7 Quick Takes

  

--- 1 ---
So it turns out that three kids is really the tipping point for everything--groceries, laundry, family finances, general chaos and disorder, the whole works.  Before Birdie was born, I did laundry once a week, a dark and light load, with an occasional extra load for towels or sheets.  Now I am doing laundry about every other day!  
And I now believe in the Sock Monster.  I didn't believe in him before now, but he most certainly exists in my basement, I'm sure of it.  I never understood why people had such trouble keeping track of socks--how hard can it be to take laundry from the basket to the washer, and back up again to fold and put away?  Turns out, it is plenty hard!  I suddenly have two little boys who take off their socks where ever they happen to get hot feet and leave them there, my husband aims for the laundry basket with his socks and frequently misses, so socks end up under the bin, well, you get the idea.  My socks tend to stay together.  Every several days, I have 4 AWOL socks from Piglet's sock bin.  They usually turn up in the next load or two, but right now I've got a green-and-gray-striped sock that has been AWOL for a few weeks.  
Come home, sock!  We need you!
--- 2 ---
I met the reason why parking in the city is such a pain.  I pulled into a spot at the end of a block, but was hanging over the line just a bit.  The car in front of me had also just pulled in, so I poked my head out to ask the gentleman if he could move his car up about 6 inches or so. (He had at least half a car's length in front of his car).  He told me that if he did that, he wouldn't be able to get out, and I should just park my car right up against his.  I barely fit doing that.  But I have to say, if you need half a spot to get out of a parallel parking place, YOU SHOULDN'T BE DRIVING IN THE CITY!
--- 3 ---
 Have you seen Once Upon a Time?  So.Good.  I watched it on abc.com on Monday afternoon, and I think this may be my new go-to show!  I've gotten sick of all the other shows I used to keep up with on the internet, so I'm due for a new one.  I'm curious to see how the show is going to arc, because it seems to me that it doesn't have enough fuel in the story for a typical series.  Has more of a mini series feel, because you know the whole thing has to resolve itself at some point given the source material.  But.  An intriguing start, nonetheless.
--- 4 ---
I'm still struggling to keep my head above water with the chaos of three.  I read several mommy blogs, and in one of the comments this week, someone wrote that the day can be considered a success if you don't see BLOOD or FLAMES.  Ha!
--- 5 ---
Postpartum fashion drama continues.  I carried very differently this pregnancy, so the weight is sitting differently on me postpartum, and I'm having trouble adjusting to my new shape.  I keep thinking that I'm going to find the perfect garment that will make me feel like a million bucks, and I can wear it every day, but alas, I've only found a few accessories here and there that are great, but get puked on regularly, so the whole price-per-wear thing is really not that great for me.  Although I did recently purchase this great top from Kohl's, and with a navy cardigan and this great navy floral scarf I got at Target, I do feel pretty put together.  I paired it with the grey cargo skirt I wrote about several weeks ago.  It really is the Best. Cargo. Skirt. Ever.

--- 6 ---

I saw this on Facebook and had to laugh. Because it is so true.

--- 7 ---

Birdie turned 2 months this week, and I've been working on her baby book with My Digital Studio (since I can do that while nursing).  



For more Quick Takes, visit Conversion Diary!

7 Quick Takes Friday

*Anyone here for card candy, it is under #7.

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We have an old family recipe from my great-aunt Fannie (yes, that really was her name) called Hamburger Pie. The recipe card my mom wrote out lists the cost of the dish as $5, but I think that was in the 1970s, whereas my great-aunt probably came up with some version of it during the Depression when she was newly wed). My family really likes this dish, but I've been tweaking it for some years as I'm now allergic to one of the ingredients (green beans) and the foundation is difficult to locate in the city (crescent roll dough). I think I've finally hit upon the Platonic ideal of this dish. I made it for my parents when they were here last weekend and it was quite a hit! My recipe is as follows:

1# ground beef

1 onion, diced

1 green pepper, diced

8 oz. tomato sauce

8 oz. sweet potato baby food (I used two 4 oz jars)

2 tsp. garlic powder

1.5 tsp. salt

1 large handful shredded carrots (matchstick style)

1 package puff pastry, thawed (Pepperidge Farm is good for this)

about 12 oz shredded cheddar cheese (I used a montery jack/colby/cheddar mix)

2 eggs, slightly beaten

parchment paper (do not use wax paper!)

