Am I doing it wrong?

I went to Adoration yesterday morning at church.  I felt I needed to go and sit with God for a bit to see what he had to say to me on some things I've been struggling with.  I was pretty excited to go. I hadn't been in a while and the timing yesterday worked out perfectly with some errands I needed to run.   

Other Catholics that I follow on social media go to Adoration and come back "refreshed", "invigorated", "full of the Spirit" and excited because "they heard God speak to them" and "give them direction" or they just felt so "full of peace" that they just knew everything was going to be okay.

I wanted (needed!) some of that so off to Adoration I went!

And I sat there.  And I prayed.  And I sat there some more.  And I prayed some more.  And I tried to quiet all the voices in my mind.  And I waited for God to speak. And I prayed more. And I waited. I waited for direction, for peace, for refreshment, for answers.
 
And none of that came. 

So I left Adoration feeling as if perhaps I didn't "do it right".  I tried not to feel dejected but I wanted to come out of Adoration the way all the other people on Instagram do - so full of Jesus that they want to shout it from the mountain tops or at least from their Insta-stories.


I felt discouraged for the rest of the day. 

I  completed my errands, the kids came home from school, there was swim practice, dinner, and then it was time for bed.

I had just fallen asleep when one of the kids (who shall remain nameless) woke me up to tell me that a project they had been working on and that was due this morning had been deleted while they were trying to convert the file to .PDF.  The file with hours worth of work was on the computer but was empty.  Blank.

I was annoyed and frustrated but remained calm.  I didn't lecture about waiting until the last minute but I started silently praying that the file could be recovered.

Dan and I got to work trying to help but after about 40 minutes of doing everything we could think of, we gave up.  The file couldn't be recovered. I advised the kid to start over.

Coffee was made, more silent prayers were prayed, and Dan and I went to bed while the kid in question got to work.

The project got finished.  

This morning as I was reflecting on yesterday, I realized the following:  I was able to react calmly to an annoying and stressful situation, I was able to give an undeserving child some measure of grace, and I was able to get a decent night's sleep without too much worry about the outcome of the project after having left it in God's hands.

I like to think that this was in part (or all) because I went to Adoration yesterday. I didn't get what I thought I was going to get but perhaps I got exactly what I needed. 

Maybe I was doing it right after all.  And maybe I need to go back next Thursday.  ;)

Just another weekend dump...

Thanks to Monday being a holiday, I will spend the rest of this week wondering what day it is.  

The kids were out of school on Friday and Dan returned home from Ireland Friday night.  The boys did yard work on Saturday while I did house work and made a blueberry pie.  And Sarah started her in-car driving!  Here's a picture I took of her driving out of our driveway:

She had a two hour session on Saturday, Sunday, and Monday and is now officially done with Driver's Ed.  Her birthday is June 4th and she can go anytime on that day or after to test for her permit! 

On Monday we had a cookout with my brother and mom and Jennifer's family.  I took zero pictures but we had a great time! 

Dan grilled burgers, my mom made twice baked potatoes, and I made a creamy cucumber salad, a fresh corn and tomato salad and Paula Deen's banana pudding recipe. (If you like banana pudding then you will love her recipe! I always make it in a trifle bowl so it looks mo' fancy.) I also made a baked pimento cheese dip that was delicious.  I will be making that one again.

And yesterday was Monday/Tuesday which meant grocery shopping and swim team practice has started.  And today is Tuesday/Wednesday and I had a doctor's appointment and Sarah has an orthodontist appointment and more swim practice and I guess tomorrow will be Wednesday/Thursday and where is this week going??

I finally abandoned my old neurologist, Dr. Jeffrey.  A couple of years ago he moved from the Winston-Salem area to Lake Norman to semi-retire and I had been faithfully driving over an hour each way twice a year for my appointment.  I finally got tired of that and asked him for a recommendation here and today was my appointment with the MS specialist he recommended.  I really like her and I'm wondering why I didn't do this sooner. 

And now you are all caught up with my life.  Maybe one of these days I will write a post with some substance and not bore you all with my "what we did this weekend" dumps. 

Or maybe not.  I used to write about the kids all the time and now every time I even take a picture they scream "you're not putting that on your blog are you?"     If I wrote about them in detail on here and they found out they would kill me.

Have a great Tuesday/Wednesday!

Rest In Peace, Wally.

Wally is no longer with us.  We found him yesterday and believe that he was hit by a car.  We are all so very sad and will miss him greatly. He truly was one of a kind.

This was the first picture I took of Wally shortly after he showed up at our house.

Another weekend in the books.

We are just cruising right along here.  May is usually very crazy for everyone with school-aged kids but this year, our May has been manageable.  Dare I say almost calm?  I guess it's because no one is receiving first communion or being confirmed or graduating to a different school..  It's pretty much been business as usual around here this May and I'm okay with that!

On Friday evening we attended Fine Arts Day at school.  It's a day long event but parents come in the evening to listen to see what all of the art and music students have been up to all year. 

There was a food truck so we grabbed dinner and brought our chairs and watched the performances in the courtyard. The weather was perfect and we had a lovely evening.

Peter's intermediate guitar ensemble performed several Queen songs and I managed to get this one recorded!

Saturday was yard mowing and house cleaning and cake making for Sunday dessert.  On Saturday evening we went shopping for football cleats for Peter and then went out to dinner. 

Sunday was Mass and lunch at mom's where we celebrated my Uncle's 84th birthday.  I made a chocolate chip cookie cake that had cream cheese frosting between the layers and was covered in a chocolate ganache.  It was so good!

It looks like a hot mess on the inside but it was sooooooo good!  This is the recipe I used. (The only this I did differently from the recipe was to double the ganache and pour it over the entire cake so it looked like it was frosted. )

And now we are already at Tuesday.  Dan is currently in Ireland.  The kids are out of school this Friday and next Monday.  It is always at this point in the year that I wish Christmas and Easter breaks were a little shorter and that we started a little earlier in August so that we could be done this week and not have to go back after Memorial Day. 

Now you are caught up!