Faith & Family Live!

Faith & Family Live is where everyday moms offer one another inspiration, support, and encouragement in Catholic living. Anyone grappling with the meaning of life or the cleaning of laundry is welcome here. Read the blog, check out our magazine, join our community, learn more about our mission, and come on in! READ MORE

Daily Lenten Meditations

«  March 2010  »

Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat
  • Pray Light a candle. Every time you pass that candle today, offer a prayer of thanks. Don’t ask for anything. Just thank him.
  • Fast Don’t cut corners. Even if no one will know, complete today’s work thoroughly.
  • Give Touch is a powerful thing. Make an effort today to touch your children: a hug, a shoulder rub, a tousled head -- especially the bigger ones
1
  • Pray Make five minutes in the morning, at midday and in the evening to be still, silent, and alone, only asking God to infuse your soul with his will.
  • Fast No noise today. Turn off the TV, the radio, the iPod. Find God in the silence.
  • Give Pay particular unsolicited attention to your least demanding child today.
2
  • Pray Begin a gratitude journal. At the end of the day, jot down five things for which you are grateful. Think upon these things.
  • Fast Remember the first time you had a moment alone with your first child. What did you promise him? Do that. Be that.
  • Give We can only expect what we inspect. For every task you assign today, follow through and before it’s truly finished ensure that there is praise from you.
3
  • Pray “My sheep listen to my voice. I know them and they follow me." -- John 10:27
  • Fast Every time a child interrupts you today, stop what you are doing and look into his eyes as he talks.
  • Give “Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless.” -- Blessed Teresa of Calcutta Speak kindly all day long.
4
  • Pray Ask God to show you how weak and small you are. Open your heart to see it.
  • Fast Don’t argue today. As much as possible give up, give in, give way.
  • Give When you are tempted to put on the TV for kids today, pull out a stack of favorite picture books instead. Invite the kids to join you on the couch.
5
  • Pray Take a walk, even if it’s cold or raining. Leave your iPod at home.
  • Fast Think of someone whose life you are tempted to envy and then choke out these words: Thank you, God, for the blessings you have given to X. Help me to see my own.
  • Give Think about the kind of person your husband married. Be that person for him today.
6
7
  • Pray "Love consumes us only in the measure of our self-surrender." -- St. Therese of Lisieux
  • Fast As you go about your daily routine today, remember that you are expecting someone very important for dinner tonight. Together with your children, work towards your husband’s homecoming as if you were expecting to welcome a king back to his castle.
  • Give “You can do nothing with children unless you win their confidence and love by bringing them into touch with oneself, by breaking through all the hindrances that keep them at a distance. We must accommodate ourselves to their tastes, we must make ourselves like them.” -- St. John Bosco
8
  • Pray Take this quote to prayer today and listen to God’s answer: “Real love is demanding. I would fail in my mission if I did not tell you so. Love demands a personal commitment to the will of God.” -- John Paul II
  • Fast Stop looking for encouragement and approval. Genuinely encourage and affirm someone else instead.
  • Give Let your child choose a huge stack of picture books (use that word “huge” when you ask her to gather them). Read them all to her today.
9
  • Pray Persevere. “He who does not give up prayer cannot possibly continue to offend God habitually. Either he will give up prayer, or he will give up sinning.” -- St. Alphonsus Liguori
  • Fast Don’t forget that the only pedestal you need ever stand on, is the one your husband and children build for you.
  • Give Focus on your home today. The world can find another volunteer, but your husband and children have only you.
10
  • Pray Insist on quiet from all your children during naptime today. Pray the Divine Mercy chaplet.
  • Fast We’re half way through. Compare yourself now only to yourself when Lent began. Tweak the plan.
  • Give Reach out to a local friend today. Reconnect.
11
  • Pray Ask God to make you humble and lowly.
  • Fast Don’t compare or complain. Do compliment.
  • Give Pack a picnic and go somewhere to eat it with your children. If the weather is prohibitive, build a tent in the living room and it eat there. Sit on the ground with them. Be fully present.
12
  • Pray Sometime before bedtime tonight, make time to pray with and for each of your children.
  • Fast Rise a little earlier and bring your husband breakfast in bed. (If it’s too late today, plan for tomorrow).
  • Give Plan a date night.
13
14
  • Pray Give thanks for food, clothes, and shelter. Listen to His plan for stewardship.
  • Fast Clean out the refrigerator today instead of eating lunch. Pull everything out and wipe it all down. As you do it, thank God for the food he provides for your family.
  • Give “We think sometimes that poverty is only being hungry, naked and homeless. The poverty of being unwanted, unloved and uncared for is the greatest poverty. We must start in our own homes to remedy this kind of poverty.” -- Blessed Teresa of Calcutta
15
  • Pray Before you read or do anything else today, pray this prayer, taken from the writings of St. Louis de Montfort: Lord, help me to imitate Mary's deep humility, lively faith, blind obedience, unceasing prayer, constant self-denial, surpassing purity, ardent love, heroic patience, angelic kindness, and heavenly wisdom. Amen.
  • Fast Give up thinking things have to be perfect.
  • Give As you do laundry today, bless the person for whom you are folding. With every crease, offer a prayer.
16
  • Pray For a few minutes tonight, after your children are sleeping, kneel beside their beds. Let your breath rise and fall with theirs. Entrust them to the Father and thank him for lending them to you.
  • Fast Let go of self-recrimination. “There is still time for endurance, time for patience, time for healing, time for change. Have you slipped? Rise up. Have you sinned? Cease. Do not stand among sinners, but leap aside.” -- St. Basil the Great
  • Give Do not say “In a minute” or “When I finish this” at all today. Instead, put aside your agenda and meet their needs (and even some wants) immediately and cheerfully.
17		 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27
28 29 30 31