Preheat oven to 400. Brown ground beef, onion and green pepper in a skillet. Add carrots and saute until slightly limp. Add tomato sauce, sweet potatoes, garlic and salt, stir until well mixed. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper and unfold puff pastries. Brush both with beaten egg, and spread about half the cheese over the pastry, leaving about 1/2" around the edges. Divide hamburger mixture in half and spread on top of each pastry, and roll up the edges of the pastry slightly. Top with remaining cheese and bake for about 30-40 minutes or until pastry is puffed and nicely browned. Blot excess oil around edge of pie before serving. This dish is better if it sits for 10-15 minutes before serving, but can be eaten directly from the oven as well.

--- 2 ---

Our Birdie is newly baptized and illumined. We had a lovely baptism last Saturday, with about 40 friends and family in attendance. The weather was beautiful, turnout was good, and it was a great day. I was hoping the exorcisms would help to cure her colic, but alas, we had several tough days this week. 

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Tuesday was one of those tough days. My parents went home in the early afternoon, and Birdie screamed from noon until midnight. Without stopping except while nursing. It was not a good day. I called the pediatrician around 8:30 p.m., and we decided to change her reflux medication to Prilosec from Zantac, which clearly wasn't working. We got the new medicine on Wednesday evening, and things seem to be settling down a bit now. 

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I just discovered a way cool band: Straight No Chaser. I love acapella groups (including the wonderful Christian group called Acapella), and these guys are good! (And from Cherry Hill, NJ, which is practically in our back yard!)

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BOO IS WALKING!! Of course, he started doing it right after he qualified for physical therapy, but at least he's getting there! He's still unsteady enough that I can't just let him walk to the bus stop with me yet, but I'm hoping that in the next 6 weeks he'll get good enough that we can perhaps dispense with the stroller for preschool pick up in the afternoons.

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I'm happy to report that Piglet passed his food challenge on eggs on Thursday. I'm tolerating eggs pretty well again, so I'm so excited about this development! Meal planning just got a lot easier--egg night here we come! Bring on the frittatas!

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Our dear friend Patrick is getting married this weekend in Oregon, and while we couldn't all make it, given the age of our children and a cross-country flight, my husband is flying out tomorrow morning for the wedding on Sunday. He even managed to get a speaking gig in Portland on Monday morning so his plane ticket and part of his hotel is paid for! I made this card for Patrick and his bride. It is based on another card  I saw earlier this year. I modified it a bit and added a few extra details, but the basic idea is from Patti MacLeith.

Supplies: Very Vanilla cs, Framed Tulips, Perfect Polka Dots EF, Vanilla Rosettes, Pearls, Teeny Tiny Wishes stamp set, Cherry Cobbler Ink, dimensionals, square punch (to make flag edges)

For more Quick Takes, visit Conversion Diary!

Quick Takes Friday

  
*Stamping project under #7 if you are just here for the creative mojo. 
--- 1 ---
 Seven weeks postpartum and my wedding ring fits again!  This is the the soonest it has fit of all my babes.  (I actually have a cheapie wedding ring that is a size bigger that I wear while pregnant/postpartum; it is nice to get my own back on after all this time!)
--- 2 ---
In an attempt to keep Boo occupied the other day while I was doing something in the kitchen, I gave him a tupperware bowl with some dry kidney beans and a spoon, thinking he might do some his usual "fill and spill" action.  Nope.  The kid ate them.  I'm still waiting for the diaper fall out.
--- 3 ---
Miss Birdie is getting baptized/christmated tomorrow, so the parental units are descending this afternoon.  So. Excited.  They are staying the whole weekend plus Monday and part of Tuesday as well.  Yippie for grandparents!!
--- 4 ---

