Amanda Woodiel, Author at Amazing Catechists

Seven Ways to Observe Advent with Children

Photo by Stefan Schweihofer (2018) via Pixabay, CCO Creative Commons

Perhaps you too have had the experience of preparing for Christmas, only to realize that amongst the candy-making, the letter-writing, the present-purchasing, the tree-trimming, and more, you never got around to spiritual preparation, even though you really meant to this year.

If you would like to add a more reflective or penitential note to your family’s Advent observance, check out the seven ideas below to get you started. Choose one (or two), gather what you will need, and start a new family tradition!

Jesse tree

The idea:

Recall salvation history. Use ornaments decorated with symbols to represent the events and stories leading up to the birth of Jesus and hang them on a tree of some kind (the tree is so named after Jesse, father of King David–see Isaiah 11:1).

What you will need:

You can order a kit. Check out Etsy for some beautiful ones.
You can do it yourself…you need something to be the tree, something to make ornaments, and a Bible or knowledge of Bible stories. I use a book that has reproducible ornaments. Each year I photocopy one set of ornaments for each child. I cut out a large Christmas tree shape from wrapping paper and tape it on the wall. Each day (when all goes well), the kids color their ornaments while I read to them the passage from the Bible corresponding to the symbol they are coloring. They then cut out their ornaments and tape them on the tree.
The tree can also be a bare branch set into a mason jar full of stones or sand, and the ornaments can be hung on it with loops of ribbon.

Advent stockings: good works

The idea:

The family does a spiritual or corporal work of mercy (or other charitable act) each day of advent. For example, we might give away a piece of clothing; pray for an end to abortion; pray for our priests; call someone who might be lonely, etc.

You need:

Slips of paper listing the good works you will do (see the end of this post for ideas).
Something to put them in. I have mini stockings with numbers on them, which we hang up. Every evening I put a slip of paper in the next day’s stocking, choosing the activity based on what can fit into our family calendar. But you could easily do the same with numbered envelopes or, if you are really adventurous, just put them all in a mason jar and see what you pull out!

Making soft Baby Jesus’ Bed

The idea:

Family members make sacrifices and do good acts throughout Advent. For each one, they lay a piece of straw or hay in an empty manger, trying to get the bed as soft as possible before Baby Jesus will be born on Christmas morning.

You need:

Raffia, hay, straw, grass, or strips of yellow construction paper.
Some sort of manger.
Baby Jesus statue.

Advent wreath

The idea:

Four candles represent the four Sundays of Advent. Three are purple to represent penance; the fourth is pink for Gaudete Sunday (the 3rd Sunday of Advent. Gaudete means “joy,” and the priest will wear rose-colored vestments). On the first Sunday of Advent, light the purple candle that is diagonal from the pink one. Say a prayer of longing for Our Savior. Every evening light this candle, accompanied by a prayer, and each successive Sunday light an additional candle.

You need:

An advent wreath/candle holder
Candles

Salvation history candle

The idea:

Similar to a Jesse tree but for the artistic. You will draw on a large candle (about 2 feet tall) the scenes from salvation history, starting with Adam and Eve at the top and Baby Jesus at the bottom. You will burn the candle throughout Advent.

You need:

A church-style large candle, 51% beeswax, about 2’ tall. Can be found at stjudeshop.com
Drawing implements

Planned read-alouds

The idea:

Read advent and nativity books during Advent: either one story per day in a book of collected Advent stories or separate books.

You need:

A book with a collection of 22-28 Advent stories (here is the one we have); or
22-28 picture books that are Advent-related, about saints whose feast day falls in Advent, or about salvation history. If you choose this option, you might want to wrap them in wrapping paper and number them, opening up one on each day.

Piece-by-piece nativity set

The idea:

Rather than give a little piece of candy in an Advent calendar, each day brings another object or person to add to the nativity scene, starting with the stable/cave and ending with Baby Jesus.

You need:

You can buy a set online that has the requisite number of pieces; or
You can make one yourself out of felt, bringing out one piece each day; or
Your children make their own paper nativity set, coloring a piece every day using free printables online.

____________________

Resources:

Here is a list of good works you might use for your family’s Advent stockings.

Do something nice for someone in secret today.
Look around your room. Is there anything you can give away to the poor?
Do an extra chore today.
Try hard to be cheerful in everything you do today.
Draw a picture of the nativity.
Read about a saint today.
Pray for your priest today. Could you offer up a sacrifice for the Church today?
Pray for an end to abortion today and give away something to moms in need.
Pray for the deceased today. Could you make a sacrifice for the souls in purgatory?
Pray for persecuted Christians today and learn about a country where they do not have freedom of religion.
Pray for people who do not know Jesus. Is there something you could do extra as an offering for them?
Pray for your family today. What can you do to help your family be more like the Holy Family?
Pray a Rosary today.
Pray the Chaplet of Divine mercy.
Do an examination of conscience tonight, and if possible, schedule Confession sometime soon.
Take a meal to someone in need.
Make a card to send to someone who lives far away.
Call or invite someone over who might be lonely.
Read the Nativity story from the Bible.
Make ornaments to send to the nursing home.
Do something for someone else that you normally don’t want to do (such as offer to play a game you know he likes).
Eat all of your food with a good attitude (even if you don’t like it) and be grateful you have it.
Sing a song to baby Jesus or make up a poem for Him.
Act out the nativity or part of the salvation story or do a puppet show.
Give money to the poor. You may do an extra chore and give away any money you earn.
Bake something and give away half.
Write or draw a thank-you card for someone.
Make a gift for your priest or staff at your parish church.
Give away food to the food pantry.
Give away a piece of warm clothing.
Work on memorizing a Bible verse.
Go to morning Mass.
Give up something you like to do or eat today and offer it up as a prayer for someone in need.
Wrap up something you have and give it to someone.

