First I must show you the inspiration for this post.......My beautiful friend, Celeste and her family
This is my friend Celeste and her beautiful family. They are an awesome homeschooling family.....in fact, Celeste was a huge influence on our decision to homeschool our children. ANYWAY, Celeste and I have been friends for about 13 years (since my Madison and her Olivia were born....way back when we lived in a little Apartment in Dallas and Jeremy was in Dental School) Celeste is an amazing Catholic Christian wife and mommy (of seven kids....she only had 2 when we met) and has totally inspired me over the years. So many of her words have stayed with me and I have used them throughout my life as a wife and mommy.
All of this to say that I am so blessed to have her as my friend.....I thank Jesus for her each day!! One thing (one of the many things) that Celeste told me a long time ago in a mother's prayer group that we were in together, was "There would be no Resurrection without a Crucifixion". That is so true!! We would not be able to understand joy, if we didn't experience suffering. What would good food taste like if you had never tasted food that was yucky!!
Well, that was what I was thinking yesterday when I was finally blessed with feeling better after being sick for what seemed like, forever.
Last night when I went to bed, finally freed from my ailments, I felt so comforted knowing that tomorrow (today) would be a "normal" day. How I reveled in that joyful thought!! Usually our daily wind and grind is pretty tiring.....especially our "crazy Tuesdays" as we call them (a lot of activities are scheduled that day each week) We are driving here and there while trying to finish school at the same time.
I was so grateful for THIS Tuesday (today)!!! There was no place that I would have rather been than starting our day with prayer together in our homeschool room, driving Madison to her science lab, and running to get gas and milk at the store.
I don't ever truly appreciate feeling well, until I experience feeling sick. So, in the words of my sweet friend (which have inspired me for so long)
"There would be no Resurrection without a Crucifixion"
A picture of today's prayer time.....the best prayer time ever (Our Awesome REGULAR daily life)
(a pic of our morning prayer time...see the candle with our Adored Christ Jesus. It helps us to focus on the importance of our time in prayer to our Father. See the book of pictures of Jesus' life that we can meditate on....this one is the Last Supper. See the soft brown rug....we love to sit on it....our schoolroom has a wood floor and so this fluffy rug is the only soft place. Now if you look closely, you will see something behind the candle. That is our schoolroom space heater. We pile around it each day during prayer time....we love to be warm like a baby caterpillar in his cocoon)
Most importantly, here are the little hands of my 3 precious children....I wanted to capture this pic
Madison is holding the purple Rosary. Look how fast she is growing. She has beautiful long fingers that play Taylor Swift songs on her keyboard perfectly while her friend Claire sings on FaceTime (see her clean manicured nails....she is always painting them and then cleaning them off because they are not perfect)
Savannah is holding the green Rosary. Look at her little fingers that have to stretch SO FAR to play "Sweet Home Alabama" her electric guitar along with her ipod (will she really ever appreciate that song as much as Jer and I do?!?!). She loves to get her nails done but the polish is always half scratched off by the next day (See the bit of purple polish on her nails....they had black zebra stripes on them too, before she played outside in the dirt)
Nicholas is holding the blue Rosary. Look at his tiny sweet fingers with the dirt under his nails.....such a little boy. He bangs away on his drums like a super cute and innocent rock star. I just love hearing him play.
Their hands tell such a story about what they are and what they enjoy. Today is a GREAT day. There is no place that I would rather be than in my schoolroom teaching my children, while NOT throwing up : )
Thank you Lord for making me better. Thank you for my health! Today only feels like such a blessing because yesterday was such a suffering.....thank you for the Great Suffering that You experienced before Your Magnificent Glory!
