Friday night live

Earlier this evening...

All four bambini are out in the garage with my beloved.  Tomorrow is the Pinewood Derby for the elder lad's Cub Scout pack, so the lad and his dad are putting the finishing touches on his lustrous truck (another one).  Through the open door I can banging, clanging, scuffling, and the younger lass yelling jubilantly "here we go!"  She and her sister are sitting in the green wagon that is rarely used for outings to the neighborhood playground anymore.  The younger lad is nearby in a stance that reads "train conductor" although he is wearing a black shirt vest (over his white school uniform polo) with green felt strategically cut and placed to look like what Chris Kratt wears on the lads' favorite show Wild Kratts graciously made for him by the mother of one of his classmates after hearing how much he, his brother, and his sisters enjoy that show.  The lasses say they are going to the beach. I'm not sure how the lad fits in the beach trip, but I have every confidence that he's got a plan.  Maybe they're taking the train to the beach.

How they love to go tinker around in the garage with their dad, sometimes stomping around in the bed of his truck, sometimes dabbing paint on small blocks of wood like the elder lass did last year as her brothers painted their Derby cars, sometimes using tools on a project with his skilled and immediate guidance.  The younger lad won't get to enter a car in the Pinewood Derby until next year when he is a first-year Cub Scout, but he's made a car (or is this year's a boat?) both years alongside his brother. 

The outcome of tomorrow's Pinewood Derby is anyone's guess, and we're not worried about that.  The process of creating, crafting, and finishing the cars has been the real prize.

The day has had its ups and downs, from these amicable sounds, school Mass, and lunch with a cherished friend to displays of fury from tired, frustrated bambini and sibling squabbles that are nothing new.  The scene in the garage ended when the lasses came in to get ready for bed and the Derby truck with freshly-installed wheels came in to cure overnight. Then it was the usual nuttiness that is the bedtime routine.

I'm sure glad I stepped away from folding laundry to take in the sights and sounds out in the garage.  It was a moment meant to capture forever.

the ultimate gift

At the end of January we observed Catholic Schools Week, one devoted nationwide to celebrating the unique gift that is a Catholic education.  After much discernment and continued prayer, we made the decision a few years ago to enroll our bambini in a parish-based parochial school for a number of reasons, chief among them being this particular school's faithful witness to the message of Christ as evidenced by its commitment to teaching Gospel values by example and living them in love.   While the academics taught at the school are first-rate, to have the reinforcement of a community actively seeking to live in accordance with God's law as we tend to the formation of our children's souls -- always by God's grace and with his help -- is priceless.

This was not the easy choice for us, but we feel it is the right one for our family.  Our bambini are thriving at this school, and they show an ever-increasing love for the Lord and consideration of other people, which we understand are the Lord's two greatest commandments.  We hope and pray this trend continues as the bambini grow to maturity, but maybe someday one or more of them will, to be blunt, chuck it all either by a willful departure from the faith or by an lukewarm apathy that creeps up over time.   There are plenty of stories of such alumni.

The pastor emeritus of the parish school often still presides at school Mass.  More than once I have heard him speak in reference to the gift that the students are receiving in the form of their Catholic education.  He always goes on to stress the importance of the students taking ownership of the gift they are being given and making it their own, carrying it with them, nurturing the seeds of faith their parents, pastors, and educators are working to plant every day, and guarding against the temptation toward laziness in the all-important matter of faith.

We can go to great lengths in the name of passing the faith on to our children, including providing access to a Catholic education for them (whether that's at a Catholic school, a  public school supplemented by parish-based faith formation classes, or home school), being active in a faith community, and living each day visibly seeking the Lord's will, all of which we know can heavily influence how the bambini filter all the messages they hear and apply them to their own lives. None of it will guarantee, however, that our bambini will ultimately become men and women of faith themselves.  That gift comes from God himself, and has to be sought, claimed, and lived by each person.

