Congrats Donna-Marie!!

Three cheers for Donna-Marie Cooper O'Boyle who is celebrating the launch of two great new books. I've read both and they are terrific, definite must-reads for any Catholic Mom!

Donna-Marie has a fun post up about a recent book signing she did and how she was able to celebrate the moment with her children. It must be a true joy as a mom to celebrate not only professional accomplishments, but more importantly a great relationship with grown children.

Congratulations Donna-Marie, may many moms continue to be blessed by your work!

How Sweet!

My cyber Sister, Sister Julie at A Nun's Life, has some awfully sweet words about our recent meet up at Loyola Press on her blog.  If you're not already a subscriber of A Nun's Life, you definitely need to add it to your "must read" list.  Just as Catholic Mom Moments is not only for moms, A Nun's Life is definitely not only for nuns, or even "nun groupies" like me! 

Proud to be a Catholic Mom fan and friend — A Nun's Life

Catholic Moments #73 - Mountain Butorac and Sr. Julie Vieira

On this week's "car cast" (recorded live from the front seat of Lisa's SUV), we feature two great interviews. Mountain Butorac discusses Catholic travel and his great website The Catholic Traveler. Sister Julie Vieira, IHM shares on her life as a Nun and her work with Loyola Press and on her wonderful blog, A Nun's Life. Deacon Tom Fox shares the second installment in our look at the life of St. Therese of Lisieux. To enter our latest contest for your chance to win Story of a Soul: The Autobiography of St. Therese of Lisieux email lisahendey@gmail.com by October 31, 2008 with the words "St. Therese Contest" in the subject line and your address in the body of the email. Share your feedback at 206-339-9272, comment here on the blog or email lisa@catholicmom.com.

Links for this Episode:
The Catholic Traveler
Loyola Press
A Nun's Life
St. Therese of Lisieux - Look for the "Email Me" button on the left side to enter contest
Story of a Soul: The Autobiography of St. Therese of Lisieux
Parish Media Liaison Kerry Madden - Spiritual Refreshment
Shrine of the Little Flower
The Catholic Company
Lisa's Facebook Profile, Plurk, Twitter
Catholic Mom Logo Store

Click here to listen to Catholic Moments #73

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Monday is Nun Day

One of my favorite blogs is A Nun's Life by Sister Julie.  She's got a great feature every Monday that highlights the lives of Catholic nuns and sisters who have devoted themselves to lives of service.  It's very inspirational!  Do you have a favorite nun or sister?  Why not pay her tribute by sharing her story with Sister Julie?

Nun Photo - Sister Margaret McCormack, CCVI — A Nun's Life

Magazine for Catholic Teen Girls

13 year old Anna wrote me to share the following information about a project she's creating:

My name's Anna and I'm 13 years old. I have created a magazine for teenage catholic girls called Faithful Magazine. I created this because i could not find a magazine for teenage catholic girls here in the UK (where I live). It is free to download from the website: http://www.faithfulmagazine.webs.com/ and is for any teen girls from anywhere in the world who wishes to read it.

Feel free to contact Anna to share your stories or questions for her new project. How inspiring it is to find young women who are looking out for ways to share their faith through the Internet. Good luck Anna!

Happy Belated Birthday Mary

In honor of Monday's Feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, would you like to respond to the following request to celebrate our Blessed Mother with the wonderful women of Behold Your Mother? Feel free to respond to Sarah directly with your submissions:

Mary Moments: the Birthday Edition
This month, we'll be focusing on the Blessed Mother's birthday, traditionally celebrated on September 8.

• What are some of your favorite Marian recipes? If Mary was coming to dinner, what would you make?
  
• What do you give a mother who has everything? What will your gift to Mary be this year?
  
• In reflecting on "another year older," how does the Blessed Mother serve as a guide, role model, and mentor to you?
  

Submit by 10 PM EST on September 10, using the online form or by emailing me at peerybingle [at] gmail [dot] com. If you have a story to share but no blog, feel free to email me your story and I'll put you live as a guest post here on my blog. We would love to have a truckload (or more) of entries to celebrate the Blessed Mother's birthday!

Must Run in the Family

Congratulations to Betsy, the sixteen year old high school senior daughter of Marybeth Hicks, on the launch of her new blog If I Could Vote...

Since I have a politically minded seventeen year old living in my home, I can appreciate the fact that young ladies like Betsy are taking time to formulate and document their opinions and thoughts leading up to the elections. I just wish more adults would take time to study the candidates positions and background as carefully as many young people are doing in their AP US Government and History classes.

Good luck with your blog Betsy - from reading what you've written so far I can see that you've inherited your Mom's talent for expressing yourself!

If I Could Vote...

Teens Helping Teens

Noted author and CatholicMom.com Homeschooling columnist Maureen Wittmann shared with me the great news about her newest project, a blog for teens entitled No Question Left Behind: Teens Helping Teens. I've shared more great information on this project over at Faith and Family Live.

Congrats to Maureen and her "dream team" of writers for creating what looks to be an incredible resource for our beloved teens!

Help Grandma Learn to Work Her Digital Camera

Two special friends of mine, Scott and Christine Maentz, have created a new website called RememberGranny.com, which is devoted to helping grandparents leave a "digital legacy" for their grandchildren. For many, the thought of doing much with the computer beyond simply checking email can be a bit overwhelming. That's where Scott and Christine step in! Here's some information on their new site:

Ok, so you’ve bought into the idea that it would be a good thing to leave a digital legacy for your kids, grandkids and the generations following them. Awesome! Congratulations on taking this important first step. Now what do you do? Where do you get started?

There are so many choices and options that you really do need someone to guide you through the technology maze. This is where Remember Granny™ shines. Our mission is to provide practical information for getting your life online and to keep things simple, always striving to speak to you in plain English. We know that much of this is completely foreign to many of you. Like traveling in a foreign country, you need a good guide to make the most of your time. We know you can easily learn to take full advantage of the Internet with the right guidance. Remember Granny™ hopes to be your personal Internet guide.

Here at RememberGranny.com we’ll be teaching you everything you need to get online. We’ll have instructional videos as well as articles on this web site that will help you filter through all the noise to make good choices and save you valuable time. It’s all free and is yours for the browsing. Just give me a couple of months to build up the articles & videos and we’ll soon have something really helpful here.

For those of you who are not inclined to take the time to do this yourself, we’ll be starting a services business that will take care of getting everything set up for you. I’ll have more information on this coming soon as well. One way or another, we’ll make sure you have what you need to take advantage of today’s digital age by using today’s rich digital media to communicate your life, your values and your ideas to future generations.

Remember Granny - Virtual immortality made easy.

Donna-Marie on the Radio with Teresa Tomeo

In case you missed it, Donna-Marie Cooper O'Boyle appeared this week on the radio with Teresa Tomeo. Since I love both of them dearly, I enjoyed listening to the segment on Donna-Marie's site. The topic is "summer prayer". Check it out!

Daily Donna-Marie: A Dose of Inspiration: Summer prayer segment on my "Mom's Corner" with Teresa Tomeo

Bringing Up Geeks!

My good friend and our CatholicMom.com columnist Marybeth Hicks recently announced the release of her new website at BringingUpGeeks.com in anticipation of her book of the same name.

Marybeth's book focuses on raising "GEEK"s - Genuine, Enthusiastic, Empowered Kids. I can't wait to see the book and have had a blast exploring her new site. Some of my favorite features of the site are the Geek Parent Community, What's Really Cool in Middle School and Fun Stuff for Geeky Kids.

I'll remind you in early July when Marbeth's book is available, but if you'd like you can pre-order Bringing Up Geeks: How to Protect Your Kid's Childhood in a Grow-Up-Too-Fast WorldBringing Up Geeks: How to Protect Your Kid's Childhood in a Grow-Up-Too-Fast World at Amazon now.

It's time to redefine what's cool for kids

Highlights from the Eucharistic Congress

The tremendous points of yesterday are too numerous to mention, but here are just a few:

• Pulling into the parking lot of the massive Georgia International Convention Center bright and early (on California time) and finding one of the last few parking spots - thanks St. Anthony
• Entering a building packed to the gills with enthusiastic, compassionate and reverent Catholic thrilled about being together to share their faith
• Selling That Catholic Show DVDs at the TCS booth with the SQPN crew. Being trained on how to use PayPal by none other than THE TECHNOPRIEST and sharing the good news about TCS and the CNMC with so many people
• Enjoying conversations with some of the world's best priests - all of whom are podcasting geeks!
  
