Flowers, candy, red hearts and romance. That’s what Valentine’s day is all about, right? Well, maybe not.

The origin of this holiday for the expression of love really isn’t romantic at all — at least not in the traditional sense. Father Frank O’Gara of Whitefriars Street Church in Dublin, Ireland, tells the real story of the man behind the holiday — St. Valentine.

“He was a Roman Priest at a time when there was an emperor called Claudias who persecuted the church at that particular time,” Father O’Gara explains. ” He also had an edict that prohibited the marriage of young people. This was based on the hypothesis that unmarried soldiers fought better than married soldiers because married soldiers might be afraid of what might happen to them or their wives or families if they died.”

“I think we must bear in mind that it was a very permissive society in which Valentine lived,” says Father O’Gara. “Polygamy would have been much more popular than just one woman and one man living together. And yet some of them seemed to be attracted to Christian faith. But obviously the church thought that marriage was very sacred between one man and one woman for their life and that it was to be encouraged. And so it immediately presented the problem to the Christian church of what to do about this.”

“The idea of encouraging them to marry within the Christian church was what Valentine was about. And he secretly married them because of the edict.”

Valentine was eventually caught, imprisoned and tortured for performing marriage ceremonies against command of Emperor Claudius the second. There are legends surrounding Valentine’s actions while in prison.

“One of the men who was to judge him in line with the Roman law at the time was a man called Asterius, whose daughter was blind. He was supposed to have prayed with and healed the young girl with such astonishing effect that Asterius himself became Christian as a result.”

In the year 269 AD, Valentine was sentenced to a three part execution of a beating, stoning, and finally decapitation all because of his stand for Christian marriage. The story goes that the last words he wrote were in a note to Asterius’ daughter. He inspired today’s romantic missives by signing it, “from your Valentine.”

“What Valentine means to me as a priest,” explains Father O’Gara, “is that there comes a time where you have to lay your life upon the line for what you believe. And with the power of the Holy Spirit we can do that — even to the point of death.”

Valentine’s martyrdom has not gone unnoticed by the general public. In fact, Whitefriars Street Church is one of three churches that claim to house the remains of Valentine. Today, many people make the pilgrimage to the church to honour the courage and memory of this Christian saint.

“Valentine has come to be known as the patron saint of lovers. Before you enter into a Christian marriage you want some sense of God in your life — some great need of God in your life. And we know, particularly in the modern world, many people are meeting God through his Son, Jesus Christ.”

“If Valentine were here today, he would say to married couples that there comes a time where you’re going to have to suffer. It’s not going to be easy to maintain your commitment and your vows in marriage. Don’t be surprised if the ‘gushing’ love that you have for someone changes to something less “gushing” but maybe much more mature. And the question is, is that young person ready for that?”

“So on the day of the marriage they have to take that into context,” Father O’Gara says. “Love — human love and sexuality is wonderful, and blessed by God — but also the shadow of the cross. That’s what Valentine means to me.”

Do you learn from your mistakes, do you admit you made a mistake?

Maybe you prefer to bury your head in the sand and pretend you don’t make mistakes, no person goes through life making no mistakes, mistakes are part of life, how we handle our mistakes kind of defines what type of person we are.

I like to think I have learnt from my mistakes, and yes I have in fact made some mistakes, as a young woman I thought I knew things and learnt that in fact I didn’t know as much as I thought I did.

I have known some people who always would look for someone to blame for their mistakes, as they couldn’t accept they made a mistake, it had to be someone else’s fault. I do not think I did that, I did in fact tried not to blame someone else for my screw ups.

We learn from our mistakes and we can grow from them as well, yes some of  us have to make the same mistake a number of times before we learn anything.

Monday’s thoughts no hang on it’s Tuesday what happened to Monday, one minute it’s here and now it’s gone………..bugga……..

Oh well lets start off Tuesday’s thoughts, with something from Monday, when I went to drop Leo off at school he didn’t want me to leave but because I had a doctors appointment I couldn’t stick around till he went in like I often do. So I tell him this and try to leave and he follows me I speak to him again, give him a big hug and kiss and tell him I will see him in the afternoon and go to leave again he follows me so a staff member comes up and takes his hand and talks to him while I leave.

All good right, wrong I get out to through the office on the way to the car park and Leo comes running up to me crying and wraps his arms around my waist and says he wants me to stay, I had to walk him back in with his arms wrapped around me as he wouldn’t let go. Another stuff member came up and spoke to him telling him I had to leave but he cried saying he wanted me to stay, I told her I would stay but I had a doctors appointment to get to at 9.15am and it was now 9.05am. In the end she had to pry him off me and hold him while I left to him crying out for his nanna, it was upsetting for me.

So I get to the doctors right on 9.15 and of course I cannot find anywhere to park so it was 9.30 by the time I got to check in with reception and another half hour before I saw the doctor and what did he say, well that he thinks I need to go back and see Dr Gibson the gastro doctor and there really isn’t anything else I can take for the nauseousness, so now I have to wait to hear from a Dr Gibson.

Now let us move onