7 Quick Takes, vol 3

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I have been remiss on this blog. Life has been so busy lately (with what I'm not sure) and it seems that I haven't had time to give this the attention I feel it deserves. I'm sure that says something about me, but that's deeper than I want to get into in a Quick Take.

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One of the things we did recently to stay busy was go out of town. I was invited on a work trip with my husband and my beautiful sister-in-law (the best Catholic I know) volunteered to keep my kids for four days so I could go. My sister-in-law does not have children of her own.

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The first thing she did, on the first day she was here, was take them to church. It did not go well.

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We did not go to church this week.  I typically work every Saturday night until 11pm or later. Then my husband usually works the next morning, which leaves us with 8am mass. And it's not a good excuse, but it's just so hard to get us all up and out the door for that. *insert whine*

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Did you read this absolutely terrific post on motherhood at Mama Needs Coffee? I'm sure you did, but I have to share it. I saved it to read again.

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And contrast that with this post at Dooce about living with a three year old. For us, three has been a million times harder than two, with both boys. The girl isn't yet two, but we'll see how that shakes out. (If you don't read Dooce, there is a lot of Language. You've been warned.)

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Last, this weekend is Mother's Day. I hope all the Mothers out there get treated like royalty. May you be as happy as a girl with a yard full of butterflies. And a Popsicle.

Quick Takes is being hosted here this week, stop by to join the fun.

The difficulty of going to Mass

As a family we've been to Mass three Sundays in a row now. It's become important to both my husband and myself that we make the effort to go every week. I see him embracing the church in ways he hasn't since in 14 years, since before I met him. We've talked about calling to see if there is a welcome wagon (if you will), and to find out about Baptism for our two younger kids. He is planning to go to confession before Lent. 

Since I'm not Catholic I feel a bit weird adapting some of the ritual and practices that he does, but I also feel weird abstaining. If he wants to say grace at dinner, and I think we should, shouldn't I be learning it as well? If he gives something up for Lent, I'd like to do it as well. Do I cross myself in church or is that reserved for those who are full Catholics? Do I genuflect as I enter the pew? I dug my copy of The Complete Idiot's Guide to Understanding Catholicism out of the garage (a process that led me to take a nap afterwards, true story) and will be looking through it for answers, but would welcome input from the peanut gallery.

The other hard part of Mass for us are the kids.  Understandably, this is all new and hard for them. They aren't used to sitting quietly for any length of time. My 6 year old is mostly ok, but the two younger ones (3 and 18 months) are unimpressed.  I feel like we're spending the whole hour herding cats.  There's no sense of sitting there gaining anything spiritual from the process, and since we haven't managed to find out about other services we aren't yet gaining community from the process.  Because of our work schedules, we've been at three different services (10am, 7pm, 8am).  It seems likely that the 8am Sunday service is the one we'll settle on, as it will rarely cause a work conflict.  I took a couple little soft toys in a bag for the baby today, and pens and paper for the boys, but I don't know if that's acceptable or not.*

Regardless of all this, the bloom has not worn off the rose and I still believe that going to church is the right thing to do. I want the routine and the weekly touchpoint of going. I'd love to feel a sense of renewal and fresh beginnings every week, and I suspect that going to church would come to do that for me. I'm not ready to proclaim myself Born Again, or even a true Believer, but I am comforted by the idea of becoming one.

*Another true story, once when I was about 12 and my brothers were maybe 4 and 6, they slithered up from our pew (3/4 of the way back) alllll the way to the front of the church, on their bellies. They removed a few shoes on their way through. They popped up at the front of the church, laughed at their victory, and proudly marched back down the center aisle to our family's pew. My kids aren't that obvious. Yet.