I pulled my 35mm Nikon N-64 out of the closet this week and have had so much fun taking pictures of the kids and experimenting with settings.  I've not developed the rolls yet, so maybe everything will be a blurry disaster, but it is a good camera, and I only stopped using it because it is bulky and hard to tote around.  (Plus the whole film developing thing was getting tricky)
--- 5 ---

Target.com is driving me crazy. I ordered something from the site, and it didn't work, so I wanted to send it back by prepaid postage since we don't drive much in the city and the nearest Target isn't, well, near, and it is hard to get out with the two littles right now. So I follow all the prompts, and get to the label, and the image doesn't work for printing. I call Target, spend 30 minutes on hold (what is up with that?), only to be told I really should just return it to the store. When I explain that I don't drive much and it would be a burden to me, she puts me on hold for the "second tier customer service," where I wait on hold another 20 minutes before giving up. This must be the corporate strategy--tell people they can return online items for free, and then make it impossible to do so, forcing them to do what you wanted in the first place, which is, return to the store, using up valuable oil/gas resources. Brilliant. I think I'll be shopping online elsewhere in the future. (But not really; sometimes you just can't beat Target's prices/selection, especially on kid's clothing)

--- 6 ---
  We all got flu shots this week (except Birdie, who is too little), and against my better judgement, I got one too.  And got the flu, just like I always do when I get the shot.  That turned into a breast infection.  Yay for flu shots.
--- 7 ---
My son's namesday was on Tuesday.  He was super excited about it, so to celebrate, I made from-scratch brownies for his preschool class, only to be told they will only serve commercially prepared prepackaged items.  Gah.  But I did make him a really cool gift!  I had this in mind the moment I saw the I Dig You! stamp set in the big catalog and just now got around to making it.    

A magnet digger puzzle! Cool, eh? Just the thing for a construction-vehicle obsessed 3 year old. I stamped the images on Whisper White, added the brads, and then adhered to one of our magnet sheets. I used paper snips to cut everything out, and then sanded the edges a bit to make them look better. If I do this again, I think I might use an exacto knife to cut out because the edges weren't quite as clean as I'd wanted. But he's three, and doesn't notice that sort of thing.

For more Quick Takes, visit Conversion Diary!

The Lure of the Gothic Heroine, Part Three

The summer that I discovered Twilight, the continual existential crisis that forms the heart of post-modern motherhood hit a peak. I struggled mightily to find myself as anything more than H’s mama, and I fought against the general drudgery of the housework that was supposed to make up my days. I had worked for ten years before my marriage, and once married, everything screeched to a halt for me as we picked up and moved four times in the first two years for my husband’s career and interests. I had defined myself by what I did for so long that without a job or academic career, I no longer knew who I was. We had moved to Philly when I was pregnant with H, so almost all my friends were from the mommy mafia. I craved creative outlets, but also wanted to find contentment at home, a goal that seemed so elusive as to be fantastical to me. Perhaps my existential crisis sounds odd to those who know me well, as I am not exactly an ardent feminist. Nonetheless, that crisis has haunted me through my years of mothering and I’m still trying to find my way through it.

I identify with Bella as a Gothic heroine, being a person who eschewed many of the ideals of the feminist movement and yet found myself feeling lost amidst those around me who went back to work and didn’t have time to cultivate a domestic life. I felt out of step with all the women who wore trousers every day and never engaged in religious ritual, be it fasting or simply attending a church or synagogue service. There were a handful of us that stayed home, but we were scattered all over the city, and had a great diversity of personality, interests, and available time, and so it became harder and harder to maintain those relationships. Four years on, I have basically lost touch with all but two or three of that original group of 20 or so women who were so important to me in the early days of mothering. When H was about a year old, I started my stamping business and did the crafting thing, which helped to give me some sense of purpose, but I still felt like there was something off-kilter about my life. I never seemed to be able to get a handle on the chaos of my days, even as H settled down into a more predictable schedule.

