Two birthdays

Two birthdays in my house this month:

Girl nº2, who is now 16

and mine.

22 years

22 year ago it was my wedding. It was the day 15.October.1988.
On the 16 we went to England (Canterbury) and then to Paris. We went also to Vaux-Le-Vicomte.
Then we came back to England and to Sintra.
It was such a happy time.
Thanks be to Our Lord for that time and all these 22 years.

Isn't this a beautiful music?

Alla Notte



Adapted from the Adagio de Albinoni.

You must see and hear the original too.

Magnificent! I like it so much since the beginning of my teen years!

Is this a busy mom?!

Too Busy for Family?

It’s 6 a.m. You begin your day with two cups of coffee, feed the kids, and grab a granola bar as you run out the door to meet the school bus. Then you make a mad rush to do errands. By 10 a.m., your blood sugar is dropping so you stop by 7-11 and grab a high caffeine drink ( never! ) and a couple of cookies (maybe). Then it is home to do laundry and clean up from the morning rush. You have a meeting at the school and the dog needs to be seen at the vet so you run by the fast food drive through, grab a burger and fries (you are really hungry now) and a Coke. The guy in the car in back of you cuts you off and you scream out your window—Jerk! (I would never do that, I just wave and smile as my grandmother used to make when she drived. This makes them crazy!)Back home to meet the kids and start thinking dinner. As you meet the kids at the bus, taxi mom begins her route. ( Well this I what I do all day long) Dinner is out because one kid has soccer, the other has ballet, and the other is in a school play; no one will be home at the same time. ( In the evening we are all at home) You decide to grab pizza on the way home because you haven’t had time to prepare dinner. Everyone eats whenever they are finished with schedules. Homework help is given and then the kids get ready for bed. At 10 p.m., you flop down on the couch exhausted and grab a bowl of ice cream to relax a minute. Your husband asks you a question and you snap at him.( This is bad!) He wants time with you, but you are tired and just realized you need to throw in a load of laundry and pay a few bills. Finally, around 1 a.m. (around 1 am?! ), you crawl into bed and set the alarm for 6 a.m.What’s wrong with this picture? ( A lot! )

The red sentences are my comments .
More at http://blogs.cbn.com/familymatters/archive/2010/10/07/too-busy-for-family.aspx

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Mind that this mother pictured here it’s not an working outside mother and, even so, she is too stressed to give some time of her to her husband and goes to bed in the a.m.!

I wake up at 6 am. I wash and dress and then I wake up my big girl. Then I empty the washing machine ( the dishes washing machine, not the clothes) and iron two shirts or any similar amount of clothes while I wait that my girl is ready. When she is I take her by car to the station so she can take the train to the university. She does that everyday and everybody in the several universities here do the same. I take her by car because I don’t want she goes on foot alone in the dark at that early hour in an empty street to take the bus to the station. We live in a very good and safe place but even so, we never know.

I come back home. Wake up the other 3 girls. While they wash,dress and have breakfast, I prepare their mid morning and mid afternoon snacks – lunch is made by the school.

We enter the car and after dropping each one in each school and taking my husband to his work, I go to work and there I stay till the end of the afternoon, some times till the evening.

Because the two middle girls haven’t the same class time everyday, some days they don’t go in the morning so, because I must have a compulsive hour rest around 1 pm, I run home and take them to their respective school.

When it’s only the nº2 that needs a lift, being a teenager, I let her go by bus.
Usually, she comes back home by bus and so does the older one – in the end of the day. It’s very safe at that hour with lots of cars and people of several ages going around. Meanwhile I went to pick girl nº3 and 4.

If there is a day that the big ones come home earlier, they pick the little one.

Twice a week, after ending my work day – outside working day, I mean – and after picking the younger ones, and taking my husband from his work and taking him home, I go to my mother to stay a bit with her and, on the way, to do some shopping.

Arriving home,  exhausted, I put the shopping in places – sometimes the big ones help me, if they arrived already, and I put the laundry to wash. Later on I need to put the clothes on the line and on the day after take it out of the line, fold and put away - in the morning or in the afternoon, depending on the season and weather.

All the other chores? Hoovering, dusting, washing the floors, cleaning, etc. ? I find some little spaces between arriving home and going out again in the next morning. Most things are made on Saturday. Some little things on Sunday, not much, because it’s the Lord’s Day. We go to Mass.

Meals? My husband makes them to ease my load.

I never go to bed late, otherwise I would be crazy.

Now you are asking: why this woman works outside her home? Why doesn’t she stays at home as she should ? For the money, quite a nice income to a big family.

But I dream about staying at home. One day, God willing, I will be a stay at home woman!

Image from http://www.millan.net/

A day in Florence

Enough of bad things. Let's forget the republic day.
I know it's October but I was thinking about our holidays in July and the day my husband was 50. We were in Rome and went to Florence because it was his birthday.

It was such a wonderful day.
After the presents and kisses in the morning, we went to the station and took a fast train, the Frecciarossa to Florence, Firenze, how it's called in Italy.
It's a wow city, each corner of it. I knew it was like that but I didn't know how much wow it was. The girls were crazy with it.

The girls with long hair are my little ones.

After all the walking and our jaws aching because of so much wow, we went to have lunch. He choose the restaurant and very well chosen it was.

Such a pleasant lunch.

He and I had Aspargus Risotto and the girls had spagetti and pizza. Here it's him enjoying his food.

The arm and a blue and white dress is my big girl. I think the other hand is my girl nº2 - or it's maybe mine.

And what about the italian ice cream, like no other in the world?!

Some fruit.

And other food.

We went back to Rome in the very end of the day exausted but so happy. Happily we went in the Frecciarossa again.
Thanks God my husband doesn't tire easily because, arriving home we had the most wonderful dinner.
What a day!

An ugly thing

Today it makes 100 years that we have to endure the republic. It's not easy.
I posted about that in my other blog. The only good thing is, because of that, we don't go to work today.
So...I will do a lot of things in my home!
That is good.