Quick "Quiche"

Last Friday I was stumped for a quick, Friday-in-Lent meal.  Actually, as a practice our family abstains from meat on all Fridays except solemnities.  But, this past Friday was hard because we have found the price of fish exorbitant, and hardly fitting into the deeper penitential practice of Lent.

So, here is what I made.  It has evolved over time for our family.  Even though we had to wait, it took less time than going out for something to eat.  We had all the ingredients on hand, a good reason to keep basics in the cupboard, refrigerator and freezer.

Please adjust for your own taste preference.  This is one of those "in the head" recipes.

Butter the bottom and sides of a 13" x 9" baking dish.  Set aside.

Rice Crust:

Boil 2 cups of water, add 1 cup of white rice.  As soon as the stirred in rice returns to a boil, pop on a tight lid.  Cook on low for 12 minutes.  Turn off the burner and let sit about another 10 or so minutes.

Veggies:

(I quit using a microwave a while ago - but you can certainly use a microwave here.)

Cook 1 bag of "California" vegetables (broccoli, cauliflower and carrot) until no longer frozen.   Drain.  This is usually done by the time the rice is finished.

Egg Mixture:

6 eggs beaten with about 1 1/2 to 2 cups of half and half.  Add some herbs to taste (we like basil, oregano and thyme).

Cheese:

Grate up to 2 cups of cheese.  We prefer Mozzarella.

Preheat oven to 350 F.

To the rice, mix in about 1/4 cup Parmesan cheese.  Press this onto the bottom and sides of the prepared baking pan.  Sprinkle half the cheese over rice.  Cover with cooked veggies.  Pour the egg mixture over all of that.  Then sprinkle with the remaining cheese.

Place in oven.  As a cautionary measure, I like to put a cookie sheet on the rack immediately below to catch any bubble-overs (if any).  Cook for approximately 45 minutes.  Test with a knife.  When we've used regular or skim milk, it can take a bit longer to cook to done.  Let sit out of the oven just long enough to set the table.  This helps it firm up for serving.  Cut into serving size pieces, and enjoy.  For our current little family of 4 one casserole dish provides left-overs.  When it was all seven of us, I would double the recipe, cooking 2 dishes at the same time.  It still provided left-overs.  When the kids were little, one dish was ample.  But you know how kids and their appetites grow rapidly!

Sometimes we add fake crab, using fewer vegetables.  Try variations, using ingredients your family enjoys.  We switched from a pastry to rice because it was a lot simpler.  Plus helped avoid wheat sensitivity.  

Why "Sisters in the Trinity"?

This question has been running through my mind for a while, and finally in Mass yesterday the answer flashed into my mind.  

There are plenty of "how-to" lists and books for keeping a house.  In addition, there are also plenty of "spiritual" development books, many good, some not so.  And most of us are familiar with Holly Pierlot's "A Mother's Rule of Life."

So, why did Marion and I begin our original The Little Way list on Yahoo!Groups?  And, perhaps, more importantly why are we continuing with this blog.

The answers are both simple and complex.  And here are my thoughts.

First, of all, if you already have a deep spiritual life keep at it.  What I've discovered in my own journey is that at times I am deeply involved, and others I need a reminder of where I've been, and ultimately where I am destined to be.  Our original Little Way list was an aid for me to keep on seeking after the good, the beautiful and the holy.

Second, if you already have a good idea of how to run your household while raising a family and homeschooling, terrific!  This blog might not be for you.  But, what I've come to discover over the years of correspondence with those who have been part of this, while many have great systems, what they desire is an overarching concept that helps raise their vocation of mother and wife into a higher realm.  This is what I seek, as well.  

Third, neither Marion or I claim to have the answers.  We hope to simply provide some ideas for you to ponder, employ or discard.  We know that as our own lives have changed our way of approaching our vocations have been transformed.  