My Top 12 Tips for New-to-Homeschooling Parents

By Amanda Woodiel

Some friends of mine have decided to homeschool next year, and I found myself giddy. Homeschooling has blessed our family tremendously–from the amount of time I get to form my children in virtue to the simple life we are forced to live in order to accommodate one income; from the relationships my older children have with my younger children to the generous amount of leisure it affords us.

My exuberance makes me want to rain advice and book suggestions down on my friends’ unsuspecting heads, but I recognize that I should exercise restraint. Instead, I offer here my top 12 tips for New-to-Homeschool folks.

1) Decide what your non-negotiables are at this stage of your child’s education.

For us, our non-negotiables are learning our faith well; math; learning to write well; and reading time. Would I like my kids to know their history? Of course. But I can add that into my non-negotiables of writing and reading. Do I want them to know science? I do. Geography? Yes. But those will increase in intensity as they get older. For now, if they read, write, do some math, have some kind of virtue/Bible lesson, and get outside to play or build, then that’s a good day.

2) Write your school’s mission statement based upon the non-negotiables and post it.

As you get into learning more about homeschooling, it’s pretty easy to lose the forest for the trees. It’s a little like wedding planning…suddenly, you think you must incorporate party favors and cake pops while the real thing you ought to be concerned about (the sacrament of marriage) gets lost under the fluff. Knowing what your mission is helps to make those homeschooling decisions a little easier; everything can be held under the light of “does this fit into our educational mission?”

3) Know who you are.

See, as you go along, you are going to come across blogs of homeschool parents who make snow globes and amazing origami forest animals. If that’s not you, don’t sweat it. Your kids will be fine, I assure you, without ever building an Egyptian pyramid out of colored sugar cubes. Instead, focus on your own talents for teaching. Are you great at silly songs? That’s awesome for teaching history. Do you enjoy being outside? You can pack science, math, and religion into a single nature walk. Are you good at carpentry? More math! Sure, you can stretch yourself every now and then and do more of what you aren’t naturally disposed to do, but for the day in and day out of homeschool, teach in a way that is pleasant to you.

4) Know who your child is.

As you go along in your homeschooling journey, you will come to know who your child is and how he learns best. Sadly, it may not quite match your preferred method. That’s okay–you can both stretch. This is one reason why homeschooling is so effective: you can tailor how you teach to how your student learns. Is he visual? Use dry erase boards a lot. Auditory learner? Record yourself reading his spelling list and spelling it out for him. Does he learn through story? Read aloud his history. Does he need to move a lot? Math problems can be combined with races pretty easily.

5) Look at different homeschooling philosophies before you sweat which curriculum you will use.

Charlotte Mason, Classical, Waldorf, and Unit Studies will soon become educational philosophies you will dissect with other homeschooling parents. Simply learning about different ways to homeschool will likely help you fine-tune what is important to you. Personally, I don’t follow any homeschool philosophy in particular but have picked out elements from several different methods. I strongly believe in outside time a la Charlotte Mason, I incorporate the 4-year cycle of history study used by the Classical method, and I am low-electronics like Waldorf.

6) Co-op…or not.

You can’t go wrong here. Trust your gut. You can do a co-op and thereby pool your talents with others so that your kids are getting pottery classes, for example, whereas you can hardly draw a stick figure personally. On the other hand, you could not do a co-op and learn art alongside your child at home. One thing I will say is that the “socialization” impetus for co-ops is largely over-emphasized. If you live in a neighborhood, go to church, have interactions with extended family, participate in any organized extra-curricular activity like Cub Scouts or sports, and make time for play dates or library activities…your kids are going to be socialized just fine, and they will be socialized across age groups as children have been for hundreds of generations before.

7) Structure your day.

In general, children like structure to their day, and this is especially important if your child is transitioning from traditional school to homeschool. He is used to having nearly every minute planned out for him. Clearly, you don’t need to go to that extreme, but a simple rhythm to your day will obviate being asked again and again, “What are we doing next? Can I go outside? When can we paint?” It can be as simple as “breakfast, read aloud, math, recess, handwriting, read-alone time, lunch, done.” It will also keep you from having to reinvent the wheel every day.

8) Schedule your non-negotiables first.

I used to put the stuff that was really important to me, like Scripture memorization, after we got other subjects out of the way. Do you know that meant? That meant we hardly ever got to Scripture memorization. Someone dropped by, or I had to prep dinner, or everything just took longer than I had anticipated or it was a beautiful day and we decided to go for a walk. I finally realized that we had to do our non-negotiables first and all of those lovely enrichment-type activities as the day progressed. That way, by the end of the day, we had at least done what was most important to us. Another idea is to put the electives at the end of the week. In our home, we schedule Fine Arts Friday and study art history, music appreciation, poetry, creative writing, and/or go on field trips then.

9) Don’t try to re-create a traditional school environment at home.

You don’t have to do six different subjects every day. You could decide to take a month and do all science all the time. You can do one subject in-depth every day of the week for a total of five subjects weekly. You can do school in the afternoon. Your kid does not have to sit at a desk. You can do math problems with chalk outside. You can do all of school outside! You can do a math review while you grocery shop. You can add non-traditional subjects like service projects and gardening. Or maybe that’s all you do for a month! Again, refer back to your non-negotiables and mission statement, but remember, you can be far more flexible and creative in how you implement them than what you might believe at first.

10) Structure quiet time into every day.

This is to keep your sanity, basically, and yet I personally believe it to be a fundamental human need that is often overlooked. I want my kids to know how to be alone with themselves without having to turn on a screen. I want them to learn how to entertain themselves. Especially since we have a large family, we could constantly be chattering away and running about without ever learning to listen to our thoughts and how to be at peace with ourselves. And also–this will be the time when you get your things done.

11) Use a daily checklist.

