The Adventures of Auntie Liz and LittleMan: How it Began

On the 20th day of June in the year 2015, my life changed.

My sister-in-law gave birth to my nephew.

And I fell in love.

The day I met the little boy who stole my heart in the only way a nephew can.

And then, on the 16th day of August in the year 2015, my life changed - yet again.

I became a mother.

Okay, a Godmother. But still. It's a big deal in my world.

And now...it's almost a year after his birth and we're getting ready for another delivery in November. I'm finding that I am that aunt:

 

Time-giving, single, capable, available.

Education-minded, Godly, opinionated and vocal. 

Honest, critical, observant, risky.

Dedicated, late, ridiculous, spontaneous.

Gift-giving, sharing, willing, working.

And don't forget those adjectives I want to say about myself, but I'm not sure if it holds true:

Fun, loving, forgiving, trusting, understanding, perfect...ha!


But really, our adventures today are just a mini-episode of our typical expeditions. Here's LittleMan's rendition of a typical day with Auntie...be surprised by his vocabulary:


     Auntie Liz says she'll be at Momma & Daddy's by 11ish in the morning. Momma & Daddy are getting nervous because it's already 11 and she isn't here yet. They're especially nervous today because when she drove the 1.7 hours yesterday, she wound up with a flat tire, delaying her arrival 30 minutes.

    So, Daddy calls grandma at 11:10am. Turns out Auntie had woken up at 9:30, took her time getting ready, forgot about updating Momma & Daddy.

     She makes her way to our house. We play. There's this running joke on Daddy's side about this thing that Auntie likes to do. Daddy refers to it with an extra syllable, I think, "sens-or-ar-y play"...I think it's real fun - I get to splash around with water, play with yogurt at lunchtime - maybe put some in my hair, play with rocks (sometimes she even lets me chew on them!), squish flowers, play (and sometimes chew on) leaves...we have a great time!  

    Every time Auntie comes to our house, I smile huge to show that I love her. She finds the craziest ways to make me laugh...my favorite is hide-and-seek with everything that I own: Duckie from bathtime, Firefighter dog, stuffed Lamby, her hand-turned-duckbeak...you name it, she'll do it! Of course, I'm not old enough to name anything, but she seems to be doing well with what she's got.

   I also know that she loves me because she agreed to come and babysit me for two hours while I sleep at night. See, Daddy works night shift during the week and Momma chose these real weird hours as a nurse...probably one of the most inconsistent of its kind (she usually works 7am-7pm Friday-Sunday). Long story short, they needed a babysitter from 10pm-12am the night of the 4th. Naturally, Auntie Liz was glad to jump on that opportunity! Such love, such love.


And that's how it goes! I've had many opportunities to reflect on my auntie-ness. I love it, I embrace it, I brag about it in conversations to the voices in my head (because it's rude to brag about such things to relatives). Look forward to my upcoming webjournal of these reflections!

Thank you, Jesus, for the gift of Life!
 

Some of the best decisions I've made...(not in chronological or preferential order)

1. Joining the youth of the area to the cities for a NET Lifeline Mass...therefore kickstarting my zeal for the faith.
2. To love the color purple.
3. Making a homemade cape.
4. Going to college.
5. Being a middle child. (We get to choose these things, right?)
6. Quitting Facebook, Twitter.
7. Purchasing a coffee bean grinder.
8. Joining a convent.
9. Leaving a convent.
10. Taking up knitting.
11. Adding an Early Childhood Education Major to my plate.
12. Giving my heart to God...dedicating my life to Him...
13. 
    

Truthful Tuesday

...because today isn't Tuesday but I couldn't think of a synonym of truthful that starts with a "W".

I love being with people.

Oh how much fun this beautifully-edited/filtered picture is!

I like to talk to people and spend time getting to know people.

Now that's just cute.

I am the most productive when I study or am around people. I suppose I don't necessarily need to have a conversation with someone to be productive, I just like to be in the presence of people.

So I told only a half-truth on Fun Fact Friday. I may in fact be a people-person. After all, I am an introverted extravert and therefore, deep down, I like people. They're not too bad, I guess.

Plus, without them, life would be pretty boring...not to mention lonely!

Fun Fact Friday

I'm not a people-person.
I'd love to live in a place like this:

 

 Maybe wander around the woods like this:



 

But only if I can look like this; cane, oil lamp, and all:

 

More Money?

Listening to the country radio station at work, the announcer states to the other and to us listeners: "More women would rather receive this than a wedding proposal...the answer, of course, is...a promotion." The two continue to discus how this makes sense because "More money, I suppose!"

Me?

 

 

 

I'd rather get married, thank you.

