about the Rite of Election.  First, I do have to apologize because I sometimes forget that hello, not everyone is Catholic. Just like everyone is not in the military and will not understand when I tell you that yesterday my husband went to the TMO because we are PCS’ing, but it’s to early to contact the TLF.

So I had another blogging dilema. Let someone else worry about offending the Brits, the growing nanny state and the price of tea in China because I’ve got readers needing answers.  And pretty yarn to knit up. Focus, everyone, focus!

Really, though- I wanted to make sure I explained the Catholic jargon in a way that would still let the original story flow.  I was going to hyper link, I was going to provide a glossary at the end.  And then Sandy said, “um, how about just a website?”

I tend to overthink a bit.

So here you go Sandy, and anyone else I left scratching their heads.  Here is a Glossary of Terms for the Rite of Christian Initiation (RCIA). It’s part of a much larger article about the entire process of RCIA.

Amazing

Philip and I were asked by two of our friends to sponsor them as they enter the Catholic Church this Easter.  Of course, this is an honor and a privilege for us – and a very unique experience.  We each have godchildren and we’ve both been Confirmation sponsors, but this is the first time we’ve been godparents/sponsors together.

So the four of us spent pretty much all of last Sunday together participating in the Rite of Sending at our home parish here on base, then at the Rite of Election at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception.  All I can say is…amazing.

I’d never been to the Basilica, so I was immediately awestruck by the building itself.  The interior rivaled any basilica or cathedral we’ve seen in Europe.  I cannot even begin to do it justice in trying to describe it with words.  I didn’t bring a camera, so I can’t share any pictures, sadly.  Our homeschool group is taking a tour next month, so I’ll get some pictures then.

The Rite itself – again, wow.  There were 5 Bishops in attendance – the Archbishop of DC, 3 of his auxiliary bishops and the Bishop of the Archdiocese for the Military Services.  Incidentally, ours was the only church that identified itself as being from a military base, so the bishop was probably there just for us!  The sheer number of people being baptized or coming into full communion with the Church was so inspiring, and makes you think that maybe our country really isn’t going to hell in a hand basket after all.  Each of the catechumens who will be baptized at Easter were called by name and were presented by their godparent to the Archbishop.  He seemed to be having quite a good time, shaking hands and smiling the whole time.  They lined up on the in front of the altar, where they answered questions as a group.  After they returned to their seats, the candidates for Confirmation were by parish and went up with their sponsors.  We didn’t get to meet the Archbishop, but we filled the enormous chancel.  We were one of the first parishes called up, so we stood to the very back.  It was an amazing view, looking out over the sea of humanity, and also taking in the beautiful artwork surrounding us. We will probably never again be that close to the altar of the Basilica.

I have to say that it was actually a lot of fun.  Our military men in their uniforms looked quite handsome and distinguished, and we had seats about 5 rows from the front.  I got little crick in my neck from looking up at the Archbishop during his homily, we were that close.  It was fun sharing the experience with the others from our parish, too.

I do have another side story to tell about something that happened as we were leaving.  But it’s a story for another day…

Portrait of the Blogger in a Pink Hat

My most recently completed knitting project – a pink, cabled beret.  I’ve read that slouchy berets are all the rage out in California, and you know me – always on the cutting edge of fashion.


Here it is, flat on the table.

I’d never done cables before, but they were surprisingly easy.  I added an additional round to the pattern to accomodate my big head and thick hair, and also to allow the hat to come down and cover my ears.  The next time I wear it, I’ll probably be in Colorado.  Barring an early Spring snowstorm here, of course.  One can hope.

Another Snow Day

Subtitle: School, schmool!

We rarely get more than an inch or two of snow at time around here, so I let Boo and Pumpkin Girl have another shortened school day in favor going sledding.  Let’s just call it extra gym class. 🙂

Our formally fluffy front porch…

looked like this when we headed out:

That’s mostly ice, just for the record.

Much fun was had by all…

We were joined by my friend’s children, who are also my children’s friends.  They had races…

and some wipe-outs.

The boys engaged in some guerrilla sledding, which involved shoving off down the hill and trying to hit each other with snow balls.  In this picture, Boo’s buddy gets him good.

I got a chance to sled, too, but mostly I just took pictures.

In Like a Lion

I have yet to live in a place that snows enough for me.  Ft Leavenworth (KS) had a good amount of snow – it would snow all day and stay for the week.  We had a great sledding hill on our block and all the dads were in school together which meant they all had the same snow day cancellations.  We had so much fun, four families, moms, dads and children, all sledding together.  Some of the grown-ups were more than a little sore after sledding for a couple of days in a row.

I try not to get excited when there is snow in the forecast here.  We seem to sit right on the line of snow vs rain and usually end up with rain.  But March came in like a lion last night and dumped several inches of snow on us.


The wind was quite strong, causing the snow to drift on our patio.


Philip works on base, so he didn’t get a snow day this time.


Boo and his best friend loaded up our wagon with snow and went off to build a snow fort.  I didn’t see them for 2 1/2 hours.  Bip tried to keep up with them, but it was way too windy and I brought him back to the house.


Later, Pumpkin Girl gave him a ride in the toddler sled.  This is the last year he’s going to be able to fit in it.

We only got a little bit of school done, but really, what’s the point of snow if you can’t play in it? Good friends, hot chocolate and warm soup for dinner.  It doesn’t get better than that!

Answers

I love getting comments on my blog, but I find myself in a conundrum of how to handle them.  If someone asks a question, should I reply in the comments or through email or both?  All comments to my blog arrive to me through email and I’m supposed to be able to hit reply and it goes right to the commenter.  But I don’t think it’s working right.  I wrote out this nice lengthy reply to someone and right as I hit “send” I saw that it was going to my blog’s inbox. So I have no idea if my replies are even getting through.

So I’m going to answer some questions here.

Tami asked why she wasn’t able to make smilies appear in her comments anymore.  It’s because you need to leave a space between the sentence punctuation and the punctuation for the smiley.

Nancy wanted to know which colorway of Noro Silk Garden I’m using for my scarf.  It’s number 87, which is mostly jewel tones.  The scarf I’m making calls for 4 skeins.  By the way, the pattern I’m using is free.  I think it’s well written and is a good way to learn entrelac.  You can find it here:  Entrelac Scarf.

Janice was wondering if it’s all one skein of yarn.  Yes, it is! It’s handpainted varigated yarn.  I have seen other people’s entrelac projects where they used 2 different skeins to get a very specific set of color changes, but that’s a lot of work and I like the way the yarn does all that work for me.

JennG was wondering if I learned all these fun knitting techniques from books or from other people.  A little of both, but mostly I’m self taught.  I learn best from reading (what kind of learner does that make me?), so I can usually muddle along well enough to get by. Part of the fun of knitting, for me at least, is trying something new.  I’ve managed to infect several people in my neighborhood with the knitting bug and having all these new and quickly learning knitting friends has inspired me to try all the fun things I’ve seen others do.

Angoraknitter (a fellow Army wife who just moved to our area) mentioned that she can hardly wait until her yarn arrives (I’m assuming in her household goods).  Angora – can I call you Ang? – you don’t have to wait!  There’s a fun knitting store in Old Town Alexandria.  Head north on Hwy 1, after you pass the Beltway, turn right.  It doesn’t matter which street, but I turn at the gas station.  When you get to Washington, turn left.  When you pass the statue in the middle of an intersection, Knit Happens will be on your right.  I think the cross street is King.

She also asked me about my ottoman and chairs seen in my messy living room.  They are indeed from IKEA.  Both have removable, washable slip covers – a must in a house with children!  We put sliders under the ottoman feet so we could move it around the living room easily, but that was a mistake.  Pushing the ottoman around caused the knobs under the lid to break off, so the lid slides off when bumped into.  That was our fault, though, since it was designed to really stay in one place.  The chairs are comfy and have enough room under them to store a basket full of Wii paraphenalia under one and the WiiFit board under another.  I had to wash one of the slip covers during our last round of stomach virus and it washed up wonderfully.  No fading and the wrinkles disappeared once the slip cover was back in place.  I spot clean the ottoman at least weekly and it’s holding up well, too.

OK, I think I got all the recent questions.  Now I’m off to try to figure out how to get my emailed replies sent to the commenter.

Cast On!

My friend Shanti and I are at it again.  Crafting, that is.  We’ve been crafting buddies since the very late 80’s.  This time we’re having a knit-along together.  Several people wanted to know what I’m making with my Noro Silk Garden – well it’s for the entrelac scarf that Shanti and I are each knitting.

I cast on yesterday –

I love the way that entrelac looks like it’s strips of knit fabric woven together, but in fact it is not.  It looks tremendously difficult, but again, it is not.  If you know how to increase, decrease and pick up stitches, you can knit entrelac.

As for the Silk Garden, well, what can I say?  I found it online on sale and I had a coupon code. I saved $3 a skein, which only makes me love it more.  It feels sort of scratchy in the skein, but when it gets knit up it seems to soften.  I’ve read that with a good soak before blocking it’ll soften even further.

Did I mention that entrelac is addicting?  I keep wanting to finish just one more block, then one more row, then oooo! a color change is coming up, gotta keep going to see which color it is!  I don’t think this scarf is going to take long to finish!

Overdue Bookshelf

So last Friday when I was feeling mostly better after the stomach virus, and I’d eaten a couple of meals, I had this burst of energy. So big that it caused me to do housework.  I tackled this bookshelf:

Hey, I didn’t say it was a huge burst of energy.  And remember, I hadn’t eaten anything in like 6 days and was pretty worn out and weak. The bookshelf was all I could handle.

I was tired of looking at it all the time.  We’ve lived in this house for 2 years and this shelf has been the collecting spot for all sorts of things since we moved in.  It doesn’t have books because it is supposed to be where my Swarovski crystal collection is displayed.  But as that hasn’t happened in 2 years and we’re moving in 5 months, it’s not going to happen at all.

I took everything off the shelf, dusted it and found a new home for most of the stuff.  Then, because I’m highly distractable when it comes to housework, I went through all the other books in the house and picked out ones to give away.  I also rounded up some books for the newly cleaned off shelf.

Which is when I noticed our Curious George books.  My uncle Anthony gave Boo two Curious George anthologies for his first and second birthdays and he drew a cute little George cartoon of his own in the front covers.  We loved those books so much that the covers fell off!  I couldn’t replace them because we’d lose the little cartoons.  So they sat safely on the shelf for a while.

But since I was all energetic, I got out the book repair tape I bought a couple of months ago and fixed them.

And while I was culling another bookshelf, I found the original paper covers that I’d stashed behind some books for safe keeping. I covered them with clear library covers and now look!

All better and ready to enjoy again.

I did eventually get back to the original bookshelf.  See…

Just one more Corner of My Home that looks a little nicer.

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