Mommy, you're dust!

And he's not dust, because he wiped his off???? I thought I had heard Father say the same words to him as to me: Man, remember you are dust and to dust you shall return.

I had a brainstorm at about midnight last night, that I actually remembered this morning upon waking: rocks. We'll use rocks for our prayer table! (I did say I thought of this at midnight, right? It all sounds logical at that time).

It's a bit contrived, but I think provides a really good hands-on concrete demonstration of the concept of sacrifice. Each time my son or I is "successful" with a sacrifice, we can place a rock on the table behind the prayer table (a table which serves as backdrop for the liturgical season). At the end of Lent, before he awakes Easter morning, I'll exchange the rocks with a larger number of polished stones, as part of our Easter decorations. A few theological ideas came out throughout the day: when we store up treasures on earth, the world recognizes them for what they are - but we are called to store up treasures in heaven - and the world does not always recognize their inherent value. The rocks we are using are ugly. Plain. (Ok, most of them came from the gravel parking lot at one of the parishes where I work - the other came from outside the parish hall –to be returned when we're done). The world sees fasting and sacrifices as pointless, plain, boring, too hard and therefore worthless, etc. But the treasures we store up in heaven, are passed through the hands of Our Lady who freshens them up, making them more beautiful, before they reach Our Lord - hence MORE polished stones than we will have rocks.

Now if I could just get off my little current long enough to stop taking rocks away with naughty behavior (both of us would have been in the hole with rocks by noon if I'd stuck with that rule). We did "give" each other rocks for what we each deemed thoughtful things on the part of the other person. I'm not sure what the family behind us thought during Mass when I was told "Mommy, I'll give you a hundred rocks so I can play with your hair!" only to be told 5 minutes later that I wasn't nice and I would losing all of my rocks. ;)

This year, we are doing things a little different:

*no computer when le Petit Prince is awake unless we’re doing something together

*attend Mass at least 4 times a week (this might mean being at church at 6:30 in the morning! And NOT central time zone 6:30, which I could almost do!)
*movies on Saturdays only (le Petit Prince says Monday, so maybe)
*meat on Sundays only (wanted to give it up entirely, but a week of being sick left enough meat in the freezer that won't last until Easter)
*no non-required purchases (vehicle maintenance/replacement aside); groceries only during the first week of the month and minimal
*no candy, but some sweet things on the weekends is fine
*volunteer at the semi-local Pregnancy Crisis Center (nothing is local here!)
*purge items that could go to the PCC or another family
*weekly Stations of the Cross at the parishes
*finish re-sewing chapel veil to fulfill the employer's request of making it smaller
*begin Catechesis of the Good Shepherd training - level 3
*say a novena regarding the continuation of the elementary Montessori training

*don’t let morning prayers slip by

We get a rock every time we fulfill one of the above as well as for thoughtful gestures as pointed out by the other person.

EDITED LATER: It worked pretty well actually. We left town for Easter weekend and I conveniently forgot something after we were in the car so I came back in to swap the rocks and stones - when we arrived back home, he went straight for the prayer table and LOVED it! We ended up creating flowers to "plant" in the colored stones for every day of Easter, showing that life comes from anything when we depend on God.