Any child who can read can use a checklist to help manage his time. This is convenient when you have multiple children to teach. You can’t constantly answer “What should I do next?” I make our checklists on the computer. Each page lasts a week and has five columns, one for every day. Anything that we do together we do first (such as prayer time–we love Lisa’s book Heads Bowed: Prayers for Catholic School Days), and then each child has independent work for the day to get done.

12) Read aloud and then read aloud some more.

Reading aloud has been part of our family culture and has given us innumerable adventures from our living room. We probably know as many imaginary characters as we do real people, and it has widened our experience and deepened our bonds like nothing else. If all I did for the first three grades were to read aloud for a couple of hours each day, I would consider that time well spent. Since I usually don’t have hours every day to read aloud, I do what I can and supplement with audiobooks.

Relax. There are many ways to do this homeschooling thing right, and as long as it is done thoughtfully and with love, I can hardly think of how you could go wrong. Blessings on your homeschool journey!

Fasting 101: My Experience Over the Last Six Weeks

By Amanda Woodiel

A reader, referring back to a post from a couple of months ago, asked me if I had actually done anything to implement a weekday fast so that Sunday could be a feast day without being gluttonous.

And, wonder of wonders, I have!

So often the noble percolates in my head, and it takes months (maybe even years!) to materialize in my everyday life. But this time, thanks to several different threads coming together and by God’s grace, I have actually implemented a weekday fasting schedule.

Most days I fast from dinner until dinner. This is called intermittent fasting. (If you want to learn more about intermittent and extended fasting from a medical, physiological point of view, read The Complete Guide to Fasting by Dr. Jason Fung.) Several years ago, my trim chiropractor mentioned that this is how he eats, and I thought he was completely nuts. In truth, it is really not so radical (humans have been fasting and feasting since time immemorial) or so difficult (I found that anticipation of how hard it will be is way worse than the reality).

I have been fasting now for over six weeks. I don’t fast on Sundays or on feast days. The first big feast day since I began this practice was the Feast of the Assumption, and it really felt like a feast! After breakfast, I took the kids to a local bakery and relished a pecan sticky bun. For lunch, I put sugar in my coffee. And for dinner I ate take-out pizza. It was awesome, and it was awesome without being gluttonous. It felt like true feasting.

So how do I feel while fasting?

Mostly I feel great. The hunger comes occasionally, but as I had read, it comes in waves. If you make it through the wave of hunger, the feeling goes away and stays away for a couple of hours. So for me it’s about an hour of feeling hunger around lunchtime, and then I am fine until dinner, and even then, I don’t feel that hungry. I have done two 44-hour fasts, and those were only marginally more difficult than my usual routine.

I have felt far less lethargic than I have in a long time and have more energy than usual. I even tackled cleaning our basement (a cellar-style storage space), which is a project I have ignored for over a decade.

Overall, I have simply enjoyed food more than ever. The daily meal tastes so good and is such a delight; I feel like I have re-discovered the joy of food. It feels like the way God probably designed food to be consumed: I feel hungry when I eat, and I’m not just shoving it into my body because I want it or because it’s there or because I am feeling a negative emotion.

I should also mention that there have been surprising practical benefits. I find I have about an extra four hours per week (the time that would have been spent preparing and eating my own breakfasts and lunches throughout the week). I am spending less money. While I wouldn’t say these would personally be reasons enough to motivate me to fast, they have been pleasant advantages.

There is a spiritual side of fasting too. One of the main reasons why I fast is because I felt that food had power over me in a way that it shouldn’t. I was cranky when I didn’t eat. I thought about how to reward myself with food. I turned to food when sad or stressed. I ate too much of certain foods just because I wanted to. Intuitively, I knew that that part of my life was not properly ordered. If you are in a similar situation, you might enjoy taking a little food attachment quiz I created when I was deep in exploring my own disordered attachment to food.

Jesus presumed we would be fasting. “When you fast,” He said (see Matthew 6:16). I know so little about the power of fasting, as I am so new to it. But I can say that it has already induced some sense of detachment from the things of the world. Like all Christian spiritual practices, such as prayer and alms-giving, fasting molds the soul into the way of holiness.

Fasting also has always been a way of showing remorse for our own sins and a way to make reparation for the sins of others. I am tempted to think that because I am doing it for my physical and spiritual health, it cannot also be “applied” as a prayer. Nonsense! Think of the Holy Mass, when we pray “May the Lord accept the sacrifice at your hands, for the praise and glory of His name, for our good, and the good of all his holy church.” If the Mass itself can be said for God’s glory as well as for ourselves as well as for the entire church, well, then so can our small acts of fasting. Offer your sacrifice to God for His glory, your own good, and the good of the whole world.

If you feel out of control regarding food, want to re-discover a spiritual practice that has been around for thousands of years, and/or desire to create a rhythm in your family life that accords with the liturgical year, I encourage you to try fasting! It is changing my life.

__________________

We Call This Friday Good

By Amanda Woodiel

I have a friend who moved to the United States some twenty years ago. Although she speaks the language fluently, she hasn’t quite lost her accent, and a colloquialism will occasionally still mystify her. That’s how I am with the Catholic church. Twelve years ago I came into the Church as a young woman. Though I feel at home here, I still stumble upon meditations that strike me as so strange that I realize I am a foreigner.

This was the first Lent since I started praying a daily Rosary, and somewhere along the way it was suggested to me that I pray only the sorrowful mysteries in Lent (except Sundays). So day after day I have meditated on the Agony, the Scourging, the Crowning with Thorns, the Carrying of the Cross, and the Crucifixion.

What has jumped out at me is the juxtaposition of these mysteries with the phrase of the Hail Mary: “Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.”

Blessed are thou among women….said again and again as I contemplated His agony, His body slick with bloody sweat, His face in the dirt he made.