Shortly after finishing the Twilight series and getting somewhat caught up in the Twilight mania that seemed to grip everyone that year, I rebelled against my frumpy fashion years and started dressing “young”, wearing jeans and more form-fitting shirts/dresses, cut my hair into trendy layers (but kept the length for the sake of my marriage) and worked hard on my physical appearance. On some level I thought that if the outer shell was pleasing, I would be content. Not surprisingly, my attention to the externals wasn’t enough to satisfy the deeper (and until recently unidentified) sense that something was very wrong with me and my perspective on life.

I sometimes read a mommy blogger who writes about her domestic life and she is domestic with a capital D. She is everything I aspired to be at the beginning of my marriage—makes everything from scratch, washes her baby’s cloth diapers, cleans her entire house every day and takes joy in it, and has found motherhood to be a complete panacea of contentment and bliss. I, on the other hand, found motherhood and housewifery to be one of the first five circles of hell, with horrible nursing experiences, a cranky/fussy baby that didn’t sleep for the first year, and the inability to get the rest of it under control. I could feel my brain atrophying with every diaper change. I just couldn’t find myself in the role of housewife and mother. Her ruminations rubbed me raw and I couldn’t figure out how she managed her sanguinity. What changed things for me was the beginning of my meal planning journey, and from there, a number of household tasks fell into place. I felt a sense of purpose and rootedness that I hadn’t felt for a long time. This may not seem to fit with Gothic heroism, but I think part of Bella’s development as a character is that she finds her place and her purpose within the family structure of the Cullens and is content. Finding some sense of purpose in my life as a homemaker and wife by organizing it all into daily tasks has given me some measure of content for the present. The incredible wanderlust and urge toward change that has characterized much of my early adulthood has been tempered by this contentment. I’m still eager to visit new lands and try new things, but I’m happier to come home again at the end of it.

I will admit that the addition of two children in two years has disrupted sense of order, and right now I’m just trying to stay ahead of the meals and the laundry, and doing blitz cleaning as needed, but I hope that as I settle into life with three little ones, I will find a better rhythm again. I miss my academic life sometimes, but I miss it in the way that one misses being single—it was a different time and place and quite incompatible with the life I’m living now. I still struggle against a certain amount of slothfulness, and fight a continual battle against the basically selfish desire to have a whole day to myself to be creative or start work on a new novel, and I suspect that these will always be stumbling blocks for me, but I do know that the terrible restlessness that plagued me that summer has gone, if not replaced with total peace, at least some small measure of it.

I’ve come to two great conclusions in thinking through these points. The first is that my longing for pre-modern society is in fact a longing for place and purpose as much as anything else. The second is that modern technology and the capitalist urge that accompanies much of it are useful in their ways, but not a substitute for connectedness in community. I’ve always been tempted by people who live off the grid and other extreme types of life styles, as it seemed to me that there was a kind of simplicity and happiness in those choices. I’ve recently begun to think that eschewing technology or post-modern society simply for the sake of itself is not the road to happiness. It is more about ordering one’s life in a way that gives purpose.

That still leaves me with the quandary of having to exist in a post-secular, post-modern world and find meaning and purpose in it, while raising my children to walk the path of salvation and keeping to the journey of the straight and narrow myself. I’m still pondering that one, but I’m finding that there are little moments that remind me of the journey and help keep my mind focused and prayerful. Oddly, since I’ve found my way into this new place, I’ve identified less with the pop culture phenomenon that Twilight has become, even though I still very much enjoy the stories and movies. The angst and general unhappiness that accompanied my first readings of them has left me and now I’m left only with a (slightly) guilty pleasure, with none of the excess weight.