I pray the Lord will fan into flame the sparks of desire within our bambini and all God's children to know, love, and serve him in this life so as to be with him in the next.

sugar shock

On Fridays the eighth graders at our parish school stage a bake sale for the rest of the students, who come with their quarters after school Mass.  Today was the first time the younger lad's kindergarten class went to school Mass (they had been going to chapel separately since school began) and bake sale, so I was eager to hear how things went from the younger lad's perspective.

"Good," he said, in his usual way. 

"What did you get at the bake sale?" I asked him.

The elder lad responded for his brother, "he got a graham cracker with frosting and colored chocolate chips.  I was going to get one, but it looked really unhealthy, so I got a donut."

keepin' it real

Yes, that was my precious girl letting the faithful gathered for school Mass that "I want the PURPLE bow!"  She also wanted to know if we could "go now" and "have a snack in the car?"

"Soon," I told her in a stage whisper. 

On the bright side, no kneelers were dropped on anyone's shins or toes (though the lass did trip on a kneeler as we exited our pew to go to Communion and wanted to be carried the rest of the way).  The younger lad didn't attempt to slither out into the aisle from our pew (as he is sometimes given to do).  The baby girl registered some squawks as punctuation, but saved the yelling for later in the day when her brother the younger was all up in her face (understandably).  I caught a glimpse of the elder lad with his Bon Jovi hair sitting with his class (and looking the other way), but we made a hasty exit after Mass and thus didn't see him again until pick-up time.

So we made a minor scene today, but that's how it goes sometimes.   It's all part of learning how to behave in church just as anywhere else.  Little children have as much a place in church as adults do.

For the most part, the bambini did just fine. The color commentary (or "signs of life", as the associate pastor who presided at Mass this morning described them) often have impeccable, terrible, or simply comedic timing.  But they're are all a part of keepin' it real.  God willing, we'll be back next week.

the eye of the storm

Kind of a tough day here:

The 21-month-old lass is running a low grade fever and has needed extra "Mommy-O" attention.  In the final minutes of dinner preparation, the younger lad took a header off the sofa during a jumping episode (still against house rules) and hit his jaw with a sickening whack on the corner of the coffee table.  He's OK, if a little puffy and sore.  All the emotional residue of a day filled with fussiness converged at the table, when the eldest and youngest bambini had reached their limits and let the stress they felt be known in their respective ways.

Had we not made it to school Mass this morning, I think the course of the day would've been much different.  The graces poured out upon me there sustained me as I tried to manage the rest of the day in a triage situation.

Since the lass had not been able to sleep during siesta time today, both because she fell asleep on the way home from school Mass rather than at siesta time and because she felt so crummy, she hit the hay early even as her three-month-old sister lamented some tummy trouble of her own.  With one lass asleep, I was able to snuggle the elder lad for bedtime prayers, whose snuggling requests are often fulfilled after his sisters have gone to bed.

Truly the grace of God infused this challenge-filled day from beginning to end.  He got us out the door and on the road to Mass at a time when I am often still trying to get myself together (not to mention everyone else).  He held me up as I held both lasses and corralled the younger lad during Mass.  And he kept my head in the game, so to speak, throughout the long day with no pause for resetting myself.  It is for this last gift I am most grateful (though I am for all of them).  It was the difference between me hitting a wall and me having the grace to go on, the peace that surpasses all understanding.

Yes, I know the Grace is there for the asking, even if I'm not at Mass when I ask for it.  Going to Mass and receiving the Eucharist opened the door, though, and helped order my thoughts and heart in such a way as to receive that Grace.

I have wanted to make weekly school Mass part of our regular routine but been daunted by the logistical considerations.  Experiencing the surge of spiritual nourishment from having gone (even if I didn't catch every word of the readings or lose myself in prayer because I was trying to keep the younger lad's truck-vrooming noises in check those last few minutes of Mass) helped confirm the desires my heart has continued to express to put forth every effort to make it to that weekly liturgy.

The elder lad asked if we'd come back to Mass again.  I told him we will.

And now I'll go finish my dinner...