Moving!

The Skillman's are moving - to a family blog ;-)

http://lovetruthandskillmans.blogspot.com/

There are not posts yet, but Joe is working on it - - - - but the format is similar... same links and sidebar information, plus a few extras.

It is still under construction, but mostly done.

See you over there! Now I just have to work on linking my years of posts from this blog to the new one. Don't want to waste all that information.

Does anyone know how to do that?

Our Lady of the Rosary

Individually, we have prayed the Rosary every day for a few years, and for two and a half months (since we were married), we have been praying it together sometime after dinner and before bed. What a blessing! We hope to do this for the rest of our lives and make it an important family tradition. It might need to be modified a bit when there are tiny people running around. :-)

“All the supreme teachers, the popes, have been unanimous in proclaiming that the devotion to the Most Blessed Sacrament and the Holy Rosary are the hope and

salvation of the world in our evil and dangerous era.

They have endeavored, by word and example, to bring

the faithful more closely to Jesus Christ in the

Most Blessed Sacrament and to Our Lady’s Rosary.”

From The Eucharist and the Rosary:

The Power to Change the World

More on...the FEAST of Our Lady of Victory (the Rosary)

To commemorate the victory of the Christian Armada over the Turks on Oct 7, 1571, Pope Pius V introduced the Feast of Our Lady of Victory. Christian Europe had been at risk of being conquered by the Ottoman Empire (Muslim). The year leading up to the battle had been declared the Year of the Rosary. At the beginning of that year, each mariner of the Holy League was given a rosary and instructed to pray it daily. The rosary also served to unite the contentious factions of the Holy League during the year of its formation and proved equally important for getting the Holy League to the battle as winning the battle. When faced with unfavorable wind at the onset of the battle, the men picked up their rosaries and began praying. Miraculously the winds shifted and served to be a key factor in the ensuing victory.

The Feast's name was changed in 1969 to “Our Lady of the Rosary” and it is now a mandatory memorial. It is now attached to and starts Respect For Life Month.

Many complain that the Mass and Rosary are repetitious. However, the “repetition” of the Mass and Rosary alike can work a slow but deep transformation of one's heart. One could also point out that repetition is not necessarily a sign of a lack of imagination. It may be sheer exuberant pleasure that makes us repeat an activity. G. K. Chesterton argued that repetition is a characteristic of the vitality of children. They like the same stories, the same words, time and time again, not because they are bored and unimaginative but because they delight in life.

Chesterton wrote:

“Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, “Do it again”; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead, for grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again” to the sun; and every evening “Do it again” to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes each daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old and our Father is younger than we. The repetition in Nature may not be a mere recurrence; it may be a theatrical encore. Heaven may encore the bird who laid an egg."

Pray the Rosary. Pray the Mass.

Exult in the monotony. Transform your heart.

A Day Late - St. Francis

October 4th is the Feast of St. Francis. yesterday it was trumped by Sunday, because Jesus is a little more important. However, the Feast of St. Francis is a great day for me and Joe. Both of us have a great love for St. Francis and St. Claire, (of which the long story will come in another post) and it is the one year anniversary of the day we were engaged (outside of our favorite Adoration chapel with a statue of St. Francis)!

I still receive daily Eucharistic emails, and this was the email on the Feast of St. Francis.

"I beg you to show every reverence and honor possible

to the most holy Body and Blood of Our Lord Jesus Christ,

in whom all things in heaven and on earth

are set at peace and are reconciled to Almighty God.

Let us love God and adore Him

and offer Him praises by day and by night."

St Francis of Assisi

b.1181 d.1226

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace;

where there is hatred, let me sow love;

where there is injury, pardon;

where there is doubt, faith;

where there is despair, hope;

where there is darkness, light;

and where there is sadness, joy.

O Divine Master,

grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;

to be understood, as to understand;

to be loved, as to love;

for it is in giving that we receive,

it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,

and it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life.

Amen.

Ste Francis, ora pro nobis!

Little Flower

St. Therese of Lisieux (The Little Flower), born Therese Martin, was a young French girl, passionately in love with Jesus Christ, who became a Discalced Carmelite nun at age fifteen and died of tuberculosis at age twenty-four in a monastery in Lisieux, France.

Therese experienced extraordinary breakthroughs in what is possible in a human being's relationship with God and with other humans. Since her death, she has fascinated countless people. Her memoir, "Story of a Soul," became the religious bestseller of the 20th century. Countless miracles have been attributed to her intercession. She was canonized in 1925 and, in 1997, named a Doctor of the Church. She is often called the "Little Flower."

"My mission: to make God loved, will begin after my death. I will spend my heaven doing good on earth. I will send a shower of roses."

"Jesus, help me to simplify my life by learning what you want me to be - and becoming that person."

"Let us see life as it really is... It is a moment between two eternities..."

"To Call God my Father and to Know myself His Child, that is Heaven to me ..."

I highly recommend reading this.

St. Therese, pray for us, that we may be

simple, humble, and love Christ with a child-like faith.

Amen

Mapping Out Our Nations Sin

The link below is to a posting on Faith and Family Live - It is a study of our nations sin.

What’s your hometown’s sin of choice?

A team from Kansas State has mapped out our nation’s hot spots for the 7 deadly sins by plotting per-capita statistics of things like violent crime, STDs, and numbers of fast food restaurants.

Some might question the “science” of these findings, but the maps sure are an interesting way of looking at our country’s regions.

I especially like the fact that the map for pride is an aggregate of the other six maps “because pride is the root of all sin.”

http://www.faithandfamilylive.com/blog/mapping_out_sin

Feast of the Archangels

"O, angelic spirits, who guard our tabernacles, wherein

lies the adorable treasure of the Holy Eucharist,

defend it from profanation and preserve it for our love."

St Josemaria Escriva

"Michael and his Angels battled against the dragon...

Satan, the seducer of the whole world, was driven out."

A Sermon of Pope Saint Gregory
From the Third Nocturne of Matins of the feast of Saint Michael the Archangel

We speak of nine orders of Angels, because we know, by the testimony of Holy Scripture, that there are the following: Angels, Archangels, Virtues, Powers, Principalities, Dominations, Thrones, Cherubim and Seraphim. It must be realized that "Angel" is the name of their office, not of their nature. For the holy Spirits of the heavenly homeland are always Spirits, but they cannot always be called Angels; they are Angels only when they are announcing something. Those who announce less important things are called Angels, and those who announce the highest things are called Archangels. And so not any Angel but the Archangel Gabriel was sent to Mary; for this ministry, it was fitting to have the highest Angel, since he was to announce the greatest news of all. These Archangels are also given special names to describe their particular virtue. For Michael means "Who is like to God?" Gabriel means "Strength of God," and Raphael "Medicine of God."

Whenever something is to be done needing great power, Michael is sent forth so that from his action and his name we may understand that no one can do what God can do. Hence that old enemy who through pride desired to be like God is shown at the end of the world, left to his own strength and about to undergo the final punishment, as destined to fight with Michael the Archangel, as John says, "There was a battle with Michael the Archangel." Similarly, Gabriel was sent to Mary; he who is called "Strength of God" came to announce Him who deigned to appear in humility to conquer the powers of the air. And Raphael is interpreted, as we said, "Medicine of God," for when he touched the eyes of Tobias to do the work of healing, he dispelled the "night of his blindness."

St Michael, St Gabriel, St Raphael, pray for us

and defend us in battle!

Monday's are my favorite!

With my current schedule, I am totally free on Monday's. This is such a blessings! I use the time to do household things that I would have normally done on the weekend. [Though Sunday I did clean a little because Joe was around to help ;-) ]

Just to give you a peek into my Monday, here is how it goes:

6:00-8:00 (depending on the day): Wake up and change the sheets. I am a fanatic about changing the sheets every week, and clean sheets are one of my favorite things EVER. However, folding the sheets in another story. Our big king bed can be quite the challenge. So usually, even thought we have 3 sets, I wash, and then put back on the same ones. That leaves the bed unmade for a few hours, which I don't love - but can handle. ;-)

Then I make some coffee and get to work reading blogs, checking email, responding, reading news stories, etc. Because Monday's are more laid back in the morning, I usually get to take more prayer time as well.

Finish any laundry left over from last week. Usually I try to do a load or 2 during the week to keep the work load down. I realize that with only 2 people, we don't produce a lot of dirty clothes, but someday there will be more little people joining us who make a lot of laundry, and it is good to have a little routine now to fall back on.

Clean. Not too hard with our 2 bed/2 bath home, and I keep that to a minimum by picking up and tidying things all week long.

Meal plan and grocery shop. Joe did the meal planning this week and next (We try to do 2 weeks at a time) which was great! It isn't everything I would have picked, but I love that he wanted to help plan and of course picked all his favorite meals (lots of meat and potatoes, especially on October 4th - our engagement anniversary and the feast of St. Francis - "Let the meat hang from the walls!".

Now I just have to head to Freddy's to get all the goods.

I try to be home from the store around 11:00 (won't happen today), wash the produce, put everything away and then busy myself with other tasks.

Today I need to run some errands aside from the grocery store (Macy's and Target), finish a sewing project I am working on, (put the sheets back on the bed), head to my mom's to drop off stuff for her garage sale next week (If you are around, come check it out, there are lots of great things!) and prep some dinners for this week. There are also some family business things I need to get done - bill paying schedule, paper filing system (for being an organizer myself, I still haven't mastered paper management the way I hope to someday). Maybe there is something on this website that Lindsey blogged about today- Organizing Junkie

On my list of fun things to do, I also need to write my dear friend Sr. Cora Marie (used to be Kathy Webb) a letter. All last year I wrote her once a week, but this year she can't receive mail except for her feast day, Christmas and Easter. So I have been writing once a month.

I hope you all have a productive Monday! Let me know if you have tip for paper order too! PLEASE!