Confirmation Saint

   
     After months of deliberation and procrastination, I have finally chosen my patron saint for Confirmation! This spring I will (hopefully) be receiving the Sacrament of Confirmation. I say hopefully because, well, long story short, it depends on if we can sell our house and move in time. In the St. Louis diocese, they confirm in eighth grade rather than eleventh like here.

     I know many of my friends are not Catholic so I'm going to explain why we choose saints at Confirmation. Saints are those people who we know are in Heaven. When we receive Confirmation, we choose a patron saint. We ask saints to intercede (pray) for us in a special way, just like we ask our friends to pray for us. A patron saint... I really don't know how to explain it, they just pray for you extra. :P Also, their lives are virtuous and are examples for us to follow.

     I had thought about several different saints. St. Therese of Lisieux (the Little Flower) was one of my top choices because I loved her Little Way and her book, A Story of a Soul, was very touching to me. I also considered Edith Stein (St. Benedicta of the Cross) because of her courage (and the fact that the 1940's are one of my favorite time periods to study), but I really didn't know much about her. St. Catherine Bolonga was another option, becasue she is the patron saint of artists.

     I thought I had to choose a female saint, but I asked Fr. Monsingor Cox right before the Christmas Eve Mass. He said I could choose a male saint, if I made the confirmation name feminine!

     So I choose St. Thomas Aquinas. I could fill up pages and pages with a biography of St. Thomas (this website certainly did!), but haven't the time. St. Thomas is the most famous for his book Summa Theologica-- which is humongous and very scolarly. He is known as the saint of reason, logic, writing... many things. :) In his fifty years on earth, he wrote over 60 works! Here is a short biography of his life.

    One of my favorite ideas from his works (I don't know if it was just an idea he got across, or an actual phrase he used) is Fides et Ratio-- Faith and Reason. If I haven't already written a lengthly blog post on that in the past, expect one in the future. :)

     Oh, and my Confirmation name is Thomasina. :)

Butterbeer

I've always loved making crafts or other things with a "theme"... drinking tea always reminded me of the Mad Hatter's Tea Party, or perhaps Mr. Tumnus' tea in Narnia.

J.K. Rowling's books are crammed full with many interesting foods. Most of them are entirely made up. All of them sound delicious. So guess what I decided to do? Make some. Food of choice? Butterbeer.

Butterbeer was the preferred drink for teens at the Three Broomsticks in Hogsmeade (adults went for the firewhiskey). Here is a recipe (with some improvation by yours truely):

• 1 cup of cream soda
• 1/4 cup of butterscotch syrup (you could conceivably use butterscotch chips, or grown ups can use that butter snap thingie)
• 1/8 tbsp butter

Melt the butterscotch and butter in a cup in the microwave until the butterscotch starts to bubble and the butter is entirely melted. Stir. Pour in cream soda. Drink should fizz quite a bit. Have it warm on a cold winter day, or chilled to cool you down.

You can experiment... I haven't tried these, but I imagine that milk, vanilla, and brown sugar would all taste good in Butterbeer!

This butterbeer has a very strong flavor-- don't plan on anyone being able to drink any more than half a mug. You could probably water it down a bit with some milk or extra cream soda. I don't know how the Hogwarts kids drank full mugs of it. :P They must have had a different recipe! Anyway, my family loved this drink, I hope you do, too!

English Country Line Dancing-- The Scottish

I finally found the videos I took at the Christmas Ball! Grandma and Papa gave us their old camera; it saves as a different format, hence the reason my searches didn't find it. But the good thing about the different format is the fact that it takes sound and can go on Blogger. :)
This dance is one of my favorites, although its not technically "English". We call it The Scottish, and it is the most tiring dance. It is so popular that they have to do it two times so everyone can have a go. It is a looong dance, and I taped nearly the whole thing. You do not have to watch all ten minutes of this. :)

A Post Without A Point

Welcome, 2010!!!

...where are the hover cars? Teleportation? Time travel? I'VE BEEN GYPED!

Well, I do have a a tiny little touch-screen device that is essentially a mini computer (iPod touch), so I guess its okay. :) BluRay players are sharper than movies in the theaters... It is strange to think that in 1950, a computer scientist predicted that in fifty years, computers would be able to fit inside one room. It is also strange to think that when my parents were children, a movie was made in which a guy drove to the future in a DeLorean. They traveled to 2015-- five years from now-- and found flying cars. But the electronic windows were covered with static.

I guess it just goes to show that you can never know what will happen. In 2008, could I have ever predicted that we would move (or, heh, be trying to move) away from our big/tiny town/city? No.

I could do a "Year in Review" post, although by this point, it would be "Last Year in Review." That would be a logical thing to do, since we did not send out Christmas cards. (I believe this is the third year that such an atrocity has occured...) But I haven't the time or the energy at the moment, though I might still do it. :) Besides, even though this is a Shaylynn's blog/FAMILY blog, I think that 3/4 of my followers are friends, not family. So if I do do such a post, it will happen later.

I honestly don't know what the point of this post it. I thought about telling everyone what we did on New Year's Eve... but 1) I haven't even done that for Christmas, and 2) It was rather boring, and would only bore you out of your minds.

So I have decided to be merciful to your poor brains and not detail New Year's Eve.

And, as such, this post really has no point other than to say HAPPY NEW YEAR and May this year be blessed for you and yours!

So... I shall shut up now. 

Oh, and I do have a gazillion pictures to upload-- mostly Thanksgiving and Christmas ones-- but our back computer is being temperamental and the laptop doesn't have the editing software. So that will come later.