Watch out for Fifi

She's a pitcher!

New! New! New!

Do you ever feel guilty because you know you should be line-drying your linens in the summer? Who hasn't looked out at the clothes line and thought to herself, "Gee, think of all the money we could save if only I were using that clothes line!" But you can't use clothes line because you have lost all the clothes pins!


Have we got a product for you.


The Guilt No More (TM) Clothes Line. The pins are already lost, so you can drape your sheets and dish towels right over in a very haphazard fashion and NOT FEEL BAD about it.

This new exciting product is the companion to our Guilt No More (TM) Clothes Dryer, which tumbles your wet laundry indefinitely but does not add any heat.

My family is currently testing a model of this one.

Best. Husband. Ever.

Yes, Superguy is out right now with ALL SIX, count them, six (6) of our offspring, running errands, and I am at home in the refrigerated glory of our silent home.

I am making chocolate chip cookies, eating chocolate chips, blogging, doing laundry, and listening to talk radio. All at once. Multitasking.

Been reading a lot about the bad state of the world these last couple of days. But here in the domestic church presided over by Superguy, life is peaceful. He's about to be unemployed, and yet he is out with children, who love to just be with him, even if it is only a trip to the grocery store.

I'd live in a cardboard box on the side of the freeway with this man.

Guilt No More yard

There are some people who have very messy lives. These people for some perverse reason seem to feel that the only way they can bear to go on living their messy lives is to tell perfect strangers about all the ways their lives are messy. (I think particularly of hairdressers who have given me the history of their romantic entanglements with men who are now in prison, as well as people at large parties who regaled me with detailed descriptions of their various methods of birth control, and how these methods did or did not work according to expectation.)

I too live a messy life, in a very real sense. Messy, that is, in that physical sense. This place, in other words, is a pit. Now, the only way I can bear to live in such a messy place is to remember that I am in the family business -- Guilt No More Products and Services, Inc. -- and my job is to model the merchandise. Having explained myself, let me relieve my mind by sharing with you the latest line in Guilt No More landscaping. "Urban Mud/Back to Basics" is what I'm thinking this product will be called when it goes on sale.

Take a look at this.



I mean, look at it. Could you possibly do ANYTHING to mess this up? It's perfect for people who frequently prefer their lawn mower to be stored upside down, in the mud, near the piles of plastic garbage that we call the Children's Outdoor Equipment.


Oh man.
See that white string half-buried? That's the clothesline.

Hmm. Somehow, I still don't feel better.

More on the Culture of Life

My dear sister messybessy has written a lovely post on building the culture of life. How true, how right she is! We do have a lovely world, in so many ways. Even I, who am the pinnacle of anxiety and even pessimism, see and love the world God has blessed us with. And yet, I also have this current of pessimism coursing through me, a fear of all this goodness being taken away. The Culture of Life, I believe, banishes this pessimism and fear. It stands against the nihilism and hopelessness which attends our secular world and which creates the Culture of Death. Christ came to cast out fear, right? But it isn't just like falling off a log, espousing this Culture of Life. It isn't just a matter of saying, "I support life," and then fear is gone and we are all happy. I believe that as a Christian I must CHOOSE to build the Culture of Life every day, as messybessy has done. Supporting ours and other's families, hospitality, and prayer are all indeed necessary in this, and I love to read messybessy's encouragement on these. These are my additional (albeit mostly redundant) resolutions on this:

1) Build trust in the Love of the Lord, and surrender each day to Christ, trusting that he will make better use of it than I will. A Daily Offering would be appropriate here. Fear makes me want to be in control, but where does Life come from? God, not me. Did I make the beautiful flowers or the sunset? Did I design my darling daughter's blue eyes? No. The overabundance of Life, that Life that we are trying to build in this world comes from God and His Merciful Love, not from me. The best way to Build Life, or even build a life (my own) is in fact to turn it all over to Christ first thing. Didn't someone special once say that a man must give up his life in order to gain it? When I can turn over my own small life, and the life of my family to the Lord, then I have a starting place from which to build the COL. I think of the powerful image of the candles at Easter Vigil: if I turn in trust to the Lord, he will light my little candle with which I can in turn bring light to the world. In order to spread Life to the world, we have to have Life to begin with. Christ is the Way, the Truth, and the Life - we know where to turn.

2) After surrendering each day to the Lord, I have to gain and then hold onto a vision of what life I am trying to build and promote. Obviously, life in Christ is the goal here, but I think I need to hold onto a picture that is even more specific. I think messybessy's ideas about how to spend family time and how to be hospitable hit on this. I think of it in terms of my daughter. I want life for her, but more importantly I want a GOOD life for her. Again, prayer and a Christian life are the main substance of this life, but I need to keep in mind the smaller details as well. How can I create a life for her which is full of Light and beauty and goodness? If I have a vision of life that I work to build in my own home, then I can realize that vision and become a picture of life for others to witness; I can become a part of the COL. For me this vision includes affection, humor, cheerfullness, graditude, communication, hard work, good works, and of course love. Kind words, good use of my time, art and music, patience, education, and wholesome recreation are all things I need to pursue. And again, prayer first and foremost. If I try to realize this vision every day, I will be a sign to the world that life, a good life, is possible with Christ.

I think that is my main point: the world can indeed be a scary place, and seem very bleak. Fear is not living, it is hiding from life, and so the best way to overcome the fear that the world can build up (even if I am afraid too) is to counterattack by creating lives which are full of light and hope. Life and light need to be lived. I believe that this is my apostolate to the world in my vocation as a wife and mother. I hope that Christ can build my family to be full of love and light so that others might see us and know that REAL Life, rather than merely breathing and then dying, really is possible. In order to live this apostolate I need to turn to Christ first as the picture and origin of Life, then continually re-present that vision to myself, and then I need to work towards realizing it.