We won the piano!

Thanks for helping with your votes! We're all so excited!

Vote to give a piano to Parkland High School!

http://www.wxii12.com/sponsors/4925789/detail.html

Please go to this website today through Friday and vote for my high school (Parkland High School) to get the piano. The voting ends on Friday, so there's only a little bit of time left. Our school could really use this type of donation.

It only takes a few seconds and it's free! If you are sure to uncheck the two boxes at the bottom of the form, you'll never be bothered by sales information in your inbox, either. All you're doing is letting the sponsors know you think Parkland High School deserves a piano! And we do!

Oh, and if you want to post on your blog to see if we can get even more votes, that'd be great!

Thank you,

Tamara

Great song!

The Family Routine set to Pachabel's Cannon in D

Mara's Going to Kindergarten Tomorrow!

Prayer for School Children

It's that time of year again ...


O God, our heavenly Father, Who lovest mankind, and art most merciful and compassionate, have mercy upon these your children, Thy servants, for whom we humbly pray Thee, and commend them to Thy gracious protection. Be Thou, O God, their guide and guardian in all their endeavors; lead them in the path of Thy truth, and draw them near to Thee, that they may lead a godly and righteous life in Thy love and fear; doing Thy will in all matters. Bless and strengthen their teachers. And, give them grace that they may be temperate, industrious, diligent, devout and charitable. Defend them against the assaults of the enemy, and grant them wisdom and strength to resist all temptation and corruption of this life; and direct them in the way of salvation, for the merits of Thy Son, our Saviour Jesus Christ, and the intercessions of His Holy Mother, and Thy blessed saints --
and their Guardian Angels!

Amen.

Linked from here.

Many Years!

Happy Name Day to Mara and Happy Birthday to Mom!

May God grant you both many happy years!

The Dormition of our Most Holy Lady the Theotokos and Ever Virgin Mary

August 15

Apolytikion in the First Tone
In birth, you preserved your virginity; in death, you did not abandon the
world, O Theotokos. As mother of life, you departed to the source of life,
delivering our souls from death by your intercessions.
Kontakion in the Second Tone
Neither the grave nor death could contain the Theotokos, the unshakable hope,
ever vigilant in intercession and protection. As Mother of life, He who dwelt
in the ever-virginal womb transposed her to life.

Reading:

Concerning the Dormition of the Theotokos, this is what the Church has received
from ancient times from the tradition of the Fathers. When the time drew nigh
that our Savior was well-pleased to take His Mother to Himself, He declared
unto her through an Angel that three days hence, He would translate her from
this temporal life to eternity and bliss. On hearing this, she went up with
haste to the Mount of Olives, where she prayed continuously. Giving thanks to
God, she returned to her house and prepared whatever was necessary for her
burial. While these things were taking place, clouds caught up the Apostles
from the ends of the earth, where each one happened to be preaching, and
brought them at once to the house of the Mother of God, who informed them of
the cause of their sudden gathering. As a mother, she consoled them in their
affliction as was meet, and then raised her hands to Heaven and prayed for the
peace of the world. She blessed the Apostles, and, reclining upon her bed with
seemliness, gave up her all-holy spirit into the hands of her Son and God.

With reverence and many lights, and chanting burial hymns, the Apostles took up
that God-receiving body and brought it to the sepulchre, while the Angels from
Heaven chanted with them, and sent forth her who is higher than the Cherubim.
But one Jew, moved by malice, audaciously stretched forth his hand upon the bed
and immediately received from divine judgment the wages of his audacity. Those
daring hands were severed by an invisible blow. But when he repented and asked
forgiveness, his hands were restored. When they had reached the place called
Gethsemane, they buried there with honor the all-immaculate body of the
Theotokos, which was the source of Life. But on the third day after the burial,
when they were eating together, and raised up the artos (bread) in Jesus' Name,
as was their custom, the Theotokos appeared in the air, saying "Rejoice" to
them. From this they learned concerning the bodily translation of the Theotokos
into the Heavens.

These things has the Church received from the traditions of the Fathers, who
have composed many hymns out of reverence, to the glory of the Mother of our
God (see Oct. 3 and 4).

