Feast Day: St. Ignatius of Antioch and a birthday

St. Ignatius of Antioch -- thrown to the lions in the Coliseum in the 1st century

during the persecutions under Trajan

It is also my brother Paul's birthday .... happiest of days to our very own 49-er!

Feast Day: St. Margaret Mary Alacoque

St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, pray for us!

Books: Betsy-Tacy Reading Challenge

We're half-way through the month of October and I'm done!  I've read all 10 of the Betsy-Tacy books ... I pre-read the four younger ones (and String Bean and I are working through those together) and then I read all six of the teen and young adult ones.  What a great series.

I think the reason the books have such a loyal and vocal following is that these books ring true -- in every book you get the sense of family and love and loyalty and the simple pleasures.  The sentiment is a bit akin to Dorothy clicking her heals and saying "there's no place like home, there's no place like home."

And home can be the little cottage across from Tacy's house on Hill Street .... or the house on the windy junction of High and Plum Streets ... or the house in Minneapolis ... or the house she settles into in married life -- they're all home!  Why?  Because Betsy always has her family around her in lifeperson or in spirit.  The letters that fly back and forth during times away ... or the phone calls to catch up ... or the late-night sessions: all keep the family connected and strong and involved.

I think that these book read so well today because many of us miss those days: the days of staying in the same town for years and building up friendships and connections that stand the test of time.  We miss the long, hand-written letters that people used to write, the ones that have been replaced by IMs or txt-msgs or emails.  We're all so busy now in our own worlds we don't have time to share with our family or friends.

Betsy-Tacy books give us back those times to share.  The B-T books give us a slap in the face that says we can have much of this back again ... in addition to our IMs and emails when those are needed. 

Now, having read these ten books, which is my favorite? 

For me, my favorite is Betsy's Wedding. This should really be titled "Betsy's Marriage" since the wedding is done right at the beginning but the book goes on to show how Betsy and her husband are able to balance married life with working/writing and impending war.  The book is a great portrayal of what marriage can and should be: a meeting of two lives that become interwoven into one life, with some give and take, some sacrifice and obedience, some hard and stressful times.  But all of the life is imbued with love ... and because of the love, all comes right in the end.

That said, I think the favorite for anyone reading these books is going to be based on where the reader is when he/she reads the book.  For my 9-yod, her favorite is Betsy-Tacy and Tib, because String Bean is part of a triumvirate of friends and sees herself and her two friends in each of the characters.  When String Bean is in high school, I'm sure she'll find that the high school books become the favored reading. 

And that's at the core of the BT books -- because the characters grow through the books, the reader can grow with Betsy.  The reader can start out a young girl and become an active, happy, popular woman without sacrificing her family and friends, without losing the heart!  The reader can see herself in Tacy's natural friendliness to boys without romance, or Tib's inability to find love until she acts like herself.  The reader can see that families all have their differences and yet, if real love is present, than all works out in the end. 

Maud Hart Lovelace wrote these books about her own growing up years; growing up in the first half of the 20th century in a small town near Minneapolis.  These books were written from the heart, to show a world filled with love in a time when the World was filled with war.  Both of those worlds still exist, but the BT books help us to see that love of family and love of friendship will always win out against the war-torn world.

If you've never read the Betsy-Tacy books, either to yourself or your children, here are the books, listed in chronological order.  I think you'll find they become favorites in your house, too.

1. Betsy-Tacy -- at 5 years old the friendship begins
2. Betsy-Tacy and Tib -- at 8 years old, the pair find a third to join in
3. Betsy and Tacy Go Over the Big Hill -- at 10, the girls are starting to spread their wings a bit
4. Betsy and Tacy Go Downtown -- at 12, the girls begin to really see the world around them
5. Heaven to Betsy/Betsy Inspite of Herself -- 9th and 10th grade pass with a bit of teenage angst
6. Betsy was a Junior/Betsy and Joe -- 11th and 12th grade get the girls ready to launch on the world
7. Betsy and the Great World/Betsy's Wedding -- Betsy's world tour and marriage don't slow down the friendship or love of family

Feast Day: St. Teresa of Avila

Now, this is a cool saint ... she's one of only three women Doctors of the Church ... yep, that's how profound are her writings.  Dh studied her extensively in grad school and still loves reading about her.  I never studied her but everytime I read a quote, I think "yes, exactly!"  For instance the quote I attached the above icon ...

