How I Spent My Day Off, by Tiffany O'Neill

My husband and I have an agreement. We give each other a Free Day once a month. This means that one of us gets a day to do whatever we choose while the other one feeds, changes, entertains and bathes the three kids. All day long. I always half-joke that when it's my turn, I'll happily develop selective amnesia (what kids? what laundry? what dishes?). It rarely happens that way, though. I can't speak for fathers, but I feel confident that mothers everywhere understand that after those babies are born we are never really and truly carefree. Your kids are on your mind, stealing thought-space you had reserved for contemplating all the goods in Bloomingdale's you'd buy if you won a shopping spree, or for reminiscing about the very best vacation you ever took before you even met your husband.

Not this time, I told myself. I needed my break this past Sunday more than usual. I was starting to feel, as Bilbo Baggins once said so succinctly, "like butter spread over too much bread." I gave my husband a quick overview of what-to-feed-whom and what-to-do-if as he drove me to the train station. I relished boarding the train without a stroller (was there ever a creature more graceful and free?!). A few minutes later I was traipsing out of the train, and trotting up the stairs (no pee-smelling elevator for me today!). I paused to enjoy the first few seconds when I emerged from the ground and into Manhattan. I love New York. I mean, if you see me wearing one of those tee shirts (which you won't) you can be sure I'm sincere about the heart.

First I had brunch at a diner in Herald square. As I ate, I read my library book and forgot that I was not the only person in the room. No one asked me to take them to the bathroom or to pick up their crayon for the seventy-fifth time. (This could have happened; there are some characters in that part of town. But it didn't.) Then I wandered to Bryant Park and watched them building the ice skating rink. Maybe this year, I thought, the girls can begin learning to skate. I had a cup of coffee and read some more under the leafy green canopy just starting to go orange around the edges. I sat by the carousel. I watched the kids flipping through the shelves of children's books that are always out there amid the colorful miniature tables and chairs. Bryant Park is adjacent to the New York Public Libarary. My girls just love looking at books outside while they wait for their turn on the carousel. The last time we were there as a family I was certain Ronan was going to take his first steps. I checked the time. It felt like I had been away from them longer than I had. I hoped Daddy was giving them a decent lunch.

I stopped into H&M on Fifth Avenue and shuffled around the store with an armload of clothes for an hour. Then I realized everything would look horrid on me and vowed to come back when I lost twenty pounds. I decided to visit Barnes and Noble. Now, if it's one sacrifice I've felt since having kids it's the loss of movie theaters and Barnes and Noble. Okay, that's two sacrifices. I started out looking at all the cookbooks and Gifts for Writers that no one ever buys for me, but soon I found myself in the children's section. I found a wonderful book called A Treasury for Five-Year-Olds, perfect for my Elizabeth turning five in two weeks. Thinking of Elizabeth's birthday made me remember that Build-a-Bear Workshop is right next door to B&N, and that's where we've promised to take the girls as a birthday treat. The minute I went inside I smiled, because I can't wait to see the look on Elizabeth's face when she sees this place. I checked the time again.

When you find yourself Catholic and standing on Fifth Avenue in New York on a Sunday evening a few minutes before five-thirty, there's only one place you can go: St. Patrick's. No matter how many times I visit the cathedral, I'm awestruck. I just keep thinking, What faith it took to build this. Would it be built today? I sat next to a family with two little girls. I hoped my kids were as good today with Daddy at Mass as these little ones were.

Finally, it was time to go home. The few minutes between New York and New Jersey seemed to take so much longer than they had coming in. I thought, as the train pulled in to Hoboken, Maybe next time I'll only take half-a-day off. Or, better yet, maybe I'll just get a pedicure, then take the girls into the city for lunch. Yeah. I'll do that.

A House Full of Angels

Today during snack time Megan confided a Halloween fear. "I'm scared of seeing a ghost when I go trick-or-treating," she said.

I nodded, acknowledging that, yeah, that could be scary. I cherish the rare moments when the more introverted of my two daughters opens up to me in her shy, already-guarded way, and I try hard not to dismiss her feelings. "You don't have to be afraid of anything, you know. You have an angel--an angel that God has asked to watch especially over Megan O'Neill in Hoboken every single day. Your angel isn't more than a few feet from you at all times, and Jesus says that your angel talks to God about you."

