Speed Update of what I promised previously..

A week ago I posted this. And sadly, I only got to one of those things on the list. Christmas was a busy time for Prudence! In a quick micro-update to atone for the lack of updating about things promised, I give you:

The list:

My flight experience to Another Smalltown on Tuesday (this should be up by Thursday PM): See this post. 


More on Prudence's Dad and his craziness (based on a conversation about Justin Bieber and what promises to be an adventure in last minute Christmas shopping over the next 2 days): My dad is one of the funniest people I know. While I was in Another Smalltown for Christmas, we watched a few Christmas specials, including re-watching the one by this beautiful man: 

Photo Cred: FAMEmagazine

But before Mr. Buble serenaded me on his very first Christmas special for the second time this holiday season, we watched the adoption special "A Home for the Holidays" (in which Mary J. Blige was wearing what can only be described as a red adult onesie.) 

Mary J. Blige's Fancy Red Onesie. Photo Cred: CBS

And like in the Buble special, one Justin Bieber makes an appearance to sing his one-hit Christmas wonder, Under the Mistletoe. 

Now... don't ask me how, but my dad somehow understands/gets/whatever's Lady Gaga. But he couldn't seem to grasp the idea of the term "shawty." Example (from Under the Mistletoe):

I should be playing in the winter snow / But Ima be under the mistletoe. / With you, shawty with you, / With you, shawty with you, / With you, under the Mistletoe, yeah.

After explaining that a "shawty" is a term for an attractive girl or girlfriend or whatever (according to Urban Dictionary), I did like the Spelling Bee, and used it in a sentence (or... in other song lyrics, actually):

 Go shawty, it's your birthday, you're gonna party like it's your birthday.

I think he got it after that. ANYWAY. Mr. Bieber gave us another round of his "Under the Mistletoe" in the Buble special. But this time, Dad wasn't as concerned with the term shawty but more about that level at which young Justin decided to wear his britches. My dad exclaimed, and I quote:

"Oh my goodness! Look at him. He's wearing them below his A$$!" 

Photo Cred: Aurora Record Company

 Oh Dad. Again, you get Lady Gaga, but not The Biebs. Guess he's just not a Belieber like Mr. Buble.

The Importance of Family and Traditions (because the season just begs for this): One of the last things we talked about in my 4th grade Sunday School class on the Sunday before Christmas was tradition. Catholicism is chock full of tradition, and I love every last bit of it. I had my students talk about their family traditions, and as expected, many of them revolved around being together, decorating the house for Christmas, getting a tree, and opening presents. I think these kinds of traditions are super important because it really helps to ground your family. It gives you something to look forward to time and time again.

In Prudence's family - we've ALWAYS had a Christmas Eve Drop-In at our house. I think this year marked the 25th annual - since I'm 26 and I was only 13 days old on my first Christmas - I don't think Mom entertained friends that year. But for 25 years, family, friends, and neighbors have come over to our house (yes, even when we moved about 7 miles from the old dwelling) on Christmas Eve to enjoy each other's company and enough food to feed an army. We're talking Smoked Turkey, BBQ, Rolls, Stuffed Mushrooms, Veggies, Cheese Dip, Spinach dip, and enough sweets to make you want to join Weight Watchers on Christmas morning. If we stopped having the drop-in, I don't know what some of our friends would do since they've ALWAYS come to our house on Christmas Eve. 

The Smoked Turkey from this year's Christmas Eve Drop-In

The Desserts. Mmmmm.

While putting everything together sometimes seems like a hassle, it's still a pretty great feeling to entertain friends and family and to enjoy the company of other people. On my (delayed) flight to Another Smalltown, I picked up a book called The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin. 

I'll do a more full-fledged post on it when I finish reading the book, but yesterday on the flight back to Smalltown, USA I read the chapter "Lighten Up" where Gretchen refers to "being a treasure house of happy memories." It's often the traditions and rituals we have with family and friends that supply us with our happiest memories. 