Blessed art thou among women…as I contemplated the whips tearing at his flesh, furious lashes that end only when his executioners have worn themselves out from the effort.

Blessed art thou among women…as I saw her Son humiliated, scorned, spat upon, and struck repeatedly so that the thorns of the grotesque crown impale his head.

Blessed art thou among women…as I watched Our Lady watch her son’s battered, mutilated body stumble under the weight of the cross, a spectacle to the indifferent and an abomination to the contemptuous.

Blessed art thou among women…as she stands by Him crucified, witness to His struggle to breathe, His enduring of the unfathomable torture.

Blessed is she? Blessed? What mom dreams of the day when she will stand beside her son while he is tortured? On the face of it, it seems like a mockery to repeat this over fifty times in the face of His Passion. At any rate, it is a jarring enough paradox that it gave me pause. I knew then that I am still not a native to the church.

Forty days’ meditation gave me time to reflect. That she is blessed, I believe. So, as in so many teachings of the church that I didn’t immediately grasp, it was time to dig deeper.

How can it be that Our Lady is blessed in these days of Holy Week?

We see the world upside down, so writes Father Michael Scanlan in his book Let the Fire Fall. I believe that Mary’s blessedness in the face of the Passion is the right-side-up way to view it. I need to adjust my vision.

As in so many things, I was looking at the Passion in primarily the physical sense. Material being that I am, this body is so present to me that it usually constitutes my first consideration. But what if I were to look at the Passion in primarily spiritual terms? What if I thought about it as Fr John Riccardo presents it in his meditation on the Rosary (found here)–as the world’s greatest athlete gearing up for the single most important competition in history? What if I saw the spiritual implications of the Passion first–Jesus about to save the world from the rule of Satan?

Here, Jesus, though he looks like the defeated, is actually victorious, for he, as a priest said in a meditation I once went to, had enticed the devil to do the one thing the devil could not do–kill God Himself. It was a chess match, and while it looked as though the King had been taken, he had actually set a trap that would end in checkmate against his opponent. It was a daring, heroic, stupendous, awe-some, all-in kind of plan.

Did Our Lady understand the Passion on the spiritual level–as a supernatural match for which the prize was the human soul? Spouse of the Holy Spirit, the woman who will crush the serpent under her heel, the mother of God, I imagine she herself very well may have undergone severe temptations and wrestling with the devil in her own hidden life. She must have been clued into the spiritual realm of the Passion, even if she did not fully know what would happen three days hence.

Blessed indeed was she! She saw her son undergo bodily torture, yes, but through that, she saw him win the war. She saw him, fully human as well as fully God, not recoil from the agony of body and soul but instead stand victorious in the redemption of our human nature.

That one there is my son. The one who is wrestling all of the powers of hell but who stands–bloody, yes–but triumphant. That’s my boy–the one who whose suffering gives historic and eternal witness to the profound love of God. That one hanging there is mine, the one who is willingly giving his very life to save the eternal souls of the human race. Jesus is my son. I am blessed.

Learning to Live with Mystery

By Amanda Woodiel

The Christian worldview is chock full of mystery. How Jesus is both true God and true Man; how God is Three Persons but One Substance; how Jesus comes to us–body, blood, soul, and divinity–under the appearances of bread and wine: these are some of the great mysteries of our faith. We are steeped in these mysteries, and we are comfortable (for the most part) that our finite minds cannot fully comprehend the greatness of God. After all, some say, how much of a god is a God who is completely understood?

The mysteries of each other, however–those mysteries engender more discomfort. Whenever we hear of a tragedy intentionally perpetrated, the first question is usually “Why?” Why would someone do that? We seek to understand, because somehow understanding brings with it some measure of comfort.

But what if we can’t understand? And what if the mystery is closer to our own hearts: someone close to us who has hurt us unimaginably? When we try to sort out “why?” or “how could he?”–well, that mystery is almost unbearable.

I had always held closely a hope that when my father died, the mystery of his activities and his intentions would be solved. He passed away recently, and along with the grief of losing a parent and the shock of its suddenness, comes the grief that the mystery–instead of being revealed–has instead become more clouded and more strange.

What do we do when we must live with the mysteries of a human soul that we cannot penetrate? Clearly, I will not know more about my father’s thoughts, motivations, or activities in this life. The pieces simply don’t fit together no matter how many times I have turned them over in my mind.

When a painful mystery of life so presses upon our minds and hearts that it feels like murky waters poised to engulf us, it seems to me that we have two options. We can struggle against it, flailing our limbs in an attempt to stay upright. We can try to analyze the mystery and expend untold energy and time trying to unravel events, sort out truth, and understand the motivations of another’s heart.

Sometimes, though, we simply can’t fathom the answer. In that event, not all is lost, for we can learn to float. We can submit to our human nature. The fact is, we were not made to know all–certainly not the workings that lie at the bottom of another’s soul. We can adopt a posture of humility and lie peacefully atop the surface of the water. One way saps strength; the other preserves it. One keeps our eyes fixed on the sphere below; the other trains our eyes toward heaven.

Fortunately, truth isn’t only a set of facts but is a Person. I can choose to rest in Truth, who is Jesus Christ. Here I accept the finite nature of my human mind and yield to the God who is infinite but who loves me so completely that he came to me in history and comes to me in the Mass. I don’t understand the mystery of my father, but He does. Furthermore, if it were to my soul’s good that I unravel the mystery surrounding my dad, He would show it to me. He hasn’t yet. He might one day, but today and all days, I can rest in utter assurance that not knowing must be for my best.

When you encounter a mystery in life that cannot be solved–learn to float. You might catch a glimpse of heaven.

Our Family Read Alouds from 2017: an Annotated List

By Amanda Woodiel

We make time most school days to read loud. A friend recommended the blog Read Aloud Revival (completely worth your time), and after listening to even one podcast, I was hooked on the idea of reading aloud as a way to create bonds within families, to increase literacy among children, and to teach moral values in an organic manner.

