Rosemary tagged me for this easy meme.

1. Emails from my husband. I’d rather sit in his lap and have him tell me about his adventures, but I’ll take what I can get.

2. Little elves who make my bed for me.

3. Finally being able to wear the clothes I wore when I conceived the nearly 14 month old babe. Well, I wasn’t actually wearing them when I literally conceived her, but you know what I mean.

4. Washing machines. I spent one summer washing all my clothes by hand (out of necessity, not choice). Washing machines forevermore make me very happy.

5. When I ask the kids for their prayer intentions and Petey says, “For the Pope and his intentions.” He has no idea what he’s saying, but it’s absolutely adorable.

6. A clean and tidy house. Does anything compare?

Kristina wants to know 7 things about me…things not generally known.

That’s tough. I’ll blab about everything. I’ve been blabbing here for quite some time too. But I’ll try.

1. My middle name is Anna-Marie. Not Anne-Marie. Not Anna-Maria. And not Anna Marie. DO NOT forget that hyphen.

2. I do not prefer apricots or peaches. Not to eat. Not as a lotion scent or a body fragrance.

3. I have hitchhiker’s thumbs.

4. I drink my coffee with quite a bit of milk, but no sugar.

5. My favorite “for-pay” job I ever had was as a cook for migrant farm workers one summer. It was a cherry farm. I didn’t make much money, but I got to cook lunch and dinner for 20 or 30 men.

6. I have a fear of drowning. I have an even bigger fear of my children drowning.

7. I do not like biology.

I must go to bed, so I won’t do any tagging. Play along if you have the time!

SFO Mom tagged me for this. Like her, I suspect that the brains behind this is Father Tim who is trying to trick bloggers into admitting their traditional leanings so he can ban them.

Here’s a fun quiz made up especially for bloggers. The rules are easy. Just post the quiz on your blog and answer the questions, then pass it on to five other bloggers, and link to them in your post. Be sure to link back to the one who sent it to you.

1. Do you attend the Traditional Latin Mass or the Novus Ordo? I think I only learned what Novus Ordo meant about two years ago. I did just learn the Sanctus because I’m using Prima Latina for my 4th grader. That took us 5 weeks. So, at that rate, I’ll be ready to attend a Latin Mass in about ten years.

2. If you attend the TLM, how far do you drive to get there? N/A

3. If you had to apply a Catholic label to yourself, what would it be? A Hundred Percenter

4. Are you a comment junkie? If I weren’t to some extent, then I wouldn’t have them turned on at all.

5. Do you go back to read the comments on the blogs you’ve commented on? I try to remember to.

6. Have you ever left an anonymous comment on another blog? No.

7. Which blogroll would you most like to be on? Barb’s response pretty much sums me up, too: I read a lot of blogs in Bloglines, and doing that partly keeps me “honest” in terms of blogroll. I can’t see their blogroll and be all obsessive over whether I’m on it. I’m terrible about updating my own, as well.

8. Which blog is the first one you check? Usually Danielle Bean or Eric Scheske.

9. Have you met any other bloggers in person? Yes! Barb, Denise, Cris, The Kitchen Madonna, and Sarah.

10. What are you reading? Chosen and Cherished by Kimberly Hahn for a Bible study I’m attending. Shiloh by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor to the kids.

Bonus Question! Has your site been banned by Spirit of Vatican II? No.

If it has, who do you think Father Tim really is? Only banned sites can guess?

I pass this quiz on to: Everyone I named in question #9 not already tagged, plus Kat and Barbara.

I was tagged by Rosemary to list 8 things about me. I suppose I ought to avoid the obvious ones (I’m Catholic, I homeschool, I’m a military dependant)?

1. I have a difficult time answering the question, “Where are you from originally?” I was born in Cleveland, but didn’t stay there long. I attended four different elementary schools in two different states, but I wasn’t a military brat or the child of a corporate jet-setter. We just moved.

2. I suppress, sometimes not very well, an aggressive, argumentative, sarcastic, cynical, my-way-or-the-highway, stubborn, and highly-opinionated personality.

3. Although the color red complements my complexion, it does not complement my personality. It accents all the personality traits listed in #2, so I avoid it. I’m sure pink would look nice on me, but I just can’t bring myself to wear that color either. I will wear lavender or sage, but I mainly prefer navy and tan and various shades of blue.

4. In an effort to combat those personality traits listed in #2, I have developed a neutral facial expression and tone of voice and have programmed non-committal “mmmm”s and “uh-huh”s and nods of the head into my automated response system. Likely, this has kept me out of prison for assault and battery against a myriad of obnoxious people who hold ridiculous, small-minded, ignorant or offensive opinions. Unfortunately, many people confuse this neutrality with tolerance of their ideas, and I just seem to get more of it.

5. I don’t work as hard as I ought to on #2 or #4 with regard to my husband. He bears the brunt of my aggressive, obnoxious, and argumentative personality. Fortunately, he’s a real man, and he can handle me.

