Birds of a Feather

From left: Kim, Catalina, Briana, Amber, Alice, Misty and Pam

They say, "Birds of a feather flock together" and "Tell me who your friends are and I'll tell you who you are".  I hope that's true because, as a homeschooling mom, I hang out with some amazing ladies.  We get our kids together weekly for field trips and other group activities and one night a month, we leave the kids at home and meet for Mom's Night Out.  My friend Misty and I recently took over the responsibility of organizing MNO--she does the food part and I play Julie the Cruise Director and plan our activities.  Last night, we met at Las Palomas, a Mexican Restaurant close enough to the church for us to say a rosary together first and then move on to dinner.

We all brought our favorite quote to share.  The assignment was to put it on something to send home with another mom.  We also started something new that we will be doing at all of our meetings from now on--sharing an "Ah-hah" moment or, a moment when we could see a bit of the fruit of our labor with our kids.  My hope is that we will all start to look for these moments throughout the month and find them more often than we might think.  I plan to write mine in a notebook and read them whenever I ask myself, "why am I doing this again?" (I can tell it's time for summer vacation because that question seems to be coming up almost daily!)  

As she was leaving last night, one of the moms commented on how much this group and the positive, encouraging time together is changing her life.  I know that she and the other ladies cheer me on and make me a better homeschooler, a better mother and a better person.  What more could I ask of my friends?

Favorite Quotes of SAMS Moms

From scripture:

Kim W:  Kim made her own bath salt and attached this quote to it.  "Come to me all you that labor and are heavy burdened and I will refresh you."  Matthew 11:28

Pam M:  This quote is a Miller family motto.  They remind each other of it often and Pam told us that when her kids get up on the block at a swim meet, they strike a muscle pose to show they're thinking of it.  I love this idea and may borrow it.  If so, it will be the second great idea I credit to Pam and family.  Thank you!  

I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.  Philippians 4:13

How can there be too many children?

That is like saying there are too many flowers. (MT)

Briana M:  We can do no great things, only small things with great love.  Mother Teresa

Catalina G:  Found written on the wall in Mother Teresa's home for children in Calcutta:

People are often unreasonable, irrational, and self-centered.  

Forgive them anyway.

If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives.  

Be kind anyway.

If you are successful, you will win some unfaithful friends and some genuine enemies.  

Succeed anyway.

What you spend years creating, others could destroy overnight.  

Create anyway.

If you find serenity and happiness, some may be jealous.  

Be happy anyway.

The good you do today will often be forgotten.  

Do good anyway.

Give the best you have and it will never be enough.  

Give your best anyway.

In the final analysis, it is between you and God.  

It was never between you and them anyway.

Mother Teresa

You are Peter and upon this rock I will build my church and 

the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.  MATT 16:18

Misty C:

It is when we attempt to avoid suffering by withdrawing from anything that might involve hurt, when we try to spare ourselves the effort and pain of pursuing truth, love and goodness, that we drift into a life of emptiness, in which there may be almost no pain, but the dark sensation of meaninglessness and abandonment is all the greater.  Pope Benedict XVI 

Someone I look forward to meeting in heaven.

Imagine it--story time with C.S. Lewis!

Jade:  (Jade couldn't join us for dinner but met up with us in the rosary garden for prayer time and brought copies of this terrific quote):  If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world.  C.S. Lewis

And finally, for the poetry lover: 

Amber M:  On the world-altering importance of motherhood.  "Blessings on the hand of women! They say that man is mighty, He governs land and sea, He wields a mighty scepter, O'er lesser powers that be, but mightier power and stronger, Man from his throne has hurled, for the hand that rocks the cradle is the hand that rules the world" (from What Rules the World  William Ross Wallace 1865).

Alice D:  Two lines from a sonnet that hung over the stage in the gym of St. Mary's Academy, my high school.  It has been my personal motto for a long time and is now one of the mottos of The Doyle Homeschool:  "Thou, my mind, aspire to higher things!  Grow rich in that which never taketh rust." (from Splendidis Longum Valedico Nugis Sir Philip Sydney 1554-1586)