The Scoop on Granny

Name:
Cathi

Status:
Dreaming of the mountains...


Who is Granny?

I'm the incredibly blessed mother of 9, "Granny" to 16, and wife of "The Papa," the knight-in-shining-armor whose loving support has made it possible for me to stay home and give my life to mothering, homemaking, and 26 years of homeschooling. Life at Granny's House is full of laughter, friendship, books, music, lively debate, writing, and good things to eat. My days are made even more meaningful by coming alongside other moms, giving them the support and encouragement that I lacked as a young mother and helping them to network with each other in ways that strengthen homes and families. A few times a year I board a plane to visit my "away" kids, to attend the birth of a grandchild, or to enjoy some lazy days with my best friend, but I always love coming back to...Granny's House.

My Complete Profile

On Granny's Calendar
  • August 15 - SAC Day begins
  • August 16 - Sam is 7!
  • August 20 - Kristen's birthday
  • August 30 - THE WELTYS ARRIVE!
  • Sept 3 - FAMILY PICTURES
  • Sept 3 - Chris' birthday
  • Sept 5 - Henry is 9!
  • Sept 7 - Isaac is 10!
  • Sept 17 - The Papa's birthday
  • Sept 23-30 - Granny and Papa go to Hawaii
  • Sept 26 - PawPop is 88!
  • Sept 29 - Tim is 15!
  • Oct 2 - Cheyenne's birthday
  • Oct 4 - Liam is 5!
  • Oct 7 - John Caleb is 17!
  • Oct 18 - Tony's birthday



  • Email Granny!


    Get your own calendar



    Granny Cares
  • Care Calendar
  • Agape Pregnancy Help Center San Antonio
  • World Vision

  • Granny Cooks (and Eats)!

  • The Pioneer Woman Cooks
  • Once a Month Mom
  • $5 Dinners
  • Full Bellies, Happy Kids
  • A Year of Crockpotting


  • Granny's House (and yours!)

  • Simple Mom
  • The Nesting Place
  • Between Naps on the Porch
  • The Inspired Room



  • Granny gets around...
  • A Holy Experience
  • MommyLife
  • Confessions of a Pioneer Woman
  • Preschoolers and Peace
  • Breathing Grace
  • theMangoTimes



  • Granny stays informed...
  • Real Clear Politics
  • Fox News
  • Drudge Report

  • Granny Thinks...
  • Al Mohler
  • Between Two Worlds
  • Blog and Mablog
  • First Importance
  • Equipping the Saints
  • Desiring God

  • Granny says you may go to...
  • PowerLine Blog
  • Michelle Malkin
  • SteynOnline
  • WSJ Opinion Journal Best of the Web
  • GetHuman
  • Home School Legal Defense Association

  • Granny goes to the movies...
  • Netflix
  • Rotten Tomatoes
  • ScreenIt.com

  • Granny is watching!
  • Blue Pencil Editing
  • SPOGG
  • Mighty Red Pen
  • Conjugate Visits

  • Granny smiles at...
  • Purgatorio
  • ScrappleFace
  • LarkNews
  • Sacred Sandwich


  • Thursday, June 30, 2011
    Pi in the sky?



    "I know it will be called blasphemy by some, but I believe that pi is wrong."That's the opening line of a watershed essay written in 2001 by mathematician Bob Palais of the University of Utah. In "Pi is Wrong!" Palais argued that, for thousands of years, humans have been focusing their attention and adulation on the wrong mathematical constant. Two times pi, not pi itself, is the truly sacred number of the circle, Palais contended. We should be celebrating and symbolizing the value that is equal to approximately 6.28 — the ratio of a circle's circumference to its radius — and not to the 3.14'ish ratio of its circumference to its diameter (a largely irrelevant property in geometry).

     Hey, I always think that twice the pi is a good thing :-)


    Mathemeticians Want to Say Goodbye to Pi


    hat tip: The Papa

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    has spoken at 1:06 PM
    0 Backtalks to Granny



    This morning, I encountered the following observation:


    The completely artificial and faux-pious construct of "biblical" patriarchy continues to wreak havoc on Christian families and is embittering and handicapping a generation of precious young women. We will be reaping the consequences of this humiliation far into the sunset, and apparently we will acknowledge it only when it's too late.


    Amen and amen.

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    has spoken at 9:46 AM
    1 Backtalks to Granny



    Sunday, June 26, 2011
    Just a reminder to my incandescent friends: On January 1, you'll no longer be able to buy the "old" 100-watt light bulbs. We're stocking up--some would call it hoarding--because we despise the LED alternative that George W. Bush & Co. rammed down our sockets, and so we're doing the math to see if we can manage to store enough for at least our own lifetimes, if not our kids'. The rolling "phase-out" will eventually include 75-, 60-, and 40-watt bulbs, although some will be exempt for a while (refrigerator bulbs, 3-ways, etc.). You've heard of home wine cellars? We are building a bulb cellar  :-)

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    has spoken at 9:21 PM
    3 Backtalks to Granny



    Sunday snippets, Ava June edition...


    I've been at the Okla-home for nearly four weeks now. It's been one of the sweetest times of my life, waiting for and then greeting our little preemie granddaughter, Ava June. Wasn't it just yesterday that I was posting her parents' wedding pictures and making sure CJ had all the kitchen stuff she needed? And now they're a family of three...a perfect little family with a perfect little girl that doctors predicted shouldn't be here yet and certainly shouldn't have been strong or well enough to come home yet. We've been reminded that God uses doctors but He doesn't consult them on timing. On my way home from the hospital on Friday, knowing that Ava was just a couple of hours behind me, I was flooded with the praise chorus: 


    Thy lovingkindness is better than life
    Thy lovingkindness is better than life
    My lips shall praise Thee
    Thus will I bless Thee
    I will lift up my hands unto Thy Name


    Don't know why that particular one flooded my heart, but it's exactly what I'm thinking and feeling this weekend...


    This week I made the prediction, on Facebook, that the winner of the next election and the next president of the United States will be my state's governor, Rick Perry. I am a far cry from endorsing him, but I just feel it in my bones. That said, I'm growing increasingly interested in Michele Bachmann, a woman for whom I have tremendous respect. I don't know that she has the money or the backing to go the distance, but I'd be willing to bet that she has a future.


    Yes to Hobby Lobby. LOVE that store. I'm glad to have one close to my house, but the one in Midwest City OK is the best one I've ever been in! And while I'm not one of those who will never shop on a Sunday, you gotta love a company that still has the courage to stay CLOSED on Sundays. 


    While I've been in Oklahoma, I've crocheted two baby blankets...one for Ava and one for Van. It's been a long time since I crocheted, and it was nice to have something to do to help pass the hours in the hospital as we waited for Ava to be released. Now I think I shall make one for Savannah, slightly larger since she's almost 1!


    I'm also venturing into another area from which I've been absent for a long time...I'm going to make curtains for Ava's room. This would have been standard operating procedure for me a few years back, but it's been so long that I may have to re-teach myself to thread the machine! 


    During my long drives in the past three weeks, I finished A Patriot's History of the United States and Song of Saigon. Both were excellent listens. Echoing my previous recommendation of the former, let me add two points: 1) It's very long. But then the history of the US is, well, long. If you get the audio version and the thought of 50+ hours is daunting, choose the 2X speed. The narrator reads slowly enough that even at double speed it's perfectly understandable. It takes a few minutes of getting used to, but it really helped me to have this option. 2) If you really think you can't get through it all this summer, listen to the second half. We've all gotten much more misinformation about history in the 20th century than in the first few, so a review of the 20th from a non-leftist position will be extremely valuable if you got, as I did, the public school version.


    Thoroughly enjoyed watching, via Netflix, the 4-episode Daniel Deronda.


    I'll be returning home on Tuesday, with just enough time to do laundry, repack, and stock our van with enough groceries to get us through our one-week stay in Red River, New Mexico. We always enjoy the cool respite from the south Texas heat and the time to do absolutely nothing but rest and visit (well yes, and cook!). This year there will be more than 40 of us congregating in the little mountain motel--I can hardly wait to get going!


    Okay, time to pay attention to the littlest Snippet...here are some favorite moments from the past three weeks. Hope your week is fabulous!


    This was the very first time CJ got to hold her little one, 24 hours after delivery.






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    has spoken at 3:33 PM
    4 Backtalks to Granny



    Friday, June 17, 2011
    Weekend snippets...
    The past few weeks have brought some surprises and this hasn't been the start to the summer that I envisioned...but then I suppose it's not summer yet! And when I get thrown curves, blogging is one of the first things to go. So since I have a little bit of time, I'm going to snip some snippets instead of waiting for Sunday, when I may or may not have time for more...

    It's time for a pedicure. Past time.

