Welcome, Joseph William!
November 29
1:37 PM
7 lb, 3 oz
19″
So far, everything’s going swimmingly. Our thanks to everyone for your support and prayers!
The Best Anniversary Gift
November 30, 2010 By 11 Comments
Yesterday was our seventh anniversary, which only makes it sweeter to introduce you to our newest family member, who made his grand entrance and was nothing less than a gift from God (and an answer to a big sister’s prayer).
Prayers for Poppa Gene (updated)
August 13, 2010 By 4 Comments
We interrupt our hat talk to ask for your prayers for Poppa Gene. He has been struggling with heart complications for a while, and in the last few weeks there have been some additional “actings up,” which he, in his Marine-ness, calls “no big deal.”
It’s a big enough deal to ask for your prayers in this public way, though, despite the fact that my phone may start ringing and I may have to recant in a few hours with a “All’s fine!” post.
In fact, that’s what I’d love to do, recant. 
I’d especially ask you for your prayers for my mother-in-law. She’s had a bit of stress here lately, and though she’s been a trooper (near Marine level, really), there’s a fine crack running through her and threatening to break her wide open.
UPDATE: At 9 PM, things are…quiet. The doctor suggested that Gene go to the hospital. Being either stubborn or feeling miraculously cured, he flat out refused.
It will be a night for praying. (And it won’t be the first…or the last.)
I have a post scheduled to go live first thing in the morning, and I hope I won’t be online updating between now and then. Because I am still hoping to recant, you know.
In Utero
June 2, 2010 By 5 Comments
I can’t resist sharing this “bonus picture” of Baby 3, taken today when the little one was presumably sleeping instead of being cooperative so they could hear the little heart. My midwives would have never done another ultrasound, but then, the machine wasn’t just down the hall. (Their practice has closed since my last baby. It’s a whole new ballgame for me.) I won’t complain. I love these little glimpses at the life within me!
14 week ultrasound of Baby 3
Roses
January 13, 2010 By 3 Comments
I’ve had a lot of encouragement in the last two weeks. I have felt enormous grace and support and I’m pretty sure I’ve felt Mary’s touch a time or two.
But today takes the cake.
Look what the FedEx man brought me:
They’re not from my husband. They’re not from my parents. They’re not from an admirer.
Well, maybe they are.
My sister-in-law (giving my brother-in-law credit, though I’m pretty sure she was the mastermind in this) wrote me a little love note and said, “We don’t tell you enough how much we love you.”
Wow.
She has no idea how many layers of meaning this has for me, especially on a day when I’ve been struggling to embrace my vocation, say “Yes” as Mary did, let go of the need to figure out how I’ll get a laundry list of things done. She doesn’t know about the retreat I’m planning, the writing I have to get done, or the work that keeps getting shoved back as another little fire crops up throughout the day.
She doesn’t know that roses symbolize Mary, that this feels (and smells) for all the world like a big, encouraging hug from heaven.
But she wouldn’t mind, if she did know.
In fact, I think it might make her smile.
Thanks, “Aunt Bug,” for making my day. Now I’m off to explain to my five-year-old why I’m not being selfish to insist that they stay where I can see them, smell them, and enjoy them.
From His Mouth to My Heart
January 13, 2010 By 9 Comments
In my inbox this morning, something I needed:
“Do not fear; only believe.”
- Jesus in Mark 5:36
And then this:
Pray, hope, and don’t worry.
Worry is useless.
God is merciful and will hear your prayer.
- St. Pio of Pietrelcina
Things have been happening all at once. Yesterday was no different. From a burial to a diagnosis, I was glad to be surrounded by family.
It looks like our five-year-old, despite the big scare from last week, will be OK. Their diagnosis, so far, is very treatable and positive. I’m keeping things rather quiet here about it, because I think I need to discern some more what to say and how to say it and whether to say it at all.
Thank you for your continued prayers and support.
A Day of Silence
January 12, 2010 By 4 Comments
It won’t be silent today in my real life. But here and in the other online places I’m usually found, I will be silent.
Today’s a day for family and mourning and all the things associated with that.
By the grave, I will ponder and hold Mary’s hand.
Through the day, this thought will be floating around, sinking deeper into my head. It was in my inbox the other day, courtesy of the Women of Grace Daily Grace Lines, and it made me pause.
“What we mean, in the last resort, by ‘an answer to prayer,’ is that from the beginning of time, before He set about the building of the worlds, God foreknew every prayer that human lips would breathe, and took it into account. That, and nothing less, is the staggering claim which we make every time we say the “Our Father.”
–Monsignor Ronald Knox
We’ve been praying a lot, both for the recent death in our family and for our daughter’s health. But the answer? We don’t know or we can’t see it.
And that’s OK. I’m just going to hold Mary’s hand and work on trusting.
Here at Snoring Scholar, you'll find marriage and motherhood, book talk and rambling remarks, observations and distractions, in the midst of life in rural Ohio on a farm, with kids, critters, and Catholic flair.
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