Quick Takes Friday

For those who are here for a card, it is at the bottom under #7.

--- 1 ---

Steve Jobs is dead. I'm pretty sure everyone and their dog knows this by now, but I have to say I'm saddened by his loss. I'm not a particular Apple aficionado, and arrived very late to the whole iPod phenom, but the loss of someone so intelligent, creative, and innovative is a blow for everyone. He improved on all the things we never knew we needed and then made them an indispensable part of daily life. Or in the words of one FB poster, he took tools and gave us toys. Thank you, Steve, and rest in peace.

--- 2 ---

Sleep continues to elude us around here as Boo's waking habits at night have grown worse instead of better. In other news, his lower right molar erupted earlier this week, and none of the other four show signs of being even close, so I'm hoping this is part of the whole "it gets worse before it gets better" deal. Right now I think we are averaging 2-3 hours of decent sleep per night.

--- 3 ---

I think anyone who has read this blog for any amount of time knows my feelings for the Twilight series. I'm excited and happy to report that I bought my ticket for Breaking Dawn, Part I! I actually found a mid-morning showing at a theater in Cherry Hill so I can see it when I have a babysitter available. Send me an engraved invitation, Alice! I'm coming to see you!

--- 4 ---

Speaking of Twilight, I just posted the second of a three part series on Twilight and post modern motherhood over at my other blog. You can read the first two parts HERE and HERE.

--- 5 ---

I'm drowning in a sea of pink baby clothes. Seriously. Birdie is our first girl, and I guess there are a lot of people out there who like to dress up their little girls. A friend came to see me on Wednesday and brought a gigantic bag of second-hand baby clothes from a variety of people who have had girls in the last few years. It is a nice boon, as I've had all boys up to now, and we want our little girl to dress like a little girl! I will say it is kind of fun to dress up a girl, especially since she is too little to have any opinions about clothing yet.

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When we lived in Chicago, Peapod grocery delivery service was all the rage. We didn't try it then because it seemed unnecessary, especially since we didn't yet have children to hamper our grocery shopping trips, but with the arrival of Birdie, and Boo still not walking, I've found it increasingly difficult to get the grocery shopping done (as well as basic neighborhood errands). It is such an ordeal to get out of the house with two non-walkers that I've been limiting my trips to preschool pick up in the afternoon and the odd corner store run while my babysitter is here. (I wrote about grcoery shopping in the city HERE).

Imagine my delight when I spotted the big green Peapod truck in our neighborhood the other day! There was a promotional code to get $15 off the first order, and I can get 60 days free delivery just to try them out. So we decided to take the plunge and see how it worked for us. My first delivery arrived today, and I gotta say, I kinda like it! My grocery bill was lower than it would have been at Whole Paycheck, oops, Whole Foods, and I didn't have to worry about how much of my load was liquid because I didn't have to walk it home! So I ordered 12 two liter bottles of seltzer with impunity!! And a gallon of milk. What a wonderful service! Now I can do my big cooking day tomorrow and not be worn out before I begin from the process of getting the food from store to home.

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And the card candy for today. Today's card is one I CASEd (Copy and Share Everything) a while back from Nance Leedy--I love the little scalloped ruffle on the bottom edge. You can see the dimension better on the second picture. I know this stamp set is retired, but I just love it!

Supplies:

Blushing Bride dp and cs, Early Espresso, Baja Breeze cs, Easter Wishes & Sincere Salutations stamp sets, Early Espresso ink, Baja Breeze seam binding, scallop border punch, sticky strip, bone folder (for distressing and ruffling), pearls

For more Quick Takes, visit Conversion Diary!