Bloggers

Meet the Faith & Family bloggers. We invite you to join us in encouraging and helping the Faith & Family community grow in faith!

Danielle Bean

Danielle Bean
Danielle Bean, a mother of eight, is Editorial Director of Faith & Family. She is author of My Cup of Tea: Musings of a Catholic Mom (Pauline 2005) and Mom to Mom, Day to Day: Advice and Support for Catholic Living (Pauline 2007). Though she once struggled to separate her life …
Read My Posts

Rachel Balducci

Rachel Balducci
Rachel Balducci is married to Paul and together they are the parents of five lively boys. Besides being a mom, she is also a writer and a newspaper columnist for the Diocese of Savannah, Georgia. For the past four years, she has maintained her personal blog at Testosterhome.net where she …
Read My Posts

Lisa Hendey

Lisa Hendey
Lisa Hendey is the founder and editor of CatholicMom.com, a Catholic web site focusing on the Catholic faith, Catholic parenting and family life, and Catholic cultural topics. Most recently she has authored The Handbook for Catholic Moms. Lisa is also employed as webmaster for her parish web sites. …
Read My Posts

Arwen Mosher

Arwen Mosher
Arwen Mosher lives in southeastern Michigan with her husband Bryan and their young children Camilla and Blaise. She has a bachelor's degree in theology. She dreads laundry, craves sleep, loves to read novels and do logic puzzles, and can't live without tea. Her personal blog site is ABC Family. …
Read My Posts

Rebecca Teti

Rebecca Teti
Rebecca Teti is married to Dennis and has four children (3 boys, 1 girl) who -- like yours no doubt -- are pious and kind, gorgeous, and can spin flax into gold. A Washington, DC, native, she converted to Catholicism while an undergrad at the U. Dallas, where she double-majored in …
Read My Posts

Robyn Lee

Robyn Lee
Robyn Lee is the managing editor of Faith & Family magazine. She is (yikes!) an almost 30 year-old, single lady, living in Connecticut with her two cousins in a small bungalow-style kit house built by her great uncle in the 1950s. She also conveniently lives next door to her sister, brother-in-law …
Read My Posts