Fourth, by sharing with you, and your comments back we hope to provide a sense of community for those who don't live in a wider faith community that supports them.   One of the attractions of cloistered life for me is the physical presence of sisters who offer support on a day to day basis.

But we don't live in a cloister, we live with the family that God has bestowed and blessed us with.  We live with challenges from our extended families, our neighborhoods, parishes and towns.   For me having this added dimension of an internet based support system is vital.  You all provide an anchor when I have my sensibilities shaken.  You all provide a ready knowing that I am loved and valued.  This certainly can't substitute for the real flesh and blood persons that God places before me.  But this avenue of support also gives me the ability to seek out the wisdom of others in the time that I have available.

So if you are similar in your desires, I do hope you enjoy, and comment on the posts in this blog.  Our goal isn't to form anyone in our own image.  Our goal is to provide a supporting community that seeks to allow God to form us in His image.  Oh, and those mundane tasks like laundry, cooking, cleaning, reading favorite stories to sleep children, and listening to a college age child who needs to heard are some of those ways of formation.

Your Sister in the Trinity,

Yvonne 

Detachment/Decluttering

I am reprinting this from a previous post to the list. I think it's appropriate during lent and it's also the reality of what I am trying to do with many things in my life.

Dear Sisters,

How do we detach ourselves from things of this world? While the saints are far more qualified to write about this than, I ever will be, sometimes it is hard for us to see what their writings mean for us, as wives and mothers. I hope I will be able to give a little perspective. In this section I am going to write about attachments to clutter and things in our homes because I have already written about attachments and detachment in terms of our spirituality.

A quote from St. Teresa of Avila really sums up the issue of clutter. If we fill the palace with vulgar people and all kinds of junk, how can the Lord and His Court occupy it?” We need to get rid of the junk in our lives. It is really as simple as that. Things in your home should immediately lead you to God. If they don’t, we need to rid ourselves of them.

How many of us and said I don’t have time for prayer and yet we spend much of our time moving clutter form one location to another? If we can only let go of what does not lead us to God, then, we can be free to spend more time with Him. I am not proposing you discard everything in your home, but rather that you let go of the excess. This is a freeing exercise!

This type of virtue is not achieved in a week. We have had many years to cultivate our weakness and so it is a long struggle to win the battle. Clutters, and other distractions, creep into our lives. Often, we never notice until we are buried in them. As we begin to remove junk from our lives, we will see that it is multi-level. I have purged our home to what I felt were the necessities only to look around now, and see I need to go deeper, much deeper. I am not sure the process will ever be complete but I can say that as I let go of things there is more order to my home and I feel calmer.

Clutter in a home is almost a given. We can become desensitized to seeing clutter in our own homes, but rarely do we have a clutter-free home. Clutter drains our emotional and physical energy. We let our prayer lives suffer because we have to work to take care or our clutter. Things spiral downhill from there. If this sounds odd, read the Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis. Clutter sneaks in gradually until it has take over our lives.

As there are many wonderful books about decluttering. I will not spend much time on that subject. I do want to give some general information and share a lesson or two I have learned.

Before decluttering, consideration needs to be given to organization. Organization can help the things we have point us to God. I can see the books on the bookshelves as tools by which God allows me to educate my children. However, if I look at the ones on the floor in from of the overcrowded shelf, it is easier to see them as junk. We need to achieve balance. We don’t want to discard material we will be using with another child, but if it isn’t something we are going to use again, then perhaps it is time to let go of it.

