+JMJ+ 

So I have been away for a while. 

Over six months to be exact. I even missed my blogoversary (Nov. 19). 

The short answer, of course, is that I've been busy. With what, exactly? Well, let me get you a cup of tea and I shall tell you....

As some of you know, I had been in graduate school for about two and a half years. During these last six months, I have been finishing the last classes associated with it. Thanks be to God, I graduated with my Masters of Art degree on December 16 of this year. That journey is deserving of a post itself. But that is going to take a lot of prayerful reflection before it will see the light of print. 

In the meantime, I started to spend a lot more time with my family - in part due to guilt for spending so much time holed up in my room with graduate school. It proved timely because in April of this year, we had a major flood in our basement. This ordeal turned into a six month renovation and de-cluttering process which resulted in a much cleaner house and much happier people. 

My garden DID get planted, and it was a wonderful success! We had such a variety of vegetables this year, including new ones like kohlrabi, cabbage, and parsnips. Our growing season was miraculously extended with an extra long Indian Summer, which allowed me to squeeze out the fall crops to full maturity. 

In crafting news, I did successfully complete one project: my knitted sontag! I had planned a post on it specifically, and it's still sitting in my drafts waiting to be completed. In the sewing department, I did sew a new winter nightshirt to replace one that was falling apart at the seams (quite literally). I also inherited a lot of scraps from my mother, which will prove very useful for an upcoming project I have in mind. 

2022 was also a year that I greatly expanded both my book and movie collections. In September, I went out for my annual visit to Lia, and part of that trip included a trip to Half Price Books in Dayton. Lia made a fatal error and left me unsupervised. I wound up spending over $200 on books and movies. A full haul can be seen on my Instagram. 

An Update about the Podcast

Last year, I had announced my intention of creating a podcast, similar to my work here on the blog and talking about femininity topics. I had created graphics, some potential topics, and looked into podcasting platforms. I had even bought a microphone for the venture, and I found that it worked well (once I figured it out). I had hoped to start this podcast this summer. 

However, I must announce that at this time, I'm not going forward with the podcast. 

For the majority of the year, the issue was time. I had no time to write, no time for a lot of my hobbies, no time for hardly anything - much less record a podcast. Now that I've finished my MA, my time is now being reorganized to accommodate for many things that fell by the wayside, as well as focus on my novel publishing journey (which you can follow on my writing blog, The Rebelling Muse).   

In addition, my dear little laptop has been developing symptoms of a power supply failure. The sleep function is now destroyed, and thus, its starting to live on borrowed time. The storage, which was always poor to begin with, has been exhausted. Not exactly the kind of laptop that can really support a lot of audio files and then some. 

I also feel that I should do some additional spiritual discernment before I try it again. I went out the decision in a completely wrong-headed way by asking my friends if I should do a podcast point-blank. It was arrogant and conceited of me. I expected my vanity to be fulfilled and thank God it wasn't. Because I'm starting to take my spiritual life a little more seriously, I don't want to do something that's going to undo the precious little work that I have done and potentially harm myself, even in the service of others. 

Goals for 2023 

I had only a couple of goals in 2022. And I found that over the course of the year, I did hardly anything to accomplish them. Therefore, I have decided to take on some additional goals - some small, some big. Some of them are probably just going to be resolutions that get dumped later. But I pray that some will stick. 

So, in the spirit of plans for the new year, here are my goals for 2023: 

Spiritual Goals

I'm very slowly working towards incorporating the Third Order Dominican Rule into my own prayer life. I've always been drawn to Dominican devotions and saints, and I would like to root myself into them more. After all, I would like to be a saint myself, and if this is the path to save my soul, than I'm gonna go for it!  

Part of the Dominican spirituality is study or spiritual reading. I have discovered in 2021-2022 that I do really well with prayer and spiritual reading podcasts. I had really liked Bible in a Year by Fr. Schmitz, and so I went looking. And quite by accident (or was it?) I found a podcast on Spotify called Mystical City of God in a Year by Father Looney. So starting on January 1, I will be going through those episodes one day at a time, just after my morning prayer in place of the morning YouTube/Instagram binge. It will be a much better use of my morning "wake-up" time. 