Because we read aloud, we have stockpiled literary characters we all know and love. Our literary adventures have given birth to inside jokes and one-liners. Even the five-year-old references lessons from books we read long ago that are stored in the recesses of my mind but that are still very much alive in his.

When we read aloud together, it is almost as though we have gone on an adventure together as a family. It’s time spent together in about the most convenient, comfortable, economical and pleasurable way I can imagine!

Here is the list of what we read aloud in 2017. Given the fact that we rarely read aloud on weekends (for no good reason; we are just out of our routine) and allowing for sick days, laziness in summer, and days we simply didn’t fit it in, I would estimate that we operated at 35% of our full read-aloud potential. That being said, look at how much we plowed through!

One of the best pieces of advice I have ever received was along the lines of “If you want to be a mom who takes her kids outside, put down whatever you are doing and take your kids outside. You are now a mom who takes her kids outside.” The same is true of exercise, crafts, or read alouds. If reading aloud is something you want to start doing, go pick up a children’s book off of the floor–picture book or otherwise–and start reading aloud. Trust me, if you read it out loud, they will come. Even when it’s a picture book, the 8- and 9-year olds gather around. There is something magically enticing about hearing a story read aloud.

Chapter Books

Caddie Woodlawn by Carol Ryrie Brink

Caddie is a feisty Civil-war-era girl who lives in the wilds of Wisconsin with her family. We had tried Little House on the Prairie a year ago as a read aloud, and no one got into it (an experiment I hope to retry soon). This book is heavy on action with endearing (and enduring!) characters. A great, great read. My kids aged 9 to 4 (at the time) would name it the best book of the year!

Caddie Woodlawn’s Family by Carol Ryrie Brink and Marguerite Davis

As soon as Caddie Woodlawn was finished, my kids begged for another one. Looking around, I discovered this sequel. It isn’t quite as good as the first, but it was still a good read and filled our hearts that were begging for more time with Caddie Woodlawn and her family.

A Bear Called Paddington by Michael Bond

These are adorable stories about the talking bear from “Darkest Peru.” My children found the first Paddington movie to be too frightening. In these stories, unlike the movie, there is no villain–just a lot of mischief and unintended consequences. This book is a lot of fun.

Sarah, Plain and Tall by Patricia MacLachlan

This is a lovely, spare book about life on the prairie, the loss of a mother, and a new family in the making. Heart-wrenching without being sentimental, the storyline of this book will stay with you–and it comes out all right in the end, too.

The Mercy Watson series by Kate DiCamillo

At first the illustrations to this series and the premise of a doted-upon pig living in a house were jarring to me. Once I began to appreciate the retro style, however, I find both the illustrations and the books to be hilarious. My 3, 5, and 7 year olds can’t get enough of them!

How to Eat Fried Worms by Thomas Rockwell

I remember reading this book as a child and really enjoying it. This book, like so many books I read in my childhood that had been penned in the ’70s, failed to live up to memory. Perhaps some parts of it went over my head back then. It’s a decent read, but nothing that I would particularly recommend. I had to edit some parts of it as I was reading aloud.

The Hundred Dresses by Eleanor Estes

This book is about school cliques and bullying. Told from the perspective of one of the less mean-spirited girls in the clique rather than the girl who was ostracized, it touches on the pain of bullying without being overwhelming for a sensitive child. It has worthy reflections on “what I should have done” and the hidden person beyond appearances. A deep book, really, without being pedantic.

The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster

We read this book as part of my son’s book club. It is a fantastic book–but not one that is particularly well-suited to reading aloud to young children. Much of the book is wordplay so that the spelling needs to be seen–or at least read aloud to someone who will get the joke. However, put it on your booklist for older children because it is not only a great adventure story, but it is also a delightful, whimsical, and thought-provoking book that not only forces you to think about how we use language but also about how we live our lives. A fellow mom and I both agreed that it changed our perspectives! 4th grade and up.

Five Children and It by E. Nesbit

This book was remarkable in its day as the first that featured magical realism–that is, magic that happens in every day life as opposed to magic that is embedded in another world unlike our own. Four children (the fifth is a baby) come across a wish-giving sand fairy and find that asking for wishes that work out as anticipated is a difficult thing indeed. A classic book for a reason and beloved by our family.

The Amelia Bedelia series by Peggy Parish

Does it get any better than the literal Amelia Bedelia? This is one series from my childhood that absolutely lives up to its memory. All of the children from 3 to 9 love these books, and we have a blast following one another’s instructions in Amelia-Bedelia style (such as “Time to hit the road, kids!” “All right, mom, I’ll get the stick”). Do not get the newer books that feature Amelia Bedelia as a child; stick with the original Peggy Parish books.

The Little Bear series by Else Holmelund Minarik

What lovely books for the young child or the emerging reader! Even I can’t get enough of Little Bear. Simple stories told well.

The Cricket in Times Square by George Selden

This is a perfectly charming book about the friendship of three animals, the value of place, and music. You won’t regret reading it, and you might even shed a tear at the end like I did.

Stuart Little by E.B. White

We love E.B. White–but we didn’t love this book. Despite a couple of amusing chapters, the book’s ambiguous ending, the main character’s utter disregard for his parents, and its tired ’70s trope of “finding yourself” wore thin even with the children. Stuart Little was not particularly likeable, and the book seemed to have no point. A flop with us.

The Trumpet of the Swan by E.B. White

Here’s an E.B. White book that we DID enjoy. While there is a small amount of the old “irrelevant parent” trope, the themes of overcoming obstacles, the value of all life, and the eloquent descriptions of nature trump it. The talkative and vain Old Cob, while rather annoying at first, ended up being our favorite character, and we now love to talk in Old Cob style. We found the resolution at the end to be less than satisfactory, but it afforded good discussion.