We need to have a clear picture of where our things belong so we can put them there. If we do not have a place for something, it is probably because it isn’t a priority in our life and we should get rid of it. There are many great organizing devices available but we cannot let them become clutter I our lives. We should use them only if they are functional and fit the needs of your family. If we cannot afford these items be creative. There are many things we can recycle into organizers. The same rule applies to recycled organizers was purchased ones though; if it isn’t functional, get rid of it.
So, here’s my technique as applied to a mom:
1) Use manageable amounts of time. I think 15-minute increments are great. It is so easy for us to get distracted and leave a mess for ourselves. If you find you have more time that 15 minutes to work, then just do an extra 15-minute block. Don’t get into more than can possibly be finished in a short time.
2) Be prepared. When decluttering, have a trashcan, a “give-away” box, and a box for stuff that goes elsewhere. Some folks might suggest a “maybe” box, but we don’t have time for that. Make the decision.
3) Do it and be done with it. When I declutter, I first remove all items from an area. Then, I clean the area. Finally, I replace what needs to be there and put the rest in the appropriate container. When I finish, the containers are put in the trash, the give way is put in the car and the other stuff is put in its place. I want to get the stuff leaving the house out as quickly as possible or it will grow legs and come back. I just know it!

The biggest challenge to decluttering is our attachment to the clutter. It makes us feel comfortable. True detachment leads to decluttering and takes prayer and action. We need to pray not only to identify the attachments, but for the strength to let go of them. Once we have uncovered them, we need to remove them so we do not have an opportunity to keep returning to them. At times it is an easy process and, sometimes, it’s a difficult process. May God give you the strength and courage!

Sisters in the Trinity,
Marion

Finding Sanctity During Lent

Finding that sanctity, discovering it when I have all those run of the mill, everyday "mom" things to do can get old.  I just read a friend's blog where she hopes to be gentler, kinder, more compassionate.  Don't we all?

My post is intended to focus on two aspects.  First, it is nice to hope, and that is the first step.  Recognizing what it is you desire.  The next step would be to plan.  That's right.  In order to succeed in a wish, planning is vital.  It isn't enough to simply hope, or resolve to change.  Giving myself a specific plan lays out how I will work toward that goal.  In this case, though, my goal is not to come to an end at Lent, but to have allowed myself to live that change beyond Easter.

I would love to just hope for a clean house.  But, unless I plan and then follow my plan, it can't happen.  As much as I would hope that after all these years my house would just figure out what I want and stay that way, it won't.  It can't.  But, I can!

My plan this year is to begin Lent with remembering the letters "CPR" ... in my case, "Continual Prayerful Respiration."  Or, in other words, "praying attention" to what I am doing.  By the conclusion of Lent, my goal is be able to alter the word continual to continuous.  The difference being that continual is an event that is repeated with regularity and frequency.  Continuous is to extend without interruption or cessation.

How am I going to do this?  A prayer that Marion posted to our Little Way list quite a while ago, (and I saw circulating on the internet without mention of her as author) will be my guide.   For me it will be each shirt I iron, I'll offer a prayer for the person it belongs to.  For each dish I wash, I'll offer a prayer of thanks to the farmers who grew our food, the grocers who provided a way for us to purchase, the energy companies for heat to cook it, the easy access to fresh water we enjoy, etc.  For each time I back out of my garage, and return home, I'll offer a prayer for our friends in Peru who don't have security, for my fellow drivers on the road, for safe driving on my part, etc.   The sacrament of the present moment will very much be what I will attentively seek. by living in the here and now, offering as I progress through my day.  And it will be offering not just when I am doing a chore.  It will involve praying for the person I'm speaking to (whether by phone, or email.)  It will include offering up my discomfort at night as I'm moving toward menopause.  It will include remembering to pray for my eldest daughter and her fiance when I touch my wedding band.  All those little, attentive ways to lift up my ordinary day and actions toward heaven,  asking Mother Mary and the saints to intercede for me, my guardian angel to protect me, and for God to guide me and bless those I pray for.   

Just as CPR can be a life saving measure, I seek out my spiritual CPR to not only respire, or breathe out my prayers to God, but to receive the Holy Spirit respiring and breathing His grace into my soul, and guiding my thoughts, words, actions, chores, free-time, conversations, worship, everything in return.  

May your first day of Lent, Ash Wednesday, be a positive step on your own journey toward sanctity.