Reading courtesy of Holy Transfiguration Monastery
Apolytikion courtesy of Narthex Press
Kontakion courtesy of Narthex Press
Icon courtesy of Theologic Systems

Give it a listen!

Lafe Dutton: Am I Gone

Maybe I'm just biased because he's my first-cousin-once-removed, but I still think it's worth a listen, especially if you like folk music with an acoustic guitar.

You can listen to some samples of songs on his website, but I think singing along to the CD while driving down the road is a much better option.

Better yet, is singing together in my aunt's kitchen, watching my father's expression turn to pure joy and light as he claps to keep time.

Conversation with Mara

Mara: Can we get a bomb?
Us: A bomb? No, I don't think so.
Mara: Oh, I really wanted a bomb!
Us: What are you going to do with a bomb? What do you need to blow up?
Mara: The bad guys.
Us: Oh, no, Mara. You can't take care of the bad guys all by yourself. That's why we have police. We have to let them do their job.
Mara (Crying)
Us: Why are you crying? We're not mad at you.
Mara: I just wanted to help!
Us: It's good you want to help. Maybe one day, you can be a police officer and help. Until then, we just need to let the police know if we see any bad guys.
Mara: But what if there's some bad guy or monster that so big, even the police can't stop him.
Us: Mara, if a bad guy is too big for the police, can you stop him by yourself? The best thing is to help the police by telling them if we see any bad guys.
Mara: Okay.

****

All this, after an afternoon of watching Batfink reruns on Boomerang.

Family Portraits

Family Portraits

The new New House

This is the second new house we've almost bought in a month! The house I posted pictures of earlier (see below) wound up needing too much work. This house is more move-in ready, a tad bigger, and less money. It also has a nice flat, wooded yard, with a climber and slide already there.

Move in day is two weeks away. I'm so excited!

Mara playing in her new yard

Craig Ferguson on Alcoholism: Must Watch!

Thanks to Emily for the link.

Treehouse

This is the tree house my cousins built for their kids/nieces/nephews. It boasts three levels, the top of which is a loft, which you can see best in the second and third pictures below. There's also a rock wall on the back. The windows bring in plenty of light, and there's enough room up there to imagine the space into anything a kid could think of. I know I like it, so now I just have to figure out how to get one built in our new yard. We're not very handy--Cade and I!

From left to right--Kelly, Mara, Katie, Emma, Nate. This is from our trip to VT last summer, stopping on the way home to visit my cousins in CT. My cousin has really great kids, and all of the girls had a wonderful time playing together. Kelly read to the girls, and the littles blew bubbles together. Nate helped them climb and pushed the swings. Mara just enjoyed the chance to run wild in the big yard without being told to be careful and watch out for something breakable!

This is the house we like!

A view from the living room, through the dining room, into the kitchen, and out the door to the deck.







A view from the balcony, looking down over the living room. From here, you can really see the architechtural detail of the roofline, the arched window detail, and a glimpse of the fireplace below.









This is the window in the half bath/powder room.



I just love all the interesting details in this house!

This is the front yard, to the side of the front bridge. You can see the driveway, and the walk up to the bridge. The house is on the corner of two cul-de-sacs, so the front of the house faces a different street than the entrance to the driveway.





A view of the same yard from the front porch/bridge. You can see the streets better from this view.




This is the back yard, fenced area. The fenced portion is just a tiny bit of the half acre lot. It's mostly wooded, so the current owner says she's had a hard time growing grass. We'll have to see if we can do any better.

The bridge from the front door to the front street.





The bridge in the back yard, over the creek. This view is from the back deck, and really looks over the neighbor's back yard, as well. Apparantly, the bridge is on the border between the two properties.




This is the side yard, in front of the garage. If you walked to the back of the picture, you'd head down the bank towards the creek and bridge. The fence is visible in the back, as well.

Front view of the house. Note the pretty arched window, the little front porch, and the bridge walkway to the front door.



The side view of the house from the drive way.


The back view of the house, from the other side of the creek. You can see the fenced in yard and the deck. The window above the deck steps is the master bedroom. The roofline is the line of the vaulted ceilings in the master.

Mara's growing up!

Can you tell what's new? (Hint: The blue lips are from candy, but that's not it!)