I am dazed after the frenzy of packing a box for Susan/Hallel in France! It was a day of each of us writing cards and adding Belgian cookies, candy and some unmentionables that she requested... all packed around the sleeping bag that can fit in her back pack... It is a Labor of Love! And I still think with all the Christmas craziness that it won't get there in time! It was the best we could do, and it hurts to think that she could be sitting there with nothing from her family, but that is just the hit or miss of mailing a package around the world!
Davey came along to give the kitties a group hug... They are good sports and take the punishment that he lovingly dishes out... Ruth just took the box to town to mail it for me, and with a sigh of releif we are happy to have it with the Post office to care for now! The Belgian cookies will probably be crumbs, but delicious crumbs as Maria and Grandma Verly made them with love the other day! 
Yes, that is chocolate all over Davey's face... grandpa showed him the candy cupboard as soon as he got here. Maria just got home after going to the mass in the Nursing home and then Therese handed out some candy to the residents... Here is the story as Maria just told it to me;
Mary is busy painting a picture for Hallel - a Christmas tree and Hallel in blue... Here's the story of mass at the Nursing Home... while Mary paints for Hallel... "WE got to mass a few minutes late so we stood outside and Davey ran down the halls. Grandma was there we discovered and she was with some other ladies... they had coffee and cookies after, so we stayed for that. Then Therese remembered that she had candy to give away... she offered some to the ladies at the table, she would tell them her name and say Merry Christmas! She was very sweet and friendly! Then we went around to the residents and they told us the ones that really liked kids, so she even got some hugs."
"Davey would walk down the halls and all the people would OOOOhhhh and AHHHh. He would walk right up between the legs of the people sitting in the wheelchairs, and they would pick him up. I really like doing it! It is a great tradition!" Maria said. She is thinking of some of the things they can make and take the next time - A Christmas card, or a NewYears/Solemnity of Mary card or single decade rosary... I think that they will be frequent visitors to the Nursing Home... 10a is much easier with the 2 kids than 7a, and to see Great Grandma there and to show the kids the beauty of sharing with the wise and the old! 
Here is the entire verse from the Hymn for morning prayer this morning... the line about the "sing away their weeping" just reminded me of the community of the Lamb and how so much of their prayer is in the form of amazing song! So beautiful and uplifting and healing! I have been very close to tears lately when I think about Hallel being so far away and not having her with us this Christmas... But I need to go back to that quiet place within me and hear the voices of angels lifted in love for their spouse as they gather for the mass and adoration that they hunger for each day! It is hard when Hallel is here with us and she cannot find the daily mass that she needs nor the time kneeling at His feet in adoration! He is her LOVE, and she longs to be with Him much more than her earthly family! When I see how Maria is missing her spouse... I realize what a sacrifice it is for them to be seperated now due to his entering the Army!
After leaving their time in the nursing home... Therese went to the library and brought home a Minnie Mouse puppet... They were so cute in their matching red and black... well, you know what any good grandma has to do over and over... Here is that Hymn: "Strengthen feeble hands and knees,
Fainting hearts, be cheerful!
God who comes for such as these
Seeks and saves the fearful;
Now the deaf can hear the dumb
Sing away their weeping,
Blind eyes see the injured come
Walking, running, leaping." see http://www.magnificat.com/
Such a crazy wonderful scene we see in this wondrous work that Our Lord did while He walked on this earth and continues to do in our spirits and souls! Today these are his Words in the Gospel - Luke 7: 18-23 "Go and tell John what you have seen and heard: the blind regain their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, the poor have the good news proclaimed to them. And blessed is the one who takes no offense at me." Wow! Just invisioning the amazing joy and awe and absolute wonder that this scene brought to those that were present to "see" and be "healed." This is happening still all over the world and in our own lives! I sense this same wonder at how He has and continues to touch me personally in my life! 
Jesus, it really dawns on us that we are blessed to know that you are touching each one of our lives individually... we are so filled with joy and awe that we want to share it with those around us... we reach out to touch those that are maybe lonely or sick and share the joy that we have found in You! May we be happy with all those the closest to us... our families! There is where we truly need to remember that these are the ones we are given to love and serve the most in our lives! Jesus, we trust in you! Amen and Halleluia! 
Bless-bless, Barb"Our discovery of God is, in a way, God's discovery of us. We cannot go to heaven to find Him because we have no way of knowing where Heaven is or what it is. He comes down from heaven and finds us. He looks at us from the depths of How own infinite acutality, which is everywhere, and His seeing us gives us a new being and a new mind in which we also discover Him. We only know Him in so far as we are known by Him, and our contemplation of Him is a participation in His comtemplation of Himself. - We become contemplatives when God discovers Himself in us." Thomas Merton
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