Yvonne -- 

Menu Plans

I wanted to post a quick note letting you know that I have added links to two files that you can download. The first one is my blank menu form and the second is my menu for the week.

When I prepare my weekly menu plan, I make notes along the top about activities that might affect our eating plans for the week. I usually do my plans by hand and as I add an meal, I make a note in the margin of any ingredients I might need to purchase.

For breakfast, you will see veggie omelets and cereal/bagel with fruit. We don't eat all of that every day. I eat veggies/eggs for breakfast while the rest of the family opt for higher carb options. We have some pretty different dietary issues around here, so I try to accommodate them with notes that make sense to me.

I'll try to write more later this week.

Our Vocation

This is from one of my earlier posts to the email group...

Dear Sisters,
I would like to begin by sharing with you some advice that was given to me a long time ago and has had a profound effect on me in the years since.

We had recently moved to Colorado. When we moved, I had all these great ideas for how our lives would be ordered. I had all the plans made! I thought we’d have fewer distractions and we could really just get about the business of focusing our family life on God. I had this entire agenda worked out in my mind and even on paper, of how we would live. I wish I had saved that paper because it would have been a great lesson in humility.

When we arrived here, we struggled to find a parish that was going to be home. During what was supposed to be a two week visit, my parents had a roll over car accident that left my father with a broken neck. While he would fully recover, they lived with us for several years. Don’t misunderstand me, I love my parents and I know we made the right choices but needless to say, my perfect ordered life went out the window! It seemed every plan I had was thwarted in these areas and others.

And so, I decided to whine to my spiritual director. His words still bring me back to focusing on God.

Here they are as he wrote them:
“You have a nice goal about what would be good for your home and vocation. But as you know, what man proposes, God disposes. Part of your vocation is to put out fires and solve problems. My vocation is one of distractions. And so is yours. The one striving for holiness learns how to use the distractions for the greater honor and glory of God. The ones who want to be holy but do not want to work at it have a fantasy that their particular holiness will be free of hard work and sacrifice and disruption. The lives of saints are full of disruptions, obstacles and sorrows.

Soooo, it sounds like God has given you the perfect environment to become a saint; less than perfect household, below average parish and no time to pray. Saints long for situations like this, because they can see how God will change these situations through them and other people, endowed and imbued with the Holy Spirit. You have to carve out your spiritual life in your day and it may be that you have to due violence to the things and times that you like for it to get done!

But the Lord Jesus will bless you and help and visit you when you are most discouraged. Would you not like to have a visit from the Lord and be discouraged every once in a while or not to have a visit from him and never be down trodden?

Carry your cross and it will carry you to heaven along with your family and parents! This is what saints are made of. I think you already know this. And I have confidence that you can do this with the Grace of God.

God bless you in the Sacred Heart of JMJ
Fr. Mike

It’s important to make a distinction in the type of vocation we are speaking about. The dictionary has two different definitions. The first is in reference to a job. I’m not talking about that definition at all. A job is work that provides temporal goods. The second definition is “An inclination, as if in response to a summons, to undertake a certain kind of work, especially a religious career; a calling.” I really would even beg to differ with that definition because it seems to imply that only religious have vocations and that’s not true either. Our vocation is our response to God’s calling us to a particular state of life. It is what provides for our spiritual well being. My vocation is being a wife and mother as is most that will be reading this article. Sometimes I have other jobs, but they cannot change my primary responsibility to my vocation. Being the best wife and mother through a life devoted to God is my path to Heaven. It needs to be first and foremost in all that I do.

There were three important messages for me in Father Mike’s words. I’m going to use those words as a point to address some of the particulars about our vocations.

The first is that our vocation is one of distractions. This is so true! This is why I don’t believe we shouldn’t try to adhere to rigid schedules. It’s also in many regards the reason this little way came to be a reality in my life.