With the Lord by our side, there is nothing we cannot do.  Separated from Him, we will collapse ...

 

Cool, eh?

Today we learned about St. Teresa (1515-1582, Avila, Spain)  ... and her many gifts to the Church, not least of which would be the reform of the Carmelite order in Spain.  She was one tough woman who didn't take lightly anything that would lead souls away from truly loving God.  We also colored the page Waltzing Matilda so graciously posted for all while we talked about visiting Avila back in 2000 for our Jubilee Year pilgrimage.  It was hot (July in Spain!) and dry and dusty and trains were delayed ... and yet, Avila was cool, clean, and gorgeous! 

I wanted to find a fun recipe to try for this feast.  The yemas -- candied egg yolks -- just didn't sound like anything my family would like and yet that was the only sweet that was associated with St. Teresa!  I decided to do an online search of Spanish recipes and found a great-sounding recipe for polvorones, traditional special-day cookies (often made for Christmas) ... I tweaked the recipe just a tad and must have done the right thing because dh and ALL three of the kids ate almost the whole plate after dinner!  They loved them and dh said it was probably the best cookie I've made!

So, yemas step aside and let's do polvorones for St. Teresa of Avila!  Here's the recipe I made:

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 cups unbleached white flour
• 3/4 cup almonds (raw)
• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 1 egg yolk
• 3/4 cup granulated sugar
• 1-1/2 tsp cinnamon

Preparation:

This polvorones or Spanish almond cookie recipe makes approximately 16 (2-inch round) cookies.  We made heart-shaped as I still can't find my biscuit cutters!

 

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Measure and pour flour out onto a cookie sheet. Place in oven and "toast" the flour. Occasionally move the flour around on the sheet, so that it toasts evenly. Leave in oven for about 8 minutes. Remove and set aside.  At the same time, place raw almonds in a glass pie pan and toast till fragrant (about 8 mins). Remove and place almonds into a food processor. Process almonds until they are finely ground.
Reduce oven temperature to 250 degrees.

Cream butter, egg yolk, sugar and cinnamon together in a large mixing bowl. Add the flour and finely ground almonds and continue mixing. The dough will be very crumbly!

Place a sheet of waxed paper on a cutting board or other flat work surface. Press the dough together to form  ball. Then press the dough onto the waxed paper. Carefully flatten it down to about 3/4-1 inch thick. Use a cookie cutter to cut out the cookies and a spatula to move cookies to cookie sheet for baking.

Bake cookies on ungreased cookie sheet for 30-45 minutes at 250 degrees. Turn off heat and leave cookie sheet in oven, allowing cookies to cool completely before removing them.

 

That's it ... for "the best cookies I've ever made!"  I think next time I'll try using powdered sugar in lieu of the granulated as I think that will make them even more melt-in-the-mouth!

 

Blessings and hope you had a wonderful St. Teresa Day! 

 

 

Review: Come and See: Wisdom -- Catholic Bible Study

How many books within the Bible are considered "wisdom books"?  Can you name the "wisdom books" of the Bible?  What is one distinguishing characteristic of all these books?

I couldn't name the seven wisdom books nor did I know that they are all written in poetic (as opposed to, prose) form. 

I so don't know my Bible!  That was one of the reasons I chose the book, Come and See: Wisdom -- Catholic Bible Study for review; I figured I'd be able to answer at least these three questions when I was done with the book.

Well, I can now do that and more!  The "wisdom books" are: 

1. Job
2. Psalms
3. Proverbs
4. Ecclesiastes
5. Song of Solomon
6. Wisdom 
7. Sirach. 

They are all written in a poetic form with lots of cool literary tools embedded (including the use of acrostic-poetry in their construction, similes and metaphors, and proverbs scattered throughout).  These are such deep scriptural books that phrases or whole verses are used throughout Western literature (Shakespeare uses scriptural references extensively and what we now consider trite cliches are actually direct quotes from the "wisdom books"!).

Fr. Liesen and Dr. Manhardt do a great job of explaining the many facets of these books:  the historical setting, the literary devices used throughout, the catechism embedded in the poetry, the Church writings and Magisterial teachings that these seven books have engendered.  Each of the 22 chapters are a different part of the scriptures -- a natural/literary coupling of the various chapters or verses of the individual books. 