Christmas in Another Smalltown (because that's happening in t-minus 3 days...err, it happened 3 days ago): Christmas was grand in Another Smalltown. As I mentioned with family traditions, Prudence's family does indeed have a drop-in on Christmas Eve were upwards of 60 people come to our house for food and fellowship. Lots goes into preparations for the evening, but it's great to see family friends who've watched me grow up - especially since I've moved away from Another Smalltown and am only there about 3 or 4 times a year now.

This Christmas, we had two new additions to our family gathering: My brother got married in June, so this was Sister-in-Law's first Christmas with the Thorne family. And earlier this year, Brudder and Sister-in-Law adopted a beagle, so it was Spanky's first Christmas with us too. Food was eaten. Presents were opened. And fun was had. It was a really great Christmas - it just went by too fast!

So...there you have it. A relatively speedy update of topics I had promised previously. Hope you all had a very Merry Christmas, readers! Happy 4th Day of the Christmas Octave!

It's the little things...

I'm on my "lunch break" from writing THE BIG PAPER... so of course, I turn to writing here, because that makes sense...

It got cold in Small Town, USA. So cold that my HVAC unit froze and sounded like it wanted to take flight every time it kicked in trying to heat up tiny apartment. Which makes it difficult to sleep, in case you didn't know that. I took a gamble and switched my thermostat over to Emergency Heat last night, and said HVAC quieted down and I slept in peace. (And when I checked when I quickly stopped in at home to make lunch, HVAC was no longer frozen. Yay.)

But then I was almost late for Daily Mass this morning. Apparently you shouldn't set your alarm for 7AM, turn it off after it blares "Hakuna Matata" at you for a few seconds, and turn the TV on to watch Boy Meets World (with Cory and Topanga - the greatest love story we'll ever know, children of the 90s) -- because you might fall back asleep. God smiled on me though, because I made every light through Small Town's Uptown area and got into the Church before the sacristy door creaked open, cuing the start of Mass at 8:30. Yay.

On my way to pick up my morning coffee and blueberry scone, I was on the phone with my Dad for the second time (ever since I got back to Small Town, he's been much more chatty on the phone - me thinks someone misses me! Aww Miss you too Daddy!) and some kind stranger offered me 50 cents for the parking meter. What a nice act of kindness! I mean, I know it's only 50 cents, but that's a whole hour on the meter. And I really only needed like 10 minutes to run in and out of Small Town Coffee Shop that I love so dearly. It made me reflect on this season of Advent - showing others, even complete strangers that you'll never, ever see again and don't have to impress because of that -- random acts of kindness and compassion. It's good stuff. I like it. Yay.

Oh. So my last post - Pumpkin Pie and Prevenient Grace - I realize, ha, I never explained what prevenient grace is or why I randomly threw a BIG CRAZY THEOLOGY term in the middle of a post primarily about whipped cream and pumpkin pie. So here goes:

Simply put, prevenient grace is the grace that our Blessed Mother received from God at her conception. With the celebration of the solemnity of the Immaculate Conception yesterday and with the new translation of the Mass, you may have heard the term plopped down in the middle of an offertory prayer that the priest offers just before the preparation rite. When I heard it at the Vigil Wednesday evening, my ears perked up at the sound of a cool new word - a word that I had no CLUE about what it truly meant. And I meant to make a mental note to ask Priest-Friend about it later, but then I had a long meeting about Soup and Snack (and some other Churchy things) so... I kind of forgot about it. Plus, who remembers words like prevenient when you only hear it once, unexpectedly?

Well... God smiled again, because out of the blue Priest-Friend brought it up in conversation and I got to learn! (Learning is fun.) After learning more about the COOL BIG THEOLOGICAL TERM, I had fun telling other people about my new-found knowledge, including my Dad. Now, Dad has quite the sense of humor, and he's also more in-tune with some of the pop culture lingo than I'm necessarily comfortable with. So... in explaining that "prevenient grace is the grace that God granted to Mary at her Immaculate Conception because He saw the future merits of her bringing Christ into the world for our salvation" to him via text message, he responded: "Like Gaga said: She was born that way.

She scares me. Alot.

Yeah..  I was at a loss for words too.