Post-Modern/Post Secular Motherhood, Part Two

Lori’s article suggested to me that the difficulties of modern motherhood are of a more generalized post-secular nature than I had previously considered. What strikes me most about our post-modern, post-secular society is the isolation of it. We live in little bubbles, even within our households sometimes, and it can be difficult to make real human connections. The satisfaction of needs, which is defined as the sufficiency of the self within the home, has been superseded by the satisfaction of wants, which are driven largely by impersonal market forces and have nothing to do with the home or the family. The Internet, with its chat groups, Facebook, e-mail and the like, while a reasonable facsimile and useful in its way, is no substitute for real community. This is the appeal of the Twilight series, as Lori rightly notes—people are looking for connectedness and the Cullen family represents an idealized (and largely unattainable) form of post-modern utopia.

What originally got me thinking about the problems of post-modernity was the HBO series Rome, which I swallowed almost whole during the month of January 2010 (the entire 2 seasons worth!). The series isn’t really supposed to be a statement about modern society or even a self-conscious contrast between our society and ancient Rome, but at the same time, I found myself drawing comparisons from the little details that snuck into the corners of the series. (For context, the series centers around two centurions beginning at the end of the Gallic wars and Julius Caesar’s route of Pompey. The two centurions are based on actual people, the only two regular soldiers mentioned in Caesar’s book about the wars and the time after. The series obviously takes some liberties with facts, but the context seems to be painstakingly researched and there is much about it that could have happened). What struck me most was the small ways in which women in particular lived their lives in a small domestic community within their households. There were always lots of women around (slaves, servants, other female members of the household) to share the physical load of the work but also to share the load of the mental burden of household drudgery. In our modern context (I suppose post-modern would be more accurate) this is rare indeed—those of us who do stay home do all the housework and childcare alone, with no female company. What I longed for (and long for still) is a community in which we live interconnected with one another in a way that our modern society makes impossible. One must give up self-sufficiency and independence, and put up with constant interference in one’s affairs, but that is part of pre-modern life. Lori points out that Bella’s Gothic heroism is in embracing precisely this sort of messy human connection within the vampire Cullen family. A connection that, again, as Lori points out, is lifted to the realm of the ridiculous and fantasy by the very fact of the Cullens’ supernatural status.

The other thing which makes the dream of pre-modern community living just a dream is the fractured nature of modern life—there is no shared culture of beliefs and no shared understanding of How Things Are Done. This lack of culture/shared understanding is critical to why communes generally fail and why small religious groups living together tend to implode given time. It is difficult for post-modern people to give up their self-sufficiency and submit to hierarchy and authority. Carlisle Cullen is clearly the voice of authority in the Cullen family, and while the others are free to make choices against his wishes, there is also the desire to keep the family intact, so for the most part, Carlisle’s decisions stand.

Additionally, there is a great reluctance on the part of post-modern society to label anything “Other.” In order to achieve community in a meaningful way, in which cultural traditions and rites are shared and passed down, How Things Are Done is a shared idea, and in which people give up autonomy for interdependence, one must at some point pick labels like “Us” and “Them” in order to define that which is outside the community. Without this critical distinction, which is difficult for the modern liberal brain to comprehend, there are no boundaries, nothing is forbidden, everything is permitted, and there is nothing cohesive about any of it. I do my thing, you do yours, and we’ll talk, but we can’t connect in a meaningful way. I find this to be true of many of my friends in the mommysphere—I am connected to them by virtue of the fact that we are moms with kids about the same age, but in so many cases, these women, whom I like very well as people, have nothing in common with me and so, beyond our children, we don’t have a lot to say to one another. The lack of genuine connection and shared culture/home life can be quite isolating. The shared culture of vampirism, with its rules and regulations, combined with Carlisle’s insistence on vegetarianism for his family, creates useful boundaries. The Cullens are able to define themselves against the Other—other “normal” vampires, shape shifters, etc.—but are also able to have meaningful relationships across those same lines. In a way, this is also the Twilight utopian vision: the Cullens can have their cake and eat it too, for they are able to exist in the human sphere, rather than lurking on the fringes in isolation, but also can peacefully coexist with other vampires of their society. They are able to live in a connected way to one another in their daily lives, free at home, while constrained in public (I think of the scene in the movie where Edward takes Bella home for the first time and he says to her, “This is the only place we can be free to be ourselves.” Home is the center of that utopian vision.