• Wandering the expo and speaking with vendors about their services - listen for a complete overview on this week's podcast
• Listening to Matthew Kelly, who's just always great
• Visiting with all of the SQPNers - the podcasters, the listeners and those who support what we do behind the scenes
• Chatting with Popple - I tried not to gush too much, but these guys are totally cool!
• Having dinner with the Catholic Exchange/Canticle/CatholicMom crowd and their adorable daughters
• Attending a lobby social hour last night - sharing a beer with my fellow podcasters, getting writing wisdom from Amy Welborn and Mark Shea, and making my uStream debut
• Spending time in Eucharistic Adoration with a few hundred other very faithfilled souls and counting my many blessings - thank you Jesus for my life, for your love and for this day!
  

Please say some prayers for Kerry

I know I've been asking for lots of prayers and support lately, but I firmly believe in the power of our prayers for one another so I'm going to keep asking. A good friend of mine (even though we've never met!) is Kerry Madden, who has become known for her work as a Catholic Parish Media Liaison. Kerry is a weekly contributor to our Catholic Moments Podcast - you will recognize her as the angel with the sweet voice who calls in weekly to share great things happening in Catholic media. I'm a regular visitor to her blog, where she's always posting about wonderful Catholic new media tips. Yesterday, Kerry was hospitalized for heart troubles and has been diagnosed with Lyme Disease. She received a special blessing from her parish priest and is requesting prayers as she faces the challenges of this diagnosis.

When I received Kerry's email today and that of another friend who also needs our prayers, it underscored for me the true power and beauty of a responsible use of New Media. Through the Internet, we can lift up and support each other in times of need like these. Please pray for Kerry and her family!

Kerry's blog

Don't be a Dud at Church!!

A while back on P@H, I wrote a little post entitled 10 Ways to Avoid Being a Dud at Home. This post was based on something my buddy Mike St. Pierre wrote on his blog, The Daily Saint. Now Joshua at Tech Tips for Catholic Teens has taken up the theme with his very insightful 10 Ways to Avoid Being a Dud at Church. I loved reading this tonight, as I spent most of today engaged in the pursuit of writing about Mass!

Tech Tips for Catholic Teens » 10 Ways to Avoid Being a Dud At Church

Music Lessons? Handling Stress? Please chime in!

This week, in her column on CatholicMom.com entitled "The Piano Lesson", Heidi Hess Saxton shares an interesting take on her son's budding music lessons. It's a wonderful piece, and Heidi also invites us to chime in and share out thoughts on her blog Mommy Monsters Inc.: Tips for Helping Your Child Cope with Stress

What's your take on handling stress and on music lessons for kids? We'd love to hear from you on Heidi's blog.

Make Your House a Home

Make Your House A Home Challenge In June

If I weren't going to be out of town for two weeks in June, I'd be sorely tempted to participate in Suzanne's inspiring challenge. Her blog lists all of the details on how you can participate. Instead, I'll be making three hotels my home for June, but maybe I'll follow suit in July! If you join in, please let me know how it goes!

Catholic Rumors?

Have you been over to Rebecca Christian's blog lately?  She has this feature called "Rumor Has It" which appeals to the part of me that occasionally reads People Magazine on airplanes.  The difference is that Rebecca writes about cool Catholic people and happenings from a very cool, young Catholic perspective.  I can't wait to meet this talented young lady in person at the Catholic New Media Celebration.  Something tells me she'll be toting a video camera and will have some post-celebration footage to share.

Catholic in Film School » Blog Archive » Rumor has it…vol. 4.

Catholic Tube | Catholic Videos

Looking for Catholic video content for your blog, website, or your own personal entertainment?  Check out Catholic Tube which has many videos, all organized into channels which make them easily accessible.  I was happy to find the Father Roderick, Life Teen and Women of Grace Channels, including some others that were new to me.

Catholic Tube | Catholic Videos

Fr. Jim Martin's Upcoming Blog Tour

Thanks to Catholic Meme for the heads up on one of my favorite author's upcoming blog tour.  Visit Jesuit James Martin to see the dates and locations for the tour.  So cool!

Jesuit James Martin

Catholic Fire: The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian -- A Movie Review

At Catholic Fire, Jean has a helpful review of Prince Caspian and some good links.  If you've seen the movie, I'd love to hear from you - did you like it, love it, hate it?  Catholic Fire: The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian -- A Movie Review