From the Mixed up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E. L. Konigsburg

This is another title I dredged up from my childhood library. The premise is so engaging–run-away children make their home in the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art–but their disregard for their parents is dismaying. It read better when I envisioned myself in the place of the child than it does now when I picture myself as the adult. Even so, it gave good fodder for discussion and has a little mystery thrown in.

The Bravest Dog Ever: the True Story of Balto by Natalie Standiford

The true story of a dog who led his sled team through a blizzard to get medicine to sick children in a remote part of Alaska. It is suspenseful without being scary. Good for emerging readers to read alone, but we all enjoyed the story read aloud as well.

The Courage of Sarah Noble by Alice Dalgliesh

This book, says the epilogue, is based on the true story of a young girl who stayed with Native Americans while her father left to get the rest of the family. It is a memorable book and showcases the deep wells of courage found in children while at the same time not villianizing the adults. Highly recommended. “Keep up your courage” is now a tag-line at our house.

Because of Winn Dixie by Kate DiCamillo

This book was a step into more mature material for my children. The mother in the book has willingly abandoned her husband and her daughter. Until this book, my children had never fathomed that such a thing could occur. The writing, as is always the case with DiCamillo, is so spectacular, though, and she handles the subject so sensitively that I would highly recommend this book for all but the most sensitive of children (and my children are quite sensitive!). Great characters and a satisfying reconciliation between the hurting daughter and father. Ages 6+.

The Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle series by Betty Macdonald

The original Mrs. Piggle Wiggle books can’t be beat. Her creative ways to deal with the typical misbehaviors of children are not only wise but rollicking. While the first books generally utilize natural consequences (though the reader must suspend disbelief), later books often use “magic powder” to solve the situation. While my children still love those, I personally prefer the earliest books of the series and never tire of reading them! Children 3 and up love them.

All of a Kind Family by Sydney Taylor

This is a simple book about a large Jewish family and their everyday life. It is so innocent that there is even a chapter on mother finding a way to teach her daughters to dust the house better via hiding buttons around the room–and my kids ate it up. It has a somewhat unbelievable, though satisfying conclusion. My children (3 to 9 years old) would rank this as one of the best of the year.

Half Magic by Edward Eager

The author wrote this book in the manner of E. Nesbit’s Five Children and It and even references that book in the text! Four children find a magic coin and discover that their wishes come true only by half as much. It’s fun, has a great ending, and relatable characters.

Frindle by Andrew Clements

What a hilarious book about the power of words! This book features an intelligent and somewhat mischievous protagonist who renames a pen a “frindle.” The character, however, is not malicious and is respectful both of his parents and toward school authorities–a welcome reprieve from the usual theme of “adults are stupid.” It was thoroughly entertaining and had the kids (5 and up) begging for more.

Picture books

We read aloud many, many more picture books than are listed here. The ones below are especially worth highlighting, though! They brought us joy (or brought us to tears) and are all now beloved friends.

Boxes for Katje by Candace Fleming

Get your Kleenex ready before you sit down! This is a picture book that is memorable. It can be understood by children at least 5 and older, but the emotional impact will hit the older children (7 and up). It is the story of two little girls, one of whom is in post-war Europe, and their connection across the sea.

It Could Always be Worse: A Yiddish folk tale by Margot Zemach

This is one of those books that we quote all of the time: “It could always be worse!” my kids will chortle no matter our circumstance. It’s an entertaining book about being grateful for how good you really have it.

The Seven Silly Eaters by Mary Ann Hoberman

This book, about seven children with strong culinary preferences and a mother who caters to them, gently shows children the absurdity of both the children and the mom. I love that the family has more than 2.5 kids, and in the end, a solution is found that is reasonable. It’s just a lot of fun and has great rhymes!

The Mary Celeste: an Unsolved Mystery from History by Jane Yolen

This is a picture book for older children, about 7 and up. It is the true story of a missing ship. My children enjoyed reading the facts and coming up with their own theories as to what happened. For one of my children in particular, the fact that we don’t “know” for sure what happened was a little unsettling, but I think it is a good introduction to being comfortable with mystery.

Good Dog, Carl by Alexandra Day

This book is nearly wordless, but it makes a big impact. We continue to fabricate situations that star the inimitable Carl the Dog. The illustrations are gorgeous to boot.

Perfect Christmas: a Carol of Calm in the Midst of a Mess by Gary Bower

Each year I think about which new Christmas book I would like to add to our collection. After checking out about 20 from our local library, this one is the winner. It is a universal story about the preparations for Christmas going wrong–and remembering that even so, it is a perfect Christmas. Maybe it’s because I read it when I was knee-deep in Christmas preparations, but it brought me to tears. It also has beautiful, painterly illustrations!

Corduroy by Don Freeman

Corduroy is beloved by all of my children, but was a particular favorite of my 3 year old daughter this year. “Cordur-bear,” as she calls him, is now a sleepmate with her in the form of a stuffed animal. I remember loving this book as a child, and I’m pleased my daughter does too!

For Grown-ups

Ten Ways to Destroy the Imagination of Your Child by Anthony Esolen

This book was a life-changer for me. I recommended it to a friend, and she concurs: this is a book we will want to read year after year. It is written in satire, as if we really want to destroy the imagination of our children, and it is a scathing cultural commentary on everything from our educational system to our predilection toward cutting down heroes by focusing on their faults. It’s convicting, enlightening, and inspiring–and it will change the way you parent!

(This post first appeared at www.inaplaceofgrace.com. Text (c) by Amanda Woodiel [2018]. Photo by Mystic Art Design [2015] via Pixabay, CCO Public Domain.)