    Gov. Perry for president? Uh...Head-to-head I'd vote for him over Obama for sure. But seriously, we have to do better than this. I applaud much of what he's done in Texas, but I just don't trust him. But then, trust (in men) is relative. Trust compared to whom?

    You can survive in a small town if there's a Chinese buffet. 

    Please, please...read or listen to A Patriot's History of the United States before you pass Go or Collect $200. Please. (Approximately two of my readers will not appreciate this book. The rest of you will be asking, like me, "Why didn't we hear this in school?")

    Can't bear one more Weinergate joke. But you gotta wonder whether he's now sorry he eschewed his name's German pronunciation, not wanting to sound too Jewish. And that wasn't his worst mistake.

    I have taken up crocheting again after several years of neglecting the art. Stitching up a lusciously soft blanket for my granddaughter Ava and when finished I'll make one for Donovan. 

    Lots of things get old. Hospital cafeterias get old much faster.

    Watched Masterpiece Theatre's Wives and Daughters this week. It's not Downton Abbey, but it's a nice distraction during the wait for Season 2. It would have been worth it just for the hair, costumes, and decor!

    I like cities laid out in numbered streets. San Antonio, I'm lookin' in your direction...

    Construction workers should not stop to stare in the 4th floor hospital window at new mommies who are trying to pump milk. This is very bad form. 

    I do not want to like Golden Grahams. Really I don't. Someone save me from myself.

    Have a great weekend  :-) 




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    has spoken at 9:41 PM
    5 Backtalks to Granny



    Babies, babies!


    On June 5, CJ gave birth to little Ava June, weighing in at 3lbs 4oz at 32 weeks gestation. She has lived her short life so far in the NICU at OU Children's Hospital in Oklahoma City. When I knew that CJ was either going to deliver right away or be on bedrest for several weeks, I drove up from San Antonio to move in with them and do whatever I could, and I'm still here. So many of you are and have been praying for Ava since before her birth, and I can't tell you how much that means to me. Many others have helped CJ and Tony with food and drinks, preemie clothes, offers of places to stay, gift cards for the extra expenses...thank you so much. You've been "angels unawares."


    If you'd like to follow Amazing Ava's Adventures, let me know and I'll add you to her Facebook page where you'll see updates and more pictures.








    Ava, just moments old, being wheeled out of the delivery room on her way to the NICU


    CJ was under general anesthesia, so just minutes after she woke, Tony shows her the video of the birth


    Ava's first evening



    24 hours after birth, Ava finally gets to be held by her mommy


    First day of being dressed in real clothes, a reward for reaching the 1500 gram milestone


    Granny gets to hold Ava



    And...ten days before Ava was born, Granny's House was the scene of another birth. Kristen and Dave welcomed Donovan Mitchell Slaughter into their hearts and ours. Van's birth was very different from Ava's, yet we know with certainty that God had his hands on each one. Kristen's delivery took place in the same room that his big sister Carrie was born in seven years ago, and true to her nature, the delivery was a party, complete with our SuperMidwife Janet, lots of family and friends, Taco Cabana, and homemade cookies! Van weighed twice what Ava did...but we're sure she'll be catching up soon. Here are some pics from his Birth Day party...



    First, the two mommies who didn't know they'd be delivering cousins ten days apart!


    Tummy views, 30 and 40 weeks


    This was pretty much the position for the whole labor


    You'd think we were watching a movie, huh?


    Minutes after Donovan's birth, but he wasn't named until several hours later


    Welcome, little one!

    Janet weighs the little guy


    Okay, something about this picture reminds me of the Scarecrow, The  Tin Man, and the Cowardly Lion! The uncles were not present for the birth but were admitted minutes afterward to greet the newest male in the family.

    Six Slaughter kids!



    Two very different births...one very faithful God. Praise God, from Whom ALL blessings flow!

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    has spoken at 9:08 PM
    1 Backtalks to Granny



    Thursday, June 09, 2011
    Not sure I'm this smart.
    Aside from the fact that it's a very poorly written article, I LOVE this story!


    Spitting and urinating chimps 'replay Aesop's fable'

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    has spoken at 11:42 PM
    1 Backtalks to Granny



    Many of you know that I'm currently in Oklahoma with CJ and Tony as they spend these first days with their little, and I do mean little, daughter Ava June. CJ came home today, but while she was in the hospital I stayed at her house 40 minutes away. This has given me lots of opportunities to listen to my current audio book, which I want to pause and recommend to you. If you're a homeschooler teaching or planning to teach American history next year, you can really give yourself a great jump-start by reading or listening to A Patriot's History of the United States: From Columbus' Great Discovery to the War on Terror. If you want to brush up on your history but you're sick of left-wing revisionists masquerading as historians, this book will not disappoint. If you're my age or younger (and weren't homeschooled), you probably never heard the real history of America. Change that this summer.