END PART TWO

On Twilight, Post-Modern motherhood, and the Lure of the Gothic Heroine, Part One

I have long contemplated an essay on the difficulties of modern motherhood. While this is the first of three parts, I will state up front that this is far from my final word on the subject, and that this essay grew out of my written response to a scholarly article written by a good friend, Dr. Lori Branch of the University of Iowa. The article is entitled “Carlisle’s Cross: Locating the Post Secular Gothic,” and you can find Dr. Branch’s article published as part of The Twilight Mystique: Critical Essays on the Novels and Films. The book was released last year and you can purchase a copy of it HERE. The central points of the article are that Bella is part of the larger tradition of Gothic heroines (and why she fits there), and also that Carlisle Cullen represents a pre-modern utopia that is both appealing and fantastical to the post modern mind.

Two summers ago, I found myself in the middle of a life crisis. I turned 30 that summer, and so can hardly call it a “midlife” crisis, but it rather felt that way. Everything about my life seemed out of whack to me. At the time, we were in a parish that was spiritually unhealthy for our family, and my religious isolation was fairly intense. I was not spiritually isolated (for one cannot truly be isolated from God), but I didn’t feel surrounded by a community of like-minded believers who would support me in the Faith. It was exceedingly difficult to remember why I had to make the often hard decisions to live differently from the world and to remember the higher purpose of my life (the journey of salvation). About that time, I stumbled upon the Twilight book series. I am a fast reader normally, but I raced through them in record time. I felt lost and mourned for the years of my youth. Even though I didn’t consciously want to be 17 again (I didn’t like being 17 when I was!), I felt I had missed something crucial in those years. The books seemed to address something inside me that cried out for a voice. I couldn’t quite articulate all the aspects of my unease until I read Lori’s article.

While I didn’t identify the Twilight series as addressing religious isolation, Lori’s article makes clear that it is a primary theme of the book, and I couldn’t agree more. I find myself living in Caputo’s post-secular religious hope—someday our parish situation will improve, perhaps I will discover some forgotten corner of the city that holds a community of like-minded people, perhaps I will be able to shed the darkness that surrounds me and shine forth light, etc.—and the Twilight series made me ache for all that is impossible, both religiously (although not spiritually, and I think most of you will know the difference) and culturally. The books present a kind of stylized religion, in which difficult things are asked of its followers (vegetarian vampirism, restraint, conscious consumerism—at least to a point), but these things are quite surmountable within the family community that Carlisle Cullen has created. You might even say that Carlisle has created religion within his family unit, for they have mysteries (such as confession of “sins”—Jasper’s struggles with vegetarianism for example), they have rituals, they have faith, and they seek salvation. Their faith is admittedly a faith in the power of their love bonds, but it is faith of a sort, nonetheless. At the same time, this religion has already transformed them by the very fact they are vampires—in much the way that we hope for transfiguration along our path of salvation, by denying the passions to become more like Christ and to enter into his saving Resurrection, and becoming a new creature, Meyers’ vampires are made new with their perfect bodies, sparkly skin and enhanced senses.

END PART ONE

PPA Color Challenge 114

Quick post today; I have nothing interesting to report, and afternoons are the beginning of Birdie's 12 hour scream fest (gotta love the first forty days...) , so my brain is fried. I saw the PPA Celebrity Color Challenge today and realized I had made a card in August that fit the challenge perfectly! I just haven't posted it yet. I do confess that the general idea came from somewhere else, but I added a few layers, a few embellishments, and made it mine. I taught this card at a Moms Night Out event in August, and gave them a choice of card base colors (Rich Razzleberry, Pumpkin Pie, Old Olive/Lucky Limeade). Everyone's card turned out quite differently and it was a fun evening.