Forgiveness Beyond the Grave

By Amanda Woodiel

My father died last week. It was unexpected. He had had health issues the last couple of years and had never seemed particularly robust, but he was never near death, either.

My mom passed away eight years prior. Here I am, in my 30s (barely!) with five small children and no parents. It’s not a common status among my circle of friends, but it could be far worse.

I mention this simply to show that I have a frame of reference when I talk about grieving deceased parents. This isn’t my first rodeo. What is different this time, however, is that my father was, well, a different man than what he seemed to be. Over the last few years we had uncovered surprising details about his life–details that I will spare you, dear reader.

So the grief I feel is an alloyed grief. There is sadness that the opportunity has passed for our relationship to transform coupled with confusion over details that keep popping up (such as the bewildering claim he apparently made that he had been sent on a secret mission for the Department of Defense) commingled with utter dismay that his last note to us–intentionally placed in a spot where we would find it–was as efficient as a corporate memo and as warm as a ransom note.

The question I am left with–aside from the question of what is true regarding his life–is the question of forgiveness. How do you forgive someone who lies in his grave and whose lies extend beyond the grave? (The last sentence of his last note to us was, in fact, untrue.) How do you forgive someone who betrayed his family but who genuinely believed he could fool everyone–and who maybe, in the end, fooled himself?

As I have pondered these questions, a specific path to forgiveness and healing keeps coming to mind. Think back to Cana, the site of Jesus’ first public miracle. The hosts had run out of wine, and Mary, with the compassion of a mother’s heart, knew the embarrassment they would face. Her son is at the same wedding feast, so she hurries to him and tells him the problem. At first, Jesus seems to resist her urging. But she–great Jewish mama that she is–brushes aside his response and turns to the servants. “Do whatever he tells you,” she says with complete confidence in him. Jesus is moved by his mother’s urging and by her faith. Jesus acts, in this instance, because of his mother’s intercession.

This intercessor was given to us from the cross when Jesus gave her to John. John stands there in history as the faithful disciple but also stands in for us when Jesus gives Mary to his care: “behold your mother.” She is our mother as well, our dear compassionate mother, who is also, in evangelical parlance, a “prayer warrior.” Mary, just as she was at Cana, is a compassionate intercessor for those of us who face complicated situations.

Mary is known by many names. One such name comes from a meditation by St Irenaeus, bishop of Lyons in the last quarter of the second century and a Church Father. Drawing out a comparison between Eve and Mary, he noted:

“And thus also it was that the knot of Eve’s disobedience was loosed by the obedience of Mary” (Against Heresies, Book III, Chapter 22).

Man’s fall from grace due to original sin–what knot could be more complicated than that? Original sin, endured since our first parents, was loosed by the obedience of Mary to the will of God when she gave her fiat to become the mother of the Holy God. And so she is known as “Mary, Undoer of Knots.” Mary, undoer of the knot of original sin. Mary, undoer of whatever knot is in your life and the big knot that is in mine.

I once had a lovely little card that had printed on it “The best way out is always through.” The best way out of the pain is to walk through it. And so I have been given the answer to my question of how do I forgive: pray a daily Rosary alongside Mary, Undoer of Knots, for my father’s departed soul and for my wounded one.

What does this prayer do? Two things. When we pray in good faith for someone who has hurt us we cannot help but love that person more. It is hard for us to love the person whom we do not know. I have only done this prayer for the last week, and already I am looking at my father through more compassionate eyes than ever before; somehow, it is giving me more knowledge of him.

Secondly, praying the Rosary has a way of showing us who we are. Contemplating the mysteries of the God-Man being scourged or crowned with thorns gives me pause to think about the ways in which I have unleashed my own contempt for my Savior. The prayer becomes, then, less about offender (dad) and victim (me) and instead becomes two sinners contemplating God’s passion and his love and mercy.

And then, of course, the prayer is the outpouring of hope that God will and does redeem all things. Everything else in my life–my mother’s terminal brain disease, for example–has shown itself to be a gift. Perhaps the gift is a severe mercy, but there is always mercy. There is always the great Divine Act of turning evil on its head to bless–witness the crucifixion itself.

Praying a daily Rosary for those who have wounded us alongside our great mother and intercessor is ultimately an act of hope, an act of humility, and an act of love. By focusing daily and for a sustained time on the life of Jesus in the company of Mary, Undoer of Knots, I have confidence that I will find healing and peace.

Failure vs Success: Lessons from the Cross

By Amanda Woodiel

Do you know about St Bridget of Sweden? If you don’t and you are a mom, you want to get to know her. Here is an excerpt of her biography from catholic.com:

“In fact, nothing [St Bridget of Sweden] set out to do was ever realised. She never had a pope return to Rome permanently, she never managed to make peace between France and England, she never saw any nun in the habit that Christ had shown her, and she never returned to Sweden but died, [a] worn out old lady far from home in July 1373” (read the full biography here).

Don’t you love her already? I do. How much of motherhood feels like failing at everything–only to die a worn out old lady! The dishes are piled up (again), the house is a mess (again), I yelled at the kids (again), I didn’t pay a bill on time (again), I forgot even to ask my husband about his day (again)…the list goes on. I’m not the only one, I know, who occasionally feels this way: the phrase “mom fail” has become commonplace in our culture. You know, how you sum up the story to your friends about the time when you earnestly praised your oldest for his generosity of spirit, sunny attitude, and helpful nature–only to end by calling him the full name of the wrong child. Mom fail.

Today I was sitting in the church mulling over the “both and”-ness of Catholic theology. (This is a topic for another post, but you will get the drift in a minute.)

I am nothing (who am I that the Lord knows my name) and yet I am Everything (to the one who loves me so completely that He died for me).

I am nobody (one of billions) and yet I am Somebody (an adopted daughter of the God who created all things).