It's amazing how much bang these wisdom books pack!

I liked how Liesen and Manhardt include directed-study questions at the conclusion of each chapter; questions that are objective and great review, that direct the reader to the important or key points of each section of the Biblical passages. 

As a homeschooling mom, I see this as a great high school Religion curriculum for 9th grade Scripture or as a 12th grade Theology elective.  The coverage in this guide includes

• history by setting each book in it's contemporary setting and explaining the Jewish vs the Christian understanding of the words;
• literature by defining the myriad of literary devices used throughout each of the Biblical books
• catechism by explaining Church teachings on what these scripture passages mean for a Catholic with Papal and Church Father quotations throughout the text
• apologetics by separating the Jewish from the Catholic from the Christian understandings and defending the Catholic interpretation of these sage writings

As a homeschool mom, I could easily use this guide to build an entire semester's worth of multi-disciplinary studies for a high school student.  Pretty cool, eh?  I like that this guide is fairly self-contained -- you could use it as a study-guide for a student, an adult or a small-group from a parish. 

I do have a couple of quibbles, though:

1. The introduction is very abrupt and reads clumsily; the intro gives an overview of how the books came to be in the Bible but it is a very technical, academic discussion.  Then all of a sudden the intro explains how to use the book ... the format was ... well, wierd.
2. The objective questions at the end of each section are great but the subjective questions (marked with an asterisk) are a bit hokey ... lots about "feelings" and "imagining" that seems forced and more politically correct than it needs to be.
3. At times the text is a bit pedantic and technical.  There is an assumption of prior knowledge that this particular cradle Catholic (who went to Catholic schools from K-undergrad) didn't quite "get"; I ended up having to do further research  a couple of times to understand what they were saying.

Overall, I think this is a great study guide for high school age and older; for individuals or for groups; for parish study or for home-study.  These books of the Old Testament need to be read and understood by all Catholics. 

This review was written as part of the Catholic book Reviewer program from The Catholic Company. Visit The Catholic Company to find more information on Come and See - Wisdom - Catholic Bible Study.

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Liesen, Father Jan SSD and Manhardt, Maurie Watson (PhD)  Come and See: Wisdom -- Catholic Bible Study. Emmaus Road Publishing (Seubenville, OH) 2009; ISBN: 978-1-931018-55-5; paperback, 220 pages.

Prayers, please!

I just received an email from my dear friend down in Atlanta.  My 14yo God-daughter needs prayers:

Please include Katherine among your fervent prayers. She's had a tough start to high school and it has been complicated by health issues, particularly this last month.


The plethora of doctors are still trying to ascertain what's going on with a myriad of tests, so hopefully the good Lord will guide them to a definite diagnosis & treatment plan soon. At present she's has constant leg pain and is in a wheelchair (and has been for two weeks) and, of course, has a bad wrist w/ tendonditis too, and sleeping problems to boot. I'm hoping this all sounds way worse than it really is. But we're at the "I don't know what's going on stage," which can be trying.

She's being a trooper at times, but this is all difficult. Sometimes she's very uncomfortable with talking about all of it, so we're doing our best to respect her privacy and help her along the way. In addition, the wheelchair severely limits her 'normal' activities and life. Thus, your prayers would be most welcome. We're asking that you intercede on our behalf to ask the Lord to guide our doctors and caretakers to determine what's causing her problems, and be able to help her back to health.

This is one of those kids that's a really sweet, active, wonderful daughter/sister/student.  Please pray that the docs find out what's wrong and can help her. 
Thank you so much .... God love you!

Where should we go today?

Christopher Columbus discovers the New World!

Dh was off ... so we were too!  What to do on a cloudy, cold (never getting much above 50 today) kind of day?

How's about a hayride and pumpkin hunting with a bunch of homeschoolers at a fellow homeschooler's family farm?  Sounds good to us ...

And, before (starting around 7:00 a.m.) and during (on the ride to and from, really helps to have dh home!) and after, I worked on my talk for 7th graders tomorrow on my fave topic: knitting.  Here's the project I made for them to try:

Easy Knitted Backpack

(shown in Knit Picks' Wool of the Andes Bulky --

I still want to felt it and then post the pattern here, but I won't have time before the class tomorrow.)

How was YOUR Columbus Day?