8 April 2006

We're back

We have returned from our trek to Marian Valley. Whilst I am updating with posts from our interesting time away (which I will be back dating to the relevant days), here are some funny moments from Clare (5):

- As we were approaching a tunnel, Clare sang out, "Happy Birthday Tunnel!" Why? We don't know - and neither does Clare. But when we came through the same tunnel on the return journey we recognised the "Happy Birthday Tunnel".

- We provided each child with their own small bottle of water, which we refilled during the trip. No-one wanted to share the younger children's "floaties". Naturally, Clare's bottle went missing. When we asked Clare what happened to her bottle, she replied, "I'm too rusty to remember water."

- During the evenings we used the quiet cafeteria area between the monastery and the chapel to have our dinner. Often one of the priests would go through between the two buildings and the children always exchanged greetings. One time, Clare called to Father Gabriel, "Father. Mary is the mother of God." As he stopped with a smile, she continued imperiously, "Don't forget." "No. I won't forget." Father replied.
He then told us a story of another young homeschooled child, about two years old, who was sitting on his mother's lap during Mass contentedly sucking on his dummy (pacifier). At the consecration, when the priest lifts the host into the air, the baby pulled out his dummy with a loud "Pop", pointed his stubby finger at the Host and announced "God!" and then promptly replaced the dummy. It was all Father and the rest of the congregation within hearing could do to keep back their smiles.

- Clare was parading around the room with a sleeping bag on her head as a hat. In imitation of the scenes in "Go Dog Go" she asked Ariel, "Do you like my hat?".
Ariel gave the correct response, "I do not!". Confusing story lines, Clare responded, "I'll grind you up to make my bread."

2 comments:

Michael Hardt said...

Clare sounds like a charmer. I was going to relate a story similar to her "Marian admonition," but I got so long-winded that I just posted it on my own blog.

Thanks for sharing these.

DavidofOz said...

Thanks Michael. Your post about anthropomorphic numbers is funny.
I'm glad your back and posting again.