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    has spoken at 10:48 PM
    1 Backtalks to Granny



    Wednesday, June 01, 2011
    Here's one of those things that's hard to put your finger on. You've been hearing it for a quarter of a century, and you know it's hogwash, but explaining why isn't so easy. David Brooks tries:
    Over the past few weeks, America’s colleges have sent another class of graduates off into the world. These graduates possess something of inestimable value. Nearly every sensible middle-aged person would give away all their money to be able to go back to age 22 and begin adulthood anew. 

    But, especially this year, one is conscious of the many ways in which this year’s graduating class has been ill served by their elders. They enter a bad job market, the hangover from decades of excessive borrowing. They inherit a ruinous federal debt.

    More important, their lives have been perversely structured. This year’s graduates are members of the most supervised generation in American history. Through their childhoods and teenage years, they have been monitored, tutored, coached and honed to an unprecedented degree.

    Yet upon graduation they will enter a world that is unprecedentedly wide open and unstructured. Most of them will not quickly get married, buy a home and have kids, as previous generations did. Instead, they will confront amazingly diverse job markets, social landscapes and lifestyle niches. Most will spend a decade wandering from job to job and clique to clique, searching for a role.

    No one would design a system of extreme supervision to prepare people for a decade of extreme openness. But this is exactly what has emerged in modern America. College students are raised in an environment that demands one set of navigational skills, and they are then cast out into a different environment requiring a different set of skills, which they have to figure out on their own.

    Worst of all, they are sent off into this world with the whole baby-boomer theology ringing in their ears. If you sample some of the commencement addresses being broadcast on C-Span these days, you see that many graduates are told to: Follow your passion, chart your own course, march to the beat of your own drummer, follow your dreams and findyourself. This is the litany of expressive individualism, which is still the dominant note in American culture.

    But, of course, this mantra misleads on nearly every front.

    College grads are often sent out into the world amid rapturous talk of limitless possibilities. But this talk is of no help to the central business of adulthood, finding serious things to tie yourself down to. The successful young adult is beginning to make sacred commitments — to a spouse, a community and calling — yet mostly hears about freedom and autonomy.

    Today’s graduates are also told to find their passion and then pursue their dreams. The implication is that they should find themselves first and then go off and live their quest. But, of course, very few people at age 22 or 24 can take an inward journey and come out having discovered a developed self.

    Most successful young people don’t look inside and then plan a life. They look outside and find a problem, which summons their life. A relative suffers from Alzheimer’s and a young woman feels called to help cure that disease. A young man works under a miserable boss and must develop management skills so his department can function. Another young woman finds herself confronted by an opportunity she never thought of in a job category she never imagined. This wasn’t in her plans, but this is where she can make her contribution.

    Most people don’t form a self and then lead a life. They are called by a problem, and the self is constructed gradually by their calling.

    The graduates are also told to pursue happiness and joy. But, of course, when you read a biography of someone you admire, it’s rarely the things that made them happy that compel your admiration. It’s the things they did to court unhappiness — the things they did that were arduous and miserable, which sometimes cost them friends and aroused hatred. It’s excellence, not happiness, that we admire most.

    Finally, graduates are told to be independent-minded and to express their inner spirit. But, of course, doing your job well often means suppressing yourself. As Atul Gawande mentioned during his countercultural address last week at Harvard Medical School, being a good doctor often means being part of a team, following the rules of an institution, going down a regimented checklist.

    Today’s grads enter a cultural climate that preaches the self as the center of a life. But, of course, as they age, they’ll discover that the tasks of a life are at the center. Fulfillment is a byproduct of how people engage their tasks, and can’t be pursued directly. Most of us are egotistical and most are self-concerned most of the time, but it’s nonetheless true that life comes to a point only in those moments when the self dissolves into some task. The purpose in life is not to find yourself. It’s to lose yourself.

    Our kids are going to get plenty of the mealy-mouthed "find your passion" talk at every turn. Let's resolve to teach them that true fulfillment is found, as Jesus said, in losing yourself--preferably by throwing yourself into service of others--and that "finding yourself" is a by-product and not a requisite of a life well lived.