6. I look forward to a day when Bill and I (and no children under the age of burdensome) can travel spontaneously and for extended periods of time throughout this country and others to really get a feel for an area.

7. I have no desire to ever work for pay again. I have even less of a desire to get sucked up into a mammoth charitable organization with the same headaches of a real job (bosses, deadlines, meetings, office politics), but no benefit of a cushy paycheck to make it all worthwhile.

8. If I ever use my engineering degree again, I hope it will be for a worthy cause, like building the infrastructure in a Third World country. I can definitely see myself living in South America designing water treatment facilities. Except for the bugs and other creepy-crawlies…I have a serious stumbling block with that part of the plan.

I know lots of people have already done this one, so I tag anybody who feels left out. Leave a note in the comment box if you want to play.

Lorri of The Mac and Cheese Chronicles wants to know what I’m reading. I won’t count any book I haven’t actually opened in more than two weeks which makes this list very short:

The Seven Habits of Highly Effective Families: so far, very interesting. At the end of every chapter there are discussion questions for older family members, and family activities to include younger children. It is basically about forming a family vision about where you want to go (in life) and how you want to get there (together).

That’s it on books. I’m also trying to read the latest issues of The National Catholic Register, Faith and Family, and Heart and Mind magazine.

But mostly, I’ve been online flipping between Emmanuel Books, Mother of Divine Grace, Amazon (for reviews and superior descriptions – I’ll support Emmanuel Books, even though it’ll cost me more) and the IHM Conference pages. I plan to go to the conference on Friday, June 8th (anybody want to meet me there?) and want to have my book list ready.

Sarah tagged me for this. I’ll do the best I can.

What are your favorite top ten romantic movies?

I’m recently coming to the conclusion that 99% of the time, I watch a movie and immediately put it out of my mind. This is the only way to explain how I can scan my rental history at Netflix and only vaguely recall half the movies listed there. And romance movies are not a genre I typically aim to watch. There is only so much suffering to which I want to subject my husband. So, here’s what I came up with:

1. 50 First Dates

2. It Happened One Night

3. Groundhog Day

4. Moonstruck

5. The Notebook

6. The Sound of Music

7. The Princess Bride

8. The Age of Innocence

OK, that’s the best I can do. They are in no particular order, but those last three are movies I would actually watch over and over again. #6 and #7 I have actually watched over and over again, because I own them (a rarity for me). #8 I saw only once in the theater, but I absolutely LOVED it. I read and loved the book first (see below), and thought Scorsese did an excellent job making it a movie.

What are your top five favorite romantic books (fiction or non-fiction)?

Again, I’m pretty good at forgetting books I read. Unlike movies, I will re-read books and it’s more fun if you forget the ending, don’t you think? Also, again, romance is not my favorite genre, so the pickings are slim.

1. All of Jane Austin’s books. I have a three-volume collection of her six novels. I loved them all. But I will confuse one from another, so I won’t even try to distinguish which I liked best. In my free time, I will re-read them, and I’ll let you know my favorite then.

2. Much Ado About Nothing. OK, this is a Shakespearean play, but I’m including it here, since there isn’t a category for this form of literature. Shakespeare’s comedies were all great romances, and I prefer them to the tragedies like Othello and Romeo and Juliet. Even in my most angst-ridden teen days, I just didn’t get the whole suicide thing.

3. The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton.

I’m sure if I spent another hour here at the computer, I could come up with more. But this will have to do.

If money were no object, where (on earth) would you like to spend your Valentine’s Day and how would you spend it? In other words, what is your idea of a perfect Valentine’s Day date?

I’d say Rothenburg ob der Tauber which is a small medieval village in Germany…but not in February. I’d rather be someplace warm. Maybe Cozumel? I’ve never been to Mexico, but I’d like to check it out.

I was tagged by SFO Mom. As an aside, I despise Wikipedia, but I’ll play anyway.

Here’s how you play:

1) Go to Wikipedia
2) In the search box, type your birth month and day but not the year.
3) List three events that happened on your birthday
4) List two important birthdays and one death
5) One holiday or observance (if any)

My birthday is April 7th.

3 events:

1805 – First public performance of Beethoven’s Third Symphony (Eroica).
1906 – Mount Vesuvius erupts and devastates Naples.
1933 – Prohibition was repealed for beer of no more than 3.2% alcohol by weight (or 4% by volume), eight months before the ratification of XXI amendment.

2 important birthdays:

1506 – Saint Francis Xavier, Spanish founder of the Society of Jesus (d. 1552)
1954 – Jackie Chan, Hong Kong actor

1 death:

30- Jesus according to the Bible (Do you see why I hate Wikipedia? I mean, really…what Bible says that Jesus died on April 7th, 30? Are there dates in your Bible? What calendar are they using?)

Holiday/observance:

World Health Day – April 7th of every year is designated as World Health Day and celebrated by the 191 member countries of the World Health Organization to emphasize significant issues in public health of worldwide concern. Observed annually since 1948.

You’re it!

Celeste
Sarah