Franciscan Ecards

I have been having way too much fun! This is the month for birthdays: my sister, my two nephews, several dear friends...and a wedding anniversary thrown in for a bit of variety.

So I headed on over to Franciscan Ecards. I've been there many times over the years but Sr. Pat (from my home state of Washington) has outdone herself in renewing the site. The colors are so vibrant and the choices abundant.

After you choose a card, you get to pick a song, pick a poem, pick a stamp for the envelope. You can choose your own background colors, write a personal message, and change the font size.

In a hurry? Too many decisions? Then, you can just pick the card and put in the email addresses.

Either way, it's super easy to do. And the address is super simple to memorize, too. Just remember: holyecards.com

What could be easier than that?

Enjoy!

Great Thinkers

Growing up in public school, I soaked up the idea that people of older days weren't quite as smart as we are. Each generation, each century, people develop more intelligence...or so we were given to believe. I knew that Jesus, of course, when He walked the earth, was more intelligent than we are. But look at the simple fishermen who were His disciples. Weren't most people simple like that? Didn't the great thinkers, even, have much they were missing?

Over the years, I've learned, again and again, that this subliminal message was incorrect. Yes, man expands on the knowledge of past generations. We build on the knowledge of medical science and technology, for example. But does that mean an individual man of today is more intelligent than an individual man of past generations? I don't think so!

That's why I enjoy so much the short sermons that come into my inbox each day with the Daily Gospel. They are from many different people of many different times, some from the early centuries of the Church. These fathers of the Church didn't have the internet for research or huge libraries of printed books at their disposal. Yet they had great knowledge and wisdom.

If you'd like to read the Gospel online each day, or have it come in to your email inbox, you can visit the website of the Daily Gospel.Org here. It's completely free. You don't receive any advertising or soliciting. But if you can afford it, they can use donations to keep their apostolate going.

Life Out of Balance or "Are You Organized?"

First of all, I'm sorry I stopped writing (three whole days). Well, I didn't actually stop writing. I only stopped writing here. I haven't ever stopped writing for nearly fifty years; it's just a matter of what I write: letters, emails, lists, possible books, potential articles, and of course, my blog. That's right; I said "blog". See, I'm so behind and so ashamed, I'm trying to pretend I don't have four blogs, three of which I've largely ignored for at least a month.

Sometimes in life, it's hard to keep everything in balance...even if for you that balance doesn't always include writing, on a daily and sometimes hourly basis. At one time, we're lonely and bored. At another time, we have too much to do and think about, and are overwhelmed. Even though some of what makes "too much to do and think about" are wonderful activities and people, it sometimes means we take time away from something else or try to "do it all". Have you ever noticed how the pendulum swings? You know what's neat about asking questions on a blog? Some of you might actually answer.

Someone reading this might get the idea I'm disorganized, and then get the idea to try to help me get organized. You might not know that I already know most of the organizational systems and techniques that are currently known to man (that's mankind, as in women, men and children). Remember, one of the things I write are lists, and one of the things I do is plan. One of the things I do, too, is live too much in the future (and occasionally too much in the past).

If you want to get organized, if you want to do what I've learned, not what I do (does that sound like a good parent?), you can try the following for starters:

Website (free): Flylady

Book: Seven Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey



If you'd like to share tips with our readers for getting organized, you are most welcome! Just realize that this reader is pretty hopeless. But hey, I'm always open to new ideas. It gives me something to think about.



P.S. If you happen to be an editor, please know that I do meet life's deadlines!

Thrifty Homeschooler

Here is the ultimate support and resource for homeschooling…or for just living a frugal lifestyle. Maureen Wittmann started the Thrifty Homeschooler Yahoo group over four years ago. I've been a member for probably at least three of those years, and I still eagerly open my emails from Thrifty Homeschooler. It’s still going strong today, helping families to manage and thrive.

“The goal is to support homeschooling families, most living on one income in a two-income economy, by offering ideas and tips on how to save money in your home and school.”

This is not your ordinary list. It’s community learning with a difference.

Does the volume of emails from a group list fill up your inbox? Not to worry. Do you not want everyone to know your full name and your email address when you ask a question or contribute something? Not to worry. If you have a question, you send it directly to Maureen. She will include only your first name when passing your question on to the group. She then invites responses, sent directly to her, and gathers all the responses together into one email for everyone’s reading pleasure.

To join the more than 2600 people who are signed up to benefit from the Thrifty Homeschooler Yahoo group, you can go here.

You may also like to visit the Thrifty Homeschooler Blog. This is a different format, with different information, provided by the same devoted homeschooling mother and author, helping us out wherever she can.

"Living on a Dime" Offers Free E-Books

This friendly e-newsletter has appeared in my (e)mailbox for...probably...years now, containing lots of good tips and recipes. Tawra and Jill offer their print books and e-books for sale at their website but also lots of free information, even a debt calculator (I haven't taken the time to use it yet; or maybe I'm afraid I'll get depressed if I find out how long it may really take us to get out of the muddle).

At their site they also link to cooking guides and substitutions (scroll w-a-y down on the left). Oodles of good stuff here.

But right at the moment, on top of everything else, they are offering links to 37 free e-books! Just go here to see all the possibilities:
http://www.livingonadime.com/septpromo/sept-thanks-102294.html

By the way, just in case you don't know, if you want to download an Acrobat Adobe (pdf) file onto your hard drive (rather than just print it out right then and there), you can right-click, then select Save Target As. Type in the name you want to know the file by, and download. To read the file another day, you will need to go to Adobe Reader in your computer, select the file you want, and click on it. If you try to open a pdf file from Microsoft Word, it will look like gobbledee-gook. Now listen (only if you don't know...and I said it like that because I just spent some time figuring this out myself!), if you don't have an icon for Adobe Reader on your desktop to click on, click on Start, go to Programs, find Adobe Reader, right-click and select Create Shortcut. Voila. Now, in the future, you can access Adobe Reader right from your desktop.

All this has given me another "job". I just realized that I should probably add detailed instructions like this for dowloading my Little Saint Therese book, in case someone wants to save it and read it or print it later on.

So! Have fun! Enjoy all the resources available for you on the web.

Book Adventure

For my readers and friends who have children in grades K-8 (either going to a school or homeschooling), you might like to check out an online service called Book Adventure.

"Book Adventure is a FREE reading motivation program for children in grades K-8. Children create their own book lists from over 7,000 recommended titles, take multiple choice quizzes on the books they've read, and earn points and prizes for their literary successes."

The quizzes appear to be memory oriented, so this may not be for everyone. Those parents who prefer a more discussion-oriented approach may not like the question and answer style. But some kids would find it a fun thing to do, and it might also help improve reading test scores, as well as encouraging more reading.

As with anything with your grade schooler, you will want to check it out and be involved. Maybe there are certain books you want your child to read or certain books you don't want him to read. You can still control this. The books are not on the website, only the quizzes.

You also may want to discuss the prizes with your child beforehand. I remember when one of my kids used this program, he didn't bother with the prizes, but there had been a candy bar he was thinking of trying for, until we learned you had to visit a certain kind of store in order to redeem the coupon. This would be a good opportunity to teach the children about advertising and prizes, that there's often a catch or hidden expense, even in otherwise-free situations. I do see they have a six-month subscription for Highlights magazine as one of the prizes. If you like Highlights (I loved reading it in doctor's offices as a child), and if you don't mind renewing the subscription if your child falls in love with it, then it might be a good prize to encourage.

If you're interested, check it out. If you use it, I'd love to know what you think.

Devotion to Christ

Last night I posted about this to the Catholic BVI Readers blog (BVI for Blind or Visually Impaired); but this morning it has occurred to me that I ought to share the information about these talks with everyone!

At the EWTN site, you can find an abundance of audio talks available. What I discovered yesterday, and got excited about, is a series of talks on Devotion to Christ given by Fr. Benedict Groeschel.

You can download these to your computer; and download RealPlayer for free, I believe, if you don't already have it. Just go here to check out these talks.

Old Time Radio Programs

Have you heard your grandparents reminisce about old radio programs? I'm not talking about music or call-in talk shows. I'm talking about pre-television drama. You can walk down that memory lane, show your children how people used to be entertained. You can enjoy comedy or adventure. You can listen to "My Favorite Husband", starring Lucille Ball, or to Abbot and Costello, Bing Crosby, Bob Hope, Ozzie and Harriet, and others at Old Time Radio website.

HT: Danielle Daily

Saint of the Day Service

You can get a "saint of the day" story delivered right to your inbox...or you can visit at the website, whichever you like. You can even get it in auditory format if you'd like. Here's where to go to check it out.

Personally, I like getting mail...and having things right at my fingertips, including a daily Gospel reading (see Devotions on the Net in the sidebar for the gospel resource).

Greeting Cards

Have you ever searched for just the right e-card to send to a friend? Or have you ever wanted to slow down and just relax a bit?

You might want to check out these “movies” from Inspiring Thots . They are actually more like slide shows, except that you watch beautiful pictures as the words slowly appear, disappear, and reappear, while you listen to soothing music in the background. There are many themes: friendship, encouragement, happiness, parenting, and so forth.

Another great source of online greeting cards is Franciscan Peace Cards. Sister Patricia has provided Catholic postcards for just about any occasion: birthday, sacraments, feasts, inspiration, and even just fun.

Both of these resources are provided free, but - in both cases - donations would be helpful to keep the sites going, if we’re able and inspired to contribute.

Bloglines.com

If you like visiting blogs, you just might like Bloglines! Bloglines.com offers ready access to the blogs you like to visit. After the easy-peasy, free sign-up, you add the blogs you like. (I then just stay logged in to the site on my computer, with my Bloglines page bookmarked in my "Favorites".)

When you go to your personalized bloglines page, you can see right away who has posted something new at their blog. You click on the blog name and "voila"! The new post appears in a nice neat format, pictures and all. If you'd like to go to the blog itself, with the blog owner's personal template, you simply click on the title and there you go!

For me, this saves multiple visiting to see if so-and-so has posted anything new lately. Very nifty.

Hat tip to my new friend Holly at A Woman Seeking Grace. Thanks, Holly!