What we need to learn is that there are distractions that our out of our control and there are ones that are in our control. When you are sitting in your quiet place to pray and your child comes to you sick or in desperate need that is a distraction from prayer that is out of your control. When you overcommitted yourself to ministries that seem good on the surface, they are distractions within your control.

Our children sometimes have needs that will take us away from prayer but we need to return as quickly as we can. We will also talk later about how those distractions can even be turned into prayer.

As wives and mothers, any task or ministry we commit to should be considered and prayed about in view of how it affects our vocation. While I have little children at home, does it make my family holier if I spend 5 nights a week at church meetings? You need to discern this for your own family but I think the answer would almost always be no.

Since I mentioned the idea of children distracting us from prayer, I want to add one more thought on this topic. There is a difference between a child with a legitimate need for their mother and one that has not been trained to understand that Mommy needs time with God. Very few of us have children that have to be constantly attended to. Most of us just aren’t very good at saying, Mommy is going to go pray for awhile so please work on this task or leave me alone for 30 minutes unless it is an emergency. Not only does this help our children develop independent skills, it witnesses to them that Mommy needs God in her life.

The second comment from Father Mike that hit home for me was the comparison of distractions in the vocation of priesthood and motherhood. This goes back to the definition I gave you of vocation. Where would we be if the only vocations were that of priest and nun? I’ll tell you, we just wouldn’t be! Holy priests come from holy families and holy families come from holy priests. Every vocation has its distractions. It is so easy for us to feel like a second class citizen because that’s what the world tells us but we need to shut the blinders on the worlds view and realize that we are following a divine plan.

The final message for me was that I might have to give up what I want in order to carve out time in my day for a spiritual life. Sometimes we really just want to make excuses for not spending time with God when it is the very thing we need most. Other times, as I alluded to earlier, we are so over committed with seemingly good ministries that we don’t have time.

When I only had one child and she was a baby, it was easier for me to do more at church or in the community but as she grew and more have been added, I have watched many of the ministries I love be carved out of my life. It’s not to say that I might not return to them in a later season of life but, it is to say that my primary job right now is tending to the needs of my family. To start with, I began by eliminating the ones that I could not do with my family or took me away from home more than once a month. As I started to give up control of these things that I wanted to do, God was free to move more toward Him. Isn’t it ironic how we can be doing good deeds and still miss our vocation?

I want to close with a final thought about prayer and our vocation. When we don’t have time to pray, we have our priorities wrong. I don’t believe there are any exceptions to this rule. It as simple as saying God, I know you have a plan for me, but I can do this on my own and I don’t need or want to hear anything you have to say. God has not given us so much to do in our lives that we can’t pray. I don’t think that is the message any of us want to give to God.


Sisters in the Trinity,
Marion

Little Ways

Sometimes it feels like I’m really not following The Little Way anymore, but when I actually stop and review I realize that I am indeed not following it but rather living it! I don’t know if I can explain what I mean very well, but basically, things that need to be cleaned and projects that need to be done are done. I haven’t met every self-imposed deadline or standard but rather they are done in God’s time.

I know I’m a control freak. I’ve always been a very organized person and so, for many years it was all or nothing for me. If I didn’t have things perfect, they were chaos, at least in my mind. Little by little, I learn to let go of this control and to offer my efforts to God.

When I started writing My Sisters, I used to struggle horribly with laundry. On any given day you might find piles on the laundry room floor waiting to be washed. Over the years, with many repeated offerings, God has transformed my ways. I would not go so far as to say that I love laundry, but we have a system in place that seems to work well for getting the clothes clean. I’m still working on getting them folded and put away as quickly as I should, but all those baby steps, led to one big transformation in that area of our lives.

Day by day, I notice little difference, but in looking back over longer periods of time I can see change. I can also see many other areas I need to get busy making more offerings and that’s why I know that I’ll be living the Little Way the rest of my life.

“We can accomplish no great things, only small things with great love.” --Blessed Mother Teresa