Megan smiled, liking this idea. Who wouldn't? "Really? But, I can't see them."

"Well, no. But you know that doesn't mean they aren't here." This is what I love about my children, and all children. They believe without seeing. My whole life I have believed in God without needing visual proof, and I pray that my children will be the same. My faith hasn't saved me from grief and tragic mistakes, but it has saved me from feeling completely alone during those times.

I turned to Ronan, sitting in his high chair happily shoving a bananna into his mouth like a sword swallower. "Buddy, where's your angel?" Without missing a beat, he looked to his right and smiled. I asked him again, and again he grinned and looked straight at spot to his right. At nothing.

Later at dinner we talked about the subject of angels again. Elizabeth raised the question, "Are they boys or girls? Or maybe a boy gets a boy angel and a girl gets a girl angel."

Before I could go into the mystery of angelic gender she shrugged and said, "I guess it's something we don't know." That lovely blind faith again.

It occurred to me that the angels that God has appointed for my children, the angels that constantly see His heavenly face, those angels were sitting around the dinner table with us. They're upstairs, maybe, as I write this, in whatever corners of the bedrooms they hang out in while my precious babies sleep. If filling your home up with guardian angels isn't enough reason to have as many children as God will bless you with, I don't know what is.

To Barbie or Not to Barbie

When my daughter came home from her first day at kindergarten a few weeks ago I was eager to hear the details of her day. I expected her to tell me that she played with the pretend kitchen or with baby dolls, the way I did during play time. I was a little disconcerted when she said, "We played with Barbies! We dressed them up sassy." I have never heard my child use the word "sassy," and I certainly didn't expect her to play with Barbies at her Catholic school. Where is the educational value in that? This made me think of my own attitude toward Barbie and how differently I've come to view the doll, and especially her wardrobe, since I've had daughters.

I loved my Barbies as a kid. Before I had children, I never gave much thought to the bigger influence Barbie has on little girls. It wasn't until Elizabeth and Megan received a couple of Barbies for Christmas that I realized how dangerous having this doll in my house could be. Left to her own devices, Barbie dresses like a tramp. I noticed when I cleaned up the girls' room that if the dolls weren't laying in a naked, peach-colored tangle they were dressed as if they were headed out for a night of clubbing. Clearly, Barbie wasn't helping my efforts to teach my daughters modesty. I decided that taking the dolls away wasn't the answer. There had to be a way that my girls could enjoy their Barbie dolls the way I did, while avoiding the subliminal message that a girl is only pretty if she's wearing a halter mini-dress and platform sandals.

I'm not a seamstress, so making clothes wasn't an option. Thankfully, there are like-minded women out there who sew and utilize the Internet for marketing their talents. Barbee and Friends saved the day! This site has a lot of lovely modest doll outfits, suitable for taking Barbie to church or to the ball. I'll be ordering some modest outfits for the Barbies in my daughter's class. If we can't have the Barbies replaced by more appropriate toys, then maybe we can change her wardrobe to reflect the way a girl in a Catholic school should dress. Elizabeth's teacher seems sweet and committed to teaching Catholic values. She's young, though, and not a mother. She probably just hasn't taken a good look at Barbie's closet.

Many Catholic families choose not to allow their children to play with Barbie dolls at all, and that is understandable. We've chosen to let Barbie stay--as long as she stays covered up.

Missing: Family Pumpkin

Here is a picture of our pumpkins, taken only a week ago. Sadly, this photo is all we have left of the little orange guy in the lower right. Yesterday as we were all piling out of our apartment on the way to the park we discovered that someone had pilfered our Family Pumpkin (so named because it's the one that belongs to all of us, as opposed to the little pumpkins each kid has laid claim to). Someone actually walked right up our steps and snatched our pumpkin off of our stoop! Unbelievable. Moments like these make me doubt the brilliance of our "reverse migration" from the 'burbs to the city.