    It's Not About You

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    has spoken at 11:00 AM
    1 Backtalks to Granny



    Granny's Mission Statement
    "...Tell to the coming generation the glorious deeds of the LORD, and his might, and the wonders that he has done....that the generation to come might know, even the children yet to be born, that they may arise and tell them to their children."
    ~Psalm 78:4-6

    My Focal Passage for 2011...
    Philippians 2:5-11

    5 Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus,

    6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped,

    7 but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men.

    8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

    9 Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name,

    10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth,

    11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

    ~Philippians 2:5-11 (ESV)


    Oxymoronica...

    "The vanity of being known to be trusted with a secret is generally one of the chief motives to disclose it."

    ~Samuel Johnson


    [Oxymoronica, n., A compilation of self-contradictory terms, phrases, or quotations; examples of oxymoronica appear illogical or nonsensical at first, but upon reflection, make a good deal of sense and are often profoundly true.]


    Books on the iPhone, the Kindle, or on the nightstand...


  • The Good Husband of Zebra Drive, Alexander Mccall Smith
  • The Valley of Vision: A Collection of Puritan Prayers and Devotions, Arthur G. Bennett, editor



  • Books finished in 2011...

  • Oxymoronica, Mardy Grothe
  • Some Sing, Some Cry, Ntozake Shange, Ifa Bayeza
  • English Society in the Eighteenth Century, Roy Porter
  • One Thousand Gifts: A Dare to Live Fully Right Where You Are, Ann Voskamp
  • His Word in My Heart, Janet Pope
  • The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, Rebecca Skloot
  • Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide, Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn
  • Reading Lolita in Tehran, Azar Nafisi
  • Think: The Life of the Mind and the Love of God, John Piper
  • Moonwalking with Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything, Joshua Foer
  • Blue Shoes and Happiness, Alexander McCall Smith
  • The Red Queen, Philippa Gregory
  • Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy, Eric Metaxas
  • The Confessions of Saint Augustine, St. Augustine
  • Complete Poems and Selected Letters of John Keats, John Keats
  • Unfamiliar Fishes, Sarah Vowell
  • Words That Work, Frank Luntz
  • NurtureShock: New Thinking About Children, Po Bronson and Ashley Merryman
  • Poke the Box, Seth Godin
  • Why We Get Fat: And What to Do About It, Gary Taubes
  • A Patriot's History of the United States, Larry Schweikart and Michael Allen
  • Song of Saigon: One Woman's Journey to Freedom, Anh Vu Sawyer
  • The Artistic Mother: A Practical Guide for Fitting Creativity into Your Life, Shona Cole
  • The Politically Incorrect Guide to English and American Literature, Elizabeth Kantor
  • The Greater Journey: Americans in Paris, David McCullough


  • Oh, the thinks you
    can think...
  • Tapestry of Grace
  • Anatomical Charts
  • America's Library
  • George Washington's Mount Vernon - Virtual Mansion Tour
  • Thomas Jefferson's Monticello - Virtual Mansion Tour
  • Hurricane Demo

  • Oh, the places we'll go...
  • The Alamo
  • Majestic Theater
  • The MAiZE
  • Magik Theatre
  • Sheldon Vexler Children's Theatre

  • Granny always says...
    Saying goodbye...
    Sunday snippets...
    Summer.
    Sunday snippets...
    Coming soon to a country near you...
    Making (a) room...
    Just in case this might make an impact on your spe...
    Midweek snippets...
    What's up?
    She said YES!

    Granny used to say...
    October 2005
    November 2005
    December 2005
    January 2006
    February 2006
    March 2006
    April 2006
    May 2006
    June 2006
    July 2006
    August 2006
    September 2006
    October 2006
    November 2006
    December 2006
    January 2007
    February 2007
    March 2007
    April 2007
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    June 2007
    July 2007
    August 2007
    September 2007
    October 2007
    November 2007
    December 2007
    January 2008
    February 2008
    March 2008
    April 2008
    May 2008
    June 2008
    July 2008
    August 2008
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    October 2008
    November 2008
    December 2008
    January 2009
    February 2009
    March 2009
    April 2009
    May 2009
    June 2009
    July 2009
    August 2009
    September 2009
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    January 2010
    February 2010
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    June 2010
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    August 2010
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    October 2010
    November 2010
    December 2010
    January 2011
    February 2011
    March 2011
    April 2011
    May 2011
    June 2011
    July 2011
    August 2011


    Grace Notes

    "Were the whole realm of nature mine
    That were a present far too small...
    Love so amazing, so divine
    Demands my soul, my life,
    my all!"