I am insufficient (brimming with faults and inadequacies) and yet I am Enough (willingness to cooperate with His grace being the only requirement).

So much of what I have tried has looked like failure: various groups I have started, certain friendships, even the little blog off in the corner of the internet. Motherhood can feel like a failure at times; motherhood, which for me has had a way of exposing the depths of my temperamental deficiencies. I feel often–not always, because there are those occasional Supermom days–like a failure. Most days I am so quick to become angry, so preoccupied with my own thoughts as to brush aside an eager child’s slo-mo replay of a football move, so lazy as to ignore distasteful household chores, and yet so busy as to forget to read a book to my little kids.

There I sat in the church talking with God about this topic, and when I raised my eyes, I saw Him on the cross–a cross which, it struck me suddenly, sure looks a lot like failure. What about the cross looks successful? Without the eyes of faith, nothing. There were those three days before the resurrection when the cross, far from looking like part of a divine plan for success, looked like the very depiction of defeat.

Motherhood can feel like living in those three days between the crucifixion and the resurrection. In other words, I have the hope of the resurrection. I have the hope that these things I do daily–cleaning, feeding, loving, hugging, teaching, listening, holding, tending, training–will end in victory. But for now I live in the moment when they often look like failure; it’s precisely this interim wherein resides Hope.

I hope in the Lord, not in myself. If I were to hope in myself, my family would be on the Titanic. Instead, I hope in His mercy and in His grace, and I entrust everything–even what presently looks like failure–to the One who can and does redeem all things and who transforms what looks like failure into an eternal victory.

So I love St Bridget of Sweden because she reminds me that the world’s vision of success–implementing something productive, known, used, or profitable–is not God’s definition of success. Someone who failed by every worldly metric is, in fact, a saint. So what is success in God’s economy? We learn from Our Lord that obedience to God’s will is the very definition of success–even if the results look to all the world like failure. We have a saint to remind us of that, and should we forget her, we need only look at the cross.

Playing the Ordered Toward Game

By Amanda Woodiel

God bless the woman from our parish who comes to my house weekly to help out with the children. Not only does she give me a half day out of the house, but she, who also happens to be incredibly well-read and steeped in the Catholic faith, enriches my home with a wisdom culled from years of mothering and reading Catholic philosophy.

So when my six year old son asked her if he could stack a doll stroller on top of a mini folding chair on top of a dining room chair and so on to see if he could eventually get his Tower of Babel to touch the ceiling, she was armed with a much better answer than I would have given when he asked, “Why not?”

“Because,” said the sage. “That is not what those things are ordered toward.”

When I came home, she told me the anecdote, laughing that she had given my budding six-year-old philosopher something to chew on.

But she gave me something to chew on as well. While I outwardly nodded and smiled, my inward self was as happy as a child treated to a new flavor of candy. I quickly saw how brilliant this tack is, calculating how very often I can use this line of reasoning to forestall disaster and reasonably answer questions.

Why can’t I swing this metal pole around like a baseball bat? Because that’s not what it is ordered toward.

Why can’t I climb the door frame like an American ninja warrior? Because, my dear, that’s not what the door frame is ordered toward.

Why can’t I step on the baby’s sippy cup? Because. That. Is. Not. What. It. Is. Ordered. Toward.

****

I’ve been reading the book The Benedict Option, in which the author traces the historical shift in the metaphysical understanding of matter from something that possesses inherent meaning and structure to something that has no meaning at all until a person assigns meaning to it. We see this shift dramatically demonstrated in our current culture’s (dis)regard of the sex of a human body.

Before recent times, a person’s body informed the person’s identity. The body itself had inherent meaning and structure. My body has female parts; therefore, I am a woman. Compare this with the present-day “understanding” of the body as something that has no inherent meaning whatsoever. The fact that I have female sexual organs, runs this way of thinking, in no way determines my sex. Instead, I assign meaning to my body based upon whatever I want for that day.

How extraordinarily confusing is this way of thinking! To live in a world in which everything has no inherent structure, no inherent meaning, no inherent order is to be lost at sea in a cosmological ocean–and lost at sea alone. For if nothing has inherent meaning, then what common ground is there for two people to stand on?

So as a way to bulwark against the prevailing cultural view, we play the Ordered Toward game at my house. It is a simple game, born of that day when my wise friend introduced the concept to us.

Everyone from the 8 year old to the 2 year old loves this game. We simply name things around us and talk about what they are ordered toward. Sometimes I name the object (what is a car ordered toward? To get us from one place to another), sometimes I play the game silly (is spaghetti ordered toward decorating your head? Noooo!), and sometimes I name the purpose and the children name the object (This is ordered toward giving us shade and oxygen. A tree!).

It’s a fun game to play in the car or in a waiting room to pass the time. The children giggle because children instinctively know that objects do have inherent meaning.

Start this little exercise at your house and you will be amazed by how useful it is. When someone throws a toy: “that toy was made to spin; it’s not ordered toward throwing.” When someone sticks his feet in another child’s face: “is that what your feet are ordered toward?” When a child tries to put his sister’s underwear on his head: “that’s not what it is ordered toward!” [Are you getting a picture of life at our house?]

At the same time, I’m laying groundwork for Theology of the Body before I get anywhere close to teaching about the mechanics of sex. The point is that our bodies are ordered toward something. We already talk about what our stomachs are ordered toward (to digest food) and what our eyes are ordered toward (to see), so when we get to the point of talking about our reproductive organs, for example, we will have a solid foundation upon which to lay the Catholic theology of the body, which is to say, that the reproductive organs are ordered toward creating and nourishing life.

Of course, as the children grow older and enter into the rhetoric stage of life, I’m sure we will have conversations about secondary uses and innovative uses of existing things, at which point we will discuss ethics and morality. The first place to start when one encounters something, though, is in discovering what its primary purpose is–and this is a fun way to begin.