Elizabeth and Megan were not so much upset as they were baffled. "But why did they take it? Why didn't they just go to the pumpkin farm and get their own?" The goodness of children cannot fathom stealing. When does that change for some people? We all start out with the same innocence. I'm genuinely curious to know what occurs in the human mind that distorts that innate sense of right and wrong. I was raised in a very bad neighborhood. Our house was burgled on a regular basis. Every time it happened I felt violated and frustrated, (we had no recourse, being part of a culture that really believed it was futile to report a few worthless trinkets being lost and damage done to a rickety back door to the police) but I never got over the bewilderment. Just like my daughters' reaction to being robbed for the first time, after decades of experiencing petty theft, I'm still marveling that people steal.

Sadly, it seems that many people expect others to be dishonest. The other day I realized that I had inadvertantly walked out of the grocery store with a box of linguine in the stroller basket that I didn't pay for. When I stopped in to pay for it the next day, the cashier was amazed. "Really? Oh. Okay. Wow. Most people wouldn't bother."

The girls were with me when I paid for the linguine, and they understood that of course you couldn't just walk out with free pasta. Maybe it was good for them to see an example of honesty, especially since they now know how it feels to be the victim of dishonesty.

Instead of ranting about how much I dislike living in Hoboken and how I wish we had stayed in our boring not-nearly-as-hip town where at least we could have a pumpkin on the porch for crying out loud, I got a grip. "Let's pray for the person who took our pumpkin," I said to the girls. "They must not realize it makes Jesus sad when we steal." Daddy chimed in with, "Well, now we have an excuse to visit the pumpkin patch again!" That suggestion went over very well.

My three-year-old isn't taking any chances. "Okay," Megan said, "but this time we'll keep our pumpkin inside!"

Give Eve a Break

Who can resist the temptation to pick a round, rosy apple right off its branch? Apple-picking is a favorite fall activity in New Jersey. The sunny weekends we've been having are made for a day at the farm. Last Sunday we trekked out to Sun High Orchards in Randolph with the kiddies for apples, pumpkins and hayrides--the stuff of great autumn memories.

Best of all, this was affordable memory-making. For us, family outings are often overshadowed by the price tag. Something that shouldn't be a financial burden, such as a trip to a family farm or going to a carnival, can make the "larger family," (apparently a couple with three kids fits into this category--sad, somehow, to me) feel priced out of the game. Sun High Orchards offers apples at a $1.79 per pound, and hayrides were only a buck. We filled up two bags of apples, picked a pumpkin and enjoyed a ride around the farm all for just over $18.00.

Now it's time for Mommy and her sous chefs to delve into the cookbooks and see what we can make with the, er, fruits of our labor.

October, Then and Now

I have always been passionate about October. When I became a Catholic, I added new reasons to the list of why I love the tenth month. I also erased a few.

I grew up in a mid-sized town in California's Central Valley, a predominately agricultural region. October meant fruit stands crammed with pumpkins, candy apples and pomegranates that were such a pain to eat but so worth it. October meant that the air would smell faintly smoky all month long and that fog would hover between the trees in the walnut orchards and soften the ramshackle houses in my neighborhood, making them almost quaint. October also meant Halloween. It meant dressing up like a devil with warty, pointy ears or a witch with my sister's green eyeshadow covering my entire face. One year I was beyond excited to dress up like Casper the Friendly Ghost, until I overheard my dad say to my mom, "Don't you think Casper is creepy? I mean, he's a dead kid, right?"October meant handing over my trick-or-treating loot to my babysitter so she could inspect it for razor blades.

Now I live in New Jersey. It's hard to embrace October in this part of the country, though it's undeniably lovely. Fall here slips through the fingers, like the hometown fog I miss so much I dream of capturing some of it in a jar to keep on my desk. Now I am a Catholic and October means praying the Rosary and All Hallows Eve. It's often said that many of our Christian holidays were just Pagan observances spit-shined and repackaged. As a Catholic starting to figure all this stuff out, I think it's safe to say that the opposite is true of All Hallows Eve. Our vigil for All Saints' Day has been hijacked. I intend to rescue it, if only a little bit, in the minds of my children.

Every Friday in October and November I do a "fall craft" with my girls. Last week we cut out paper jack o' lanterns and taped them proudly in the window for the neighbors to admire. Today we'll color pictures of saints and do the same thing. I hope that October will be cherished by my children, too--for all the right reasons.

For great ideas for celebrating All Saints' Day (including amazing original coloring pages) check out my favorite Catholic mom-type-stuff blog, Waltzing Matilda.