The other major part of the Dominican spirituality is prayer. I've been using the Divine Office - both from Divinum Officium (Trad) and the Hallow App (Novus Ordo) - as well as the daily devotionals from to create a better prayer routine than the one I had previously. I've also been inspired by my parish, which is beginning to offer public recitation of the Divine Office every day (!). My current goal is to say the hours of Prime and Compline every day/night. If this is achieved by Lent, then I will start adding additional hours such as Terce, Sext, None or Vespers. 

Food Goals

One goal that I have been dying to take back up again my old practice of making bread once a week. I used to do this in high school, when I spent much of my time at home. I stopped making it in college, for obvious reasons, and have just never picked it back up again due to working or graduate school. I miss bread-making, and my arms need a good workout, haha. 

The second goal will be to use up old seeds for the 2023 Garden. When we did our de-clutter, my mom and I found bags upon bags of seeds from previous years. Rather than buying in fresh seed, I'd like to use up this old seed and get it out of my house for good. I may start some indoors again, especially those which I suspect might not germinate. 

Practice Goals

I've been keeping up with my French on and off over the past couple of years, and I've discovered that I'm starting to gain some fluency. Therefore, I'm making a goal to practice French at least once a week so I can work towards greater proficiency in the language. 

I also would like to practice my dulcimer and my choir music at least one day of the week. Choir has become *quite* complicated, and I'm unsure of how long I'll be staying in after this season is over. But I definitely want to get proficient at playing my dulcimer so I can play at parties and events, or with other people. 

Quarterly Crafting Goals

This section is a little different because rather than doing a yearly goal for my crafting, I decided to do quarterly projects instead. This will allow for two things: boredom and project complications. And maybe a completion or two, haha. 

Between January and March, I'll be working on two projects. 

The first is what I call my "Mums afghan", which features large crochet mum flowers on a granny-square kind of background. I had started this crochet afghan years ago as a project to help occupy myself during a difficult family visit. Now I'm using it as a "stash-busting" project for the acrylic yarns I still have hanging around, since I've grown to dislike how acrylic feels. 

I have worked one complete "strip" of blocks with a pink mum flowers on a purple background. Since I have more pink than purple, I'm now going to reverse the colors to make a strip with purple mum flowers and a pink background. Once I exhaust those, then I'll experiment with other similar colors, like light blue. My biggest fear, however, is that I won't have enough scrap yarn to finish the afghan, or even do a lap afghan. I'll continue until I run out of yarn, and then I'll figure out what to do. 

The second project is a scrappy quilt, my second. As I mentioned earlier, when my mom and I went through our craft supplies, I inherited a lot of fabric scraps. So many that they are spilling out all over the place. Something had to be done. Since I had some experience with scrappy quilts, I thought this would be my best option. Many of the scraps were strips, so I decided to create a pattern with a lot of stripe blocks. I'm currently experimenting with block patterns to see what will work best with what I have on hand. I also got a lot of quilting supplies over Christmas, which will help the project along tremendously. 

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And...that wraps up 2022! And now, I'd love to hear from you! What sort of projects have you all been experimenting with? Any new resolutions that you care to share/  

I hope that you all had a very blessed Christmastide, and I hope to see you all in the coming year! 

Old-fashionably yours, 

Catherine

Note: This post was originally published on the blog Maidens for Mary. I have since deleted it off of there, modified it and republished it here. 

With the good weather, comes a slew of major family events such as graduations, weddings and the like. And with that often comes...

A dance!

A dance, when done right, is a proper diversion for a young lady. I will say that going to a secular high school prom or college dance is a dangerous occasion for sin for a Catholic maiden. A lot of modern dances accentuate hip movement and the songs are obscene. Even if you are modest in clothing, you still commit a sin of immodesty if you participate in such an activity. Plus, the modern style of dance just isn't flattering, no matter the clothing.

While I did enjoy my own secular prom at the time, hindsight really is 20/20. In the nearly 10 years since my own high school prom, I'm sure that the secular style of dance and music have only worsened.

Since then, I've grown a bit wiser since I have experienced good dances - especially church dances. So, if your homeschool co-op or church is hosting a dance, I would say GO! In this way, not only will you be properly chaperoned *another thing that secular dances lack - what do you know!* but the music and dances will be in much better taste.

It can take a few forms - a formal, a prom, or...just called a dance. It can include old styles of dances, such as reels and square dancing or classic ballroom dancing. Swing dancing has also become popular among some Catholic parishes.