Chapter 7; The Third Question

Making my way through Rediscover Jesus, chapter 7 was one of the first to make me pause and think.
Backstory:
I'm working with two of my good friends to lead a young women's retreat for a mutual friend of ours. The outline of the talks are as follows:

Who am I?

 - Our identity as Daughters of God -

What does it mean to be a Woman?

- How our identity effects our womanhood -

What does it look like?

- Mary as our model for the dignity we have as Women of God -

"What am I gunna do about it?" ~ Lo

- How to live as a Woman of God -

 

The captions are my own interpretations of what the talks will be about; we will be going over our outlines next week to see what we've come up with. The three of us are giving a short testimony for the first talk and my main talk will be: What does it mean to be a woman?

This was on the forefront of my mind this morning as I sat down to pray with Matt*. Mo encouraged us all to pray about how God has shown us our identity as His daughter. It was very fitting that today's chapter was about "The Third Question". Jesus asked his disciples: "Who do people say that I am?" and "Who do you say that I am?". Matt offers the third question of: "Who does Jesus say that you are?"

 

-He says I am a child of God.

-He says that I am infinitely valuable.

-He says that I am free.

 

"Our identity is inextricably tied to Jesus (45)."

 

This all gives me more to chew on... If Jesus is the core of my identity as a child of God, what does He specifically teach me about my identity as a daughter of God?
 



We'll keep walking along this Journey with Matt together, as I have more to share with you from his writings!

 

Lord, help us to see Your workings in our day today.

 

 

 

*"Matt" here refers to author Mathew Kelly.

Chapter 1; New Beginnings

My plans...foiled...yet again.
First, I had opened Rediscovering Jesus with the intent on reading right through it. After all, I thought This will be an easy read; it's about Jesus! Low and behold, Matt says - only 5 pages in - "There are two ways to experience this book. The first is like with any other book: Read it from cover to cover. The other way is to use this book as a guide to a forty-day spiritual journey, reading a chapter a day. This second way is a perfect way to begin (or nourish) a habit of daily prayer. (17)"

Well. There goes that plan. This will be quite the unexpectedly-extended journey!

In other news, it is a perfect time to read this book. The chapters are short, sweet, and to-the-point. Chapter 1 sets the stage for the meeting of the Main Character. Matt writes how he loves Mondays because they bring us a new beginning every week. I read chapter 1 on a Monday, so it was very fitting. But all day I was bogged down with this distaste for all things "new beginning".

*A whole week later and I still have yet to finish this post.*

I'm trying to work out of my head that this is "just another one of those books for amateurs".

 

re·dis·cov·er

ˌrēdəˈskəvər/

verb

1.     discover (something forgotten or ignored) again.

I need to rediscover Jesus, too.

The Elephant

Let me take a quick moment to address that web elephant you might notice in the corner of your screen...

the best picture Google provided...that poor painted elephant!

I almost made it a year without blogging.

Intentionally? Of course not.

"Junior year" of college was full of coursework, new friends, five roommates, cooking, discovery, adopted family, dancing, babies, drinking (in moderation, but often enough that it's worth mentioning), and renewal - constant renewal. Maybe, and probably, I will expand upon these things when I run out of topics to elaborate upon...Stay tuned!

I won't make any summer goals for this web journal, but I will most definitely utilize this marvelous platform for processing the pebbles, rocks, twigs, dirt, flowers, and insects that I happen to find while hiking through the journey of life.

See you soon, dear readers, and here's to Summer 2016!

Lord, let all we do glorify you!

My Journey with Matt

...Matthew Kelly, that is.
The Catholic churches in my hometown have a strong liking for this man and his ministry, Dynamic Catholic. So much so that they'll purchase hundreds of copies of books like The Four Signs of a Dynamic Catholic, Rediscover Catholicism, and Rediscover Jesus. Since I have an addiction to free things, I am all about collecting these. However, I also suffer from procrastination and a new diagnoses, Reader's Block, during my time in school. Because of this, the situation usually goes like this:

*sees stacks of free books after church*
Oooh! A new one!
- Liz, you haven't even touched one of the copies you picked from the last book they gave out.
But this one looks good...
- They all look good.
Well, even if I don't read it, it's still good to have these on hand for the day that someone comes to me with questions...I can direct them to an author who knows what he's talking about...it's the gift that keeps on giving, right?
- ...
Right?
*grabs a copy, adds it to the collection on the bookshelf*
And that is how I end up with 3 copies of Dynamic Catholic.

Well, the vicious cycle is coming to an end because I'm going to start reading Rediscover Jesus: An Invitation.

The inspiration came from a priest's homily this past weekend. He has quoted the book multiple times, and it got me thinking that it's time I read it too.

This marks the beginning of my journey with Matt.