Friday, September 26, 2014

7 Quick Takes {Take 55} Cute kid stuff, lots of fall book recommendations, and 54 day rosary novena! edition


It's the end of the first of the three autumn months, and what have I been up to, you ask? It is my favorite season of the entire year, after all. Let's settle in with our tea and discuss. :)

-1-Evil smoke detectors that attack in the night...

Work has been busy, as it always is at this point of the semester. I arrived home the other day, pretty pooped, and Anne summoned me immediately into the living room.

"Mommy color with me."

There was no asking involved. This was a demand. :)

"Sure, Honey. Aw, what happened to your finger?"

A bright green band aid was adoring her right index finger.

"The smoke detector did that." *very casual*

Now, Anne is afraid of her smoke detector. I don't know why precisely, but she has expressed this in the past, with lots of requests for the smoke detector to be taken out and "given to another child." Obviously, this is not happening.

"The smoke detector cut your finger, Sweetie?" *very skeptical*

"YES." *very serious* "It's watching me, ISN'T IT, MOMMY?" *WIDE.EYED.FACE*

Ah ha. The blinking light is clearly the culprit. Tiny piece of duct tape, coming right up.

-2- Henry simmers with excitement, Tiffany nervously bites her nails & downloads Kindle books...

Mine and Henry's trip to Maine is in two weeks. Henry is practically levitating he's so excited. Me? Yes, I'm very excited about the actual visit. But I have to fly to get there. And you know...well. I don't like to fly. :) I do it, but I don't know that I'll ever like it. It's a combination of the lack of control and fear of enclosed spaces. I've been listening to the Airline Pilot Guy podcast, hosted by one of my favorite SQPN'ers, Capt. Jeff, and that has helped my fear quite a bit, actually. Knowledge is power, I suppose, and traveling by air is statistically much safer than other forms of travel, and it's helpful to know the reasons why. So, good. Right?

Mostly. :) The fear is less than it has been, but I'm still not anxiety-free. I have my Kindle loaded up with books and am plotting a special portable knitting project to provide distractions on the travel days in question.

-3- Speaking of Kindle books, my current fiction selection...

I started a new Love Inspired Suspense miniseries last week, and so far so good. This is a Christian line of romances, and there are traditional titles (called simply "Love Inspired"), the suspense line, and a historical line. I'm not so much interested in historical romance. Occasionally, but not often. However, I love the traditional and suspense titles. They all feature the characters bringing their faith into the situations they are facing in the book and are quite lovely. The miniseries that I started reading is called Witness Protection, and it is a six book series featuring characters within the federal witness protection program and the U.S. Marshals who guard them. Book 1 was discounted one day (check out Inspired Reads for the scoop on how to find discounted religious titles on Amazon :)), so I downloaded it, and I'm so glad that I did. It is Safe By the Marshal's Side, by Shirlee McCoy:


I already have book 2 on my Kindle, that must have been featured in Inspired Reads one day as well, which is The Baby Rescue, and I plan to download the others and make my way through the miniseries. Happy. :) This particular miniseries has a different author for each book, which can have mixed results (I really like Shirlee McCoy, I've read her books before, so she sets a good precedent :)) but I'm intrigued enough by the theme to keep going regardless.

-4- Fans of saint books for middle readers will want to check these out...

Henry and I recently finished our first installment in the Encounter the Saints series from Pauline Books & Media, which was St. Thomas More: Courage, Conscience and the King. Excellent! Henry was quite taken with it. I have to write a review of it for Catholic Library World now, I have them to thank for introducing me to the series. These books are perfect for children aged 9-12. We liked the St. Thomas More book so much that I promptly ordered 3 more for our bedtime reading, and the first one he wants to start with is St. John Paul II:

We also ordered the selections featuring St. Kateri Tekakwitha and St. Maximilian Kolbe. We can take one along with us to Maine. :)

-5- October book club!

Just a reminder that our October book for the Catholic Book Club is Sacred Fire: Practicing Devotion to the Heart of Jesus, by Philip Michael Bulman:

I've been wanting to learn more about devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus since hearing about it in a podcast earlier in the year, so this book is perfectly timed for me. It was just released this summer, and I'm very excited to dive into this for my spiritual reading in the evenings!

-6- Also starting in October, all rosary fans join in!

Beginning on St. Therese's feast day (Oct. 1st) I'm going to be praying a 54 day rosary novena. October is the month of the rosary, so it just seems perfect, no? :) Who would like to join in? We'll start, like I mentioned, on Oct. 1st, and finish on Sunday, Nov. 23rd, the last Sunday in Ordinary Time. Each day, we'll be praying a full rosary. For half of the novena (27 days), we pray for our intentions, and then for the subsequent 27 days we pray in thanksgiving for whatever result is God's will for that intention. There are instructions for the novena about which mysteries to pray on what day, but I'm going to be honest: I pay no attention to that. :0 I pray the mysteries of the rosary according to the day of the week and liturgical season. For Ordinary Time, that means this breakdown:

Monday: Joyful
Tuesday: Sorrowful
Wednesday: Glorious
Thursday: Luminous
Friday: Sorrowful
Saturday: Joyful
Sunday: Glorious

-7- Gratuitous baby photo, because who can resist those?

Real quick, I want everyone to go admire precious Baby Gift Universe, little Miriam (don't you just love her name?!) in the baby surprise jacket and hat that I knit her (scroll to take #6 in that post). *heart*

Ok all, I have to get back to work! Have a wonderful weekend, and I'll talk to you on Monday. Go check out more 7 Quick Takes over at Conversion Diary!

2 comments:

  1. Feel free to repost the picture here if you like. It is SO cute ... and so is the baby inside if I do say so myself.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hahahaha. The smoke detector. Sooo funny what kids come up with!

    ReplyDelete

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