Tara found the challenge of a family hike to be the inspiration of simple truths about blessings and gratitude and finding Jesus in the present moment.

As soon as my baby girl turned seven months old, I started feeling ill. And it wasn't the typical "I'm coming down with a cold" kind of ill. I was having a very difficult time breathing. As a busy mom, I dismissed it as the usual effects of sleep deprivation. I went to the hospital just to be sure, but they sent me home after all the test results came out normal.

Several years ago, I received a phone call from a dear friend who invited me to take a free shopping spree at Costco Wholesale Club. The offer was so tempting since anything and everything I would purchase that day would all be paid for. I was so floored by such a generous offer that I felt like one of those eager contestants who had just won the grand prize in “Supermarket Sweep.”

Abby Sasscer, homeschool mom of 3 and public speaker on simpler living, shares her top 3 benefits to living with less and 7 steps to a simpler home!

Two great ancient philosophers, Marcus Aurelius in Meditations and Boethius in The Consolation of Philosophy — two works renowned for their great wisdom and moral power — teach the importance of the virtue of self-possession. Both writers observe that no persons can control the outside events that surround them.

Disappointment, rejection, and defeat, however, do not mean incompetence, weakness, or failure. When a person shakes off the dust, he leaves because of the stiff-necked and hardhearted unwillingness of the many that lack docility and openness to the truth the messenger brings.

In the folk tale, five brothers all choose their profession and perform their work with success and prosperity: a brick maker, a mason, an architect, an innovator, and a critic. However, only the oldest brother unites vocation and avocation, and only his work has effects for the future and for heaven.

In the story the merchant’s son who wasted his money finds himself in desperate circumstances until a friend gives him a magical flying trunk. When he flies with it and descends from the sky, he introduces himself as a Turkish god who has come from above to marry the king’s daughter. Honored with this privilege, the king gladly agrees to the marriage: “Yes, you shall certainly marry our daughter.”

“Be as simple as doves” –  Matthew 10:16 When I was sitting behind my vendor table at the Immaculate Heart of Mary Homeschool Conference this past June, an elderly gentleman ...

What is Nature without the pied beauty of the four seasons? What is a home without paint, pictures, flowers, and interior decoration? What are human beings without tasteful, dignified clothing? ...

In the Odyssey, Homer’s epic about the family as the center of civilization portrays two ways of life—the civilized and the barbaric. The civilized dwell in homes, the barbaric in ...

In Robert Frost’s “After Apple-Picking” the narrator spends an entire day from morning till evening picking all the apples before the first frost of the season. He has spent the ...

A person can live in a narrow world or a wider universe. He can live in a state of stagnation with no goals or ambitions, or keep his life in ...

In The Way of a Storyteller Ruth Sawyer tells an anecdote about a gifted furniture maker renowned for his craftsmanship whose work was in great demand by the prominent and ...

by Clare Schmitt “To live without faith, without a patrimony to defend, without a steady struggle for truth, that is not living, but existing.” ~ Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati You’ve ...