Whatever the dance or event is called, the very idea of a dance usually causes headaches in the female ranks. Because the age-old question must be addressed:


A simple skirt and blouse doesn't cut it. For such a rare and formal occasion, it calls for a beautiful, elegant dress. Not something flashy, but one decorated with taste that leads the eye to the face. A dress that will make the girl's inner beauty shine.

I am of the opinion that every girl should have a formal dress in their closet, whether you wear it once or twenty times. The question is...how to get one?

Well, there are two ways - buying a dress and making a dress. I will, therefore, go through each and discuss the advantages and disadvantages of both methods.

First......

I have noticed a trend towards higher necklines. A favorite style seems to be a high neckline (and maybe short sleeves) made of only a lace overlay fabric. Considering that the style for the longest time was no sleeves or neckline, it's a considerable improvement. Still - keep in mind that lace still requires sufficient backing according to the Vatican guidelines for modesty.

However, the plunging/off-shoulder bodices, the thigh slits, and booty-tight dresses are still out there, in large quantities.

Shopping online for dresses is easier in theory, but much more risky. For one thing, you can't always see what the actual product is until it gets to you, and there is no guarantee that it will fit even if it arrives on time. There are some online shops such as Jen Clothing and BM Bridal that have really pretty modest dresses for a good price, but I caution you that many shops outsource the actual manufacturing to Chinese sweatshops. 

When looking at individual dresses, examine them front to back, and open up the skirt if looking in-store. The latter is paramount; it's important to know just how much movement the skirt is going to give you. And often, the slits are hidden in the folds of the skirt, making it look more modest than it really is!

A decent gown is one that doesn't have slits in it and has a solid bodice, with a fairly high neckline. When trying on such gowns, look out for tightness, especially in the hip and chest areas. Most formal gowns are floor length, so that shouldn't be an issue (if they are too long, they can be hemmed quite easily). 

As many girls find out, the selection of formal gowns is often limited and too often just too immodest for wearing by itself. More than likely, one will still need to purchase a short bolero or sweater in order to cover the shoulders, back and arms. Fortunately, boleros are fairly easy to access through both physical and virtual stores. 


As much as I love sewing garments, sewing a formal gown is not for the faint of heart. 

 

I love a good garden. 

Maybe it is because I was a landscaper at my college. Maybe it is because my parents and grandparents all had gardens growing up. Or maybe it's because I like fresh veggies. 

But whatever the reason, I love a good garden. 

And I have been rather...deprived, lately. 

You see, our garden patch has moved several times over the past few years. Environmental conditions are the main reason of course. Like, persistent fungi. Or depleted soil. And, well, it needs to be moved again. Because the maple tree is literally throwing shade on everything. 

And really, it needs to be out of Skye's reach. That dumb collie still thinks she's vegetarian, if not a ruminant. No green thing is safe with her. 

But moving a garden is a big operation, and despite our best efforts, it didn't happen last year. We got some volunteer tomatoes, a bumper crop of blueberries, and some herbs as a small consolation. 

I missed the garden, though. 

But do you know what really made me miss it? Growing my own oregano from seed. Those who follow me on Instagram already know this story. But for those who don't or missed it, I'll explain. 

I got this oregano seed-starting kit as part of my Easter basket in 2021. Admittedly, I never thought of myself as a "houseplant" person. This may be due to my mother, who had an unfortunate talent of, well, killing houseplants. She's even killed a cactus before, no joke. 

But I decided to try it out. I followed all the instructions, and...they sprouted! 

I was so excited. I felt more...feminine. It felt good to nurture something, even if it was a wee little green plant. 

The next few weeks, it stayed in its shiny baby pail. And with it came a few curveballs. Like, the fact that it would grow towards the window because of the light. Or when the leaves turned yellow for lack of phosphorous (or was it potash?). Thank goodness for fire pits, that's all I'll say. 

When it was eight weeks old, it had grown so big that it was spilling out of the pot. It was time to transplant it. Man, that was scary trying to break up all of those little plant roots. I was worried that it wouldn't take to the new big pot outside. But a good dose of rain cheered it up and soon it was thriving. I did get a cutting off of it before fall set in, and now I wait anxiously to see if it will survive the winter. 

But now...I have a seed-starting bug. And it has been itching for more seeds for quite some time. To give you an idea of how bad it is, I have revamped my old bullet journal to act as my garden companion (at least in part, anyway). And I bought a couple of small grow-lights. 

And in a really rebellious twist, I decided to buy my own seeds. 

I bought them from a small seed company called St. Clare's Heirloom Seeds, which is based in Wisconsin. I had seen them advertised a lot in LifeSiteNews, so I decided to check them out. While they are a smidgen more expensive than many other seed producers, St. Clare's is a small business run by a Catholic family. And frankly, I would rather support that than a huge commercial firm. 

St. Clare's also has another advantage: they specialize in open-pollinated and non-GMO crops. Being an agriculture graduate, I am rather appalled at the sheer amount of genetic engineering that is present in our food supply. And so, I've made the conscious decision to support open-pollinated and non-GMO whenever possible. 

I bought: 

I plan to start my spring vegetables in mid-March, probably after I get back from vacation. They'll probably be kept in my room, on top of my bookshelves. 

And once they're ready to be transplanted?

I plan on placing the herbs in a couple more of the pots outside. We do have a nice collection of herbs out there and I'd like to expand it. Better than growing weeds in the silly things. 

The rest? Well...I have my eye on a certain weedy patch that's in the side yard. My thought is to tear it up, and place some compost and topsoil in there. Hopefully, without getting caught and dissuaded *shifts eyes* 

I mean, if all else fails, there are plenty of pots around. I can even raise a couple of them inside if I *absolutely* have to. 

As it is, I need to stop over at Lowes one of these days to pick up some soil for my pots. Even dream gardens can't survive on thin air, you know. 

Lettuce hope this garden gets off the ground....*groans* 

May God bless you all, 

Catherine

 

Greetings and salutations! 

On my old blog, I had a tradition of writing a reflection about the pro-life movement around the time of Roe vs. Wade's anniversary. With due deliberation, I decided to carry over that tradition this year. Because really, the issue of abortion is deeply tied with the mystery of femininity, and it is an issue that I care deeply about (even though I only post about it once a year).

I usually stick to overviews or philosophical discussions about abortion, but this year, I want to take a more personal turn. Because this year, I actually participated in the National March for Life for the first time. And I will apologize in advance for the rather long post ahead. 

My FSSP parish had decided to rent a bus for the first time in several years to go down to the March. In keeping with our regular pro-life work, my YAG deliberately chose to participate in the March as our "big monthly meeting" for January. 

Getting on the bus on the morning of the 21st, I was amazed at just how young our demographics were. About 35% of the bus was made of YAG members, and about 30% more were kids between 10-20. The remaining adults were a few parents (mostly dads), and a couple of middle-aged couples. In a way, I was a little surprised, I thought the group would have been more diverse. But really, it was indicative of the growing trend: the face of the pro-life movement is young! 

We arrived at Union Station sometime around 11am after a couple hours bus ride. Being on the bus allowed me to drink in the sights of the city. It was rather surreal to see the Washington Monument from the other side of the river when we first approached. Leaving Union Station, our first objective was to reach the National Gallery of Art. Which we did, only to discover that it was quite a ways away from the rallying point. We did meet a couple of familiar faces from our extended parish family in other groups as we walked along. We hiked down just beyond the Museum of Natural History, where I got my first look at the National Mall. Just saying, it's a lot bigger than I thought. We found a spot on the outskirts of the crowd, where we could still hear but keep together. 

I'm not sure if this was true for the whole March, but I felt that in our spot of the rally, we had a high concentration of Catholics. We were nearest to a group from the St. John Paul II Seminary. We also had a group of huge Papal Flags flying off some distance to our left. A Christendom flag and the TFP banner could be seen off in the distance. I saw many Dominican and Franciscan friars walking around in full habit, along with many priests and even a few nuns. And of course, there were many other Catholic school groups congregating in the near vicinity. There was a wonderful feeling of solidarity. And it was a striking counter-example to the bad Catholic politicians that push and push for abortion without reason. 

Out of the speakers of the rally, I felt drawn a lot to Toni McFadden's speech. Her story of her abortion and her subsequent redemptive arc via her marriage and family with her former boyfriend (and father of her unborn baby) was really touching. In a way, I see that story as a microcosm of America. Abortion will always leave a stain, just as slavery did, and we will never forget the 63 million civilians that we have lost because of it. But that does not mean that we, as a nation, cannot move past it and make a success of ourselves. 

It was sometime during the rally (I think it was during the Lisa Robertson/Katie Shaw talks) when I experienced something which can only be described as a demonic attack. I felt cold to the cause. I heard a voice say interiorly, what am I doing here? What is the point? I felt like a prideful faker, there only externally. There were other, more despairing interior temptations, but I will not mention them. Suffice it to say, that's when I started praying. 

I mention this experience not to draw attention to myself, but to highlight some characteristics of the struggle. The fight surrounding abortion is not just of flesh, but also of principalities and powers. There were some serious spiritual forces hanging around this issue that people tend to forget about. If anything, these temptations were a wake-up call to me of just how vulnerable we still can be. 

And speaking of spiritual weapons, I do wish that parishes would publish announcements about the January 22 Day of Penance. I feel that so many people don't know about this, or if they do, they don't realize that it is as binding under Canon Law as a Friday Penance. Some things can only be removed by mortification, and sins of the flesh are definitely one of those. 

The rally finished with Father Mike Schmitz, and his introduction was greeted with the loudest ovation of the rally, reaching even our crew. This also helps to cement my hypothesis that there were many Catholics in that rally, lol. Anyway, his speech was a wonderful tonic (as one can expect, anyway) to send us off with. 

Very soon, we were making our way to join the 150,000 other people attempting to join the March. As we stood in 9th Street, a chant of "Hey hey, ho, ho, Roe V. Wade has got to go!" swept like a verbal wave over the assembly. That was pretty awesome. 

From there, we made our way to Constitution Ave. To be honest, this was the most stressful period for me. You see, I thought it would have been set up almost like a parade, with a little delineation between the groups. But no, it's one huge throng, moving in and out and all around. Keeping the group together - even with the help of the pilgrimage banner - was no easy feat. 

Just out of sight from the Supreme Court building, we stopped at the corner of 1st and Constitution. Unfortunately, we were on a strict timetable for our bus, and so we couldn't finish the March. We headed back up to PA, and from there, our YAG went to have a late dinner at one of our favorite restaurants. I am slightly disappointed that I didn't get to clap eyes on the Supreme Court building, but maybe I will have another opportunity later. 

The only negative experience we had was a *ahem* loudmouth Baptist lambasting all the "idolaters" to repent during the rally. We didn't run into any counterprotests anywhere. In fact, Washington seemed rather....quiet. Not sure if it was because of the cold, or nobody wanted to tangle with 150,000 crazy pro-lifers, LOL. 

I think when we hear the word "protest", we think of angry shouting and sign-waving. But that wasn't the case here. I had heard that the March for Life was one of the most peaceful and uplifting experiences one could have. I can vouch for that myself. Really, those who want to model a peaceful, loving protest of injustice, they should model the March for Life. 

If I had to describe it in one word, it would be meek. 

I know that is probably a really strange word choice, but hear me out here. Meekness is not mousiness. It's a control of the use of emotion. In other words, not letting emotions cloud up judgement, but use it forward the thought or action. 

In nearly all the speeches, the emotionally charged polemics were taken away and objective thoughts were used. For the majority of the participants, this was the same. But at the same time, there was no backing down, no apologies, no weakness. And that's the way things should be done. Because anger and emotional rhetoric may win some favors (as noted with Donald Trump), but it's an empty monster waiting to devour it's next prey. 

Like many, I do hope that this year will bring the end of Roe vs. Wade. It certainly would fit close to the historical timeline for Supreme Court flip-flops. I know that it won't be the end of abortion, but it will definitely staunch the flow a lot faster. In the meantime, we must pray, fast and act. 

We pray in reparation for all the "slaps" to the Creator's Face.

We pray today in memoriam for all the bleeding hearts that have been sacrificed to the idols of
personal irresponsibility, racial and economic purity, and the false idea of "choice".

We pray that America may be a nation that lives up to it's first principle as declared in 1776 that all persons have the right to LIFE.

We pray for all the women who have been harmed by abortion, and for their continued healing.

And we pray for all unborn children, that they may be born healthy and their souls may be saved.

Our Lady, Protectoress of the Unborn, PRAY FOR US!!


May God bless you all,

Catherine