Hallie Lord

Hallie Lord
Hallie Lord married her dashing husband, Dan, in the fall of 2001 (the same year, coincidentally, that she joyfully converted to the Catholic faith). They now happily reside in the deep South with their two energetic boys and two very sassy girls. In her *ample* spare time, Hallie enjoys cheap wine, …
Read My Posts

Fr. John Bartunek, LC

Fr. John Bartunek, LC

Fr John Bartunek, LC, STL, received his BA in History from Stanford University in 1990, graduating Phi Beta Kappa. He comes from an evangelical Christian background and became a member of the Catholic Church in 1991. After college he worked as a high school history teacher, drama director, and …
Read My Posts

Guest Bloggers

Melissa Wiley

Melissa Wiley
Melissa Wiley is a homeschooling mother of six and the author of The Martha Years and The Charlotte Years, two series of books about the ancestors of Laura Ingalls Wilder. She blogs about children’s books, family, and home education at Here in the Bonny Glen.
Read My Posts

Stay in the Loop with F&F

?
Full feed
Danielle Bean’s feed
Rebecca Teti’s feed
Arwen Mosher’s feed
Lisa Hendey’s feed
Rachel Balducci’s feed

Get our FREE Daily Digest

Add Faith & Family to iTunes

Weekly Reader Poll
 

Top Tags

advice | coffee talk | discussion | parenting | christmas | lent | prayer | family | children | books | moms | recipes | podcast | cleaning | love | encouragement | sharing | education | babies | learning | housekeeping | saints | relationships | humor | fertility | traditions | links | school | art | couples | food | casual fridays | small successes | homeschool | sex | giveaway | marriage | television | nfp | pregnancy | joy | saints of christmas | fun | tips | pro-life | technology | support | laundry | fashion | videos | career | faith | benedict xvi | cooking | new media | time management | haiti | resolutions | photos | charity | super bowl | teens | blogging | toddlers | questions | style | new years | clutter | winter | jesus | video | kids | priests | clothing | women | reading | mass | vegetables | mary | tradition | homemade | shopping | forgiveness | modesty | gifts | preferences | dinner | beauty | 40 bags | music | work | spouse | celebration | book | ideas | health | meals | time | sin | breakfast |

 

Super Snacks for Super Bowl

Share your recipes here!

Posted by Danielle Bean in Food on Thursday, February 04, 2010

We all know that fully half the fun of Super Bowl Sunday is the food. What’s cooking in your kitchen for Sunday’s big game?

Use the Mr. Linky form to share links to your blog post, Facebook entry, or F&F Connect page with recipes—or share in the comments! Happy cooking!

Comments
15
Filed under entertaining, football, recipes, snacks, super bowl

Entertaining Toddlers

any no-fail remedies out there?

Posted by Rachel Balducci in Family on Friday, January 15, 2010

On our trip to the funeral this week, I did not think through keeping two-year-old Henry entertained for the ride. He did okay on the way there, but the ride home was brutal.

“I want down,” he would say. Every five minutes.

I offered him the few board books we had in the car. Then I let him borrow his brothers’ Where’s Waldo books. Then I started grabbing random found objects in the hopes that something... READ MORE 

Comments
13
Filed under activities, entertaining, toddlers

Your Guide to a Stress-Free Thanksgiving

a work schedule keeps you on track and on time

Posted by Danielle Bean in Homemaking on Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Are you hosting a Thanksgiving gathering at your house this year? If so, I am here to tell you this:

Breathe. Relax. You can do this. It’s going to be just lovely.

We’ll be hosting Dan’s dad at our house this year. I am sad that my sister and her wonderfully big family won’t be able to join us like they did last year, but we truly are a wild enough gang all on our own.

Whether you’re hosting a small... READ MORE 

Comments
3
Filed under entertaining, hosting, meal planning, stress, thanksgiving

School Check Up and Economic Entertaining

Join us to talk about both on this week's podcast!

Posted by Lisa Hendey in News on Thursday, October 22, 2009

Download Podcast

This week on the Faith & Family Live Cast (click here to listen or click on the player above), Danielle, Rachel and I take time to check in and discuss how the students in our home are doing.  With midterms and progress reports hitting, we discuss how we handle grades and homework in our homes.  How do you find balance in the standards you set for your kids when the reality of their school performance... READ MORE 

Comments
1
Filed under education, entertaining, family finances, homeschooling, podcast

Too Two

How does this work again?

Posted by Rachel Balducci in Family on Monday, September 28, 2009

Toddlers are such a mystery. One minute they are staring at you with big, beautiful brown eyes full of love, mouth covered in whatever they just got their chubby little hands on. The next, they are climbing onto the arm of the couch and flailing their body, full force, onto padded cushions.

Or is this just my toddler?

Henry has recently discovered the fine art of being Two and my goodness it’s throwing... READ MORE 

Comments
6
Filed under entertaining, love, lunch, toddlers

New Year’s Eve…FAMILY STYLE

Posted by Robyn Lee in What's Cooking on Thursday, July 09, 2009

As a kid, I always thought that my parents let us stay up until midnight to celebrate the New Year.

But then came the year that my all-knowing older sister spilled the beans. “It’s not really midnight,” she told me. “Dad just changes the clock.”

Could it be true? It was. And it still is.

Each year, aunts and uncles, cousins and grandchildren in my family gather for a New Year’s Eve celebration.... READ MORE 

Comments
0
Filed under cooking, entertaining, feasts, food, holidays, hospitality, new years, party, recipes

Dinner Company

the work of entertaining

Posted by Rachel Balducci in Family on Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Tonight we had our parish priest over for dinner. It was a really wonderful time.

I’m one of those types of people who uses entertaining as an excuse to clean everything in sight. I work like crazy to clean all the nooks and crannies, knowing full well that the dinner company will almost certainly not see the inside of my closet and or bathroom cabinet. No, I’m kidding. I don’t clean *those* areas... READ MORE 

Comments
10
Filed under entertaining, food, guests, home

Super Bowl Snacks

What are you serving?

Posted by Danielle Bean in Food on Tuesday, January 27, 2009

The big game is coming up! Will you be watching?

And, more importantly, what foods will you be serving?

I am a big fan of traditional hot wings, but the deep frying and high butter content is not exactly health food.

Here’s a spicy alternative I definitely think is worth trying:

Spicy Citrus Wings

1/2 cup honey
1/4 cup orange juice
1 envelope Italian salad dressing mix
1 tablespoon hot pepper sauce... READ MORE 

Comments
10
Filed under entertaining, football, recipes, snacks, super bowl

Talking Turkey

Are you ready for T-day?

Posted by Danielle Bean in Food on Friday, November 21, 2008

Okay. So I just used the Butterball turkey calculator and now I am in a panic.

Apparently, to feed 5 adults and 17 children this year (What? That’s not what your guest list looks like?), I will need a 27 pound turkey.

Yikes!

I am thinking two turkeys are my best bet ... a cute little 10-pounder alongside a respectable 17-pounder.

Sound good?

How much turkey are you planning to roast next week?

Comments
12
Filed under entertaining, thanksgiving, turkey

Happy Oktoberfest!

weekend photo

Posted by Danielle Bean in Food on Saturday, October 04, 2008

We’ll be busy carving pumpkins and eating pie today. Here’s a look at the leaf cookies I make every year for our annual Oktoberfest. The yummiest cut-out cookies you will ever make. And the very best, dries-hard-and-fast decorative icing too.

Comments
8
Filed under cookies, entertaining, oktoberfest, photos

Page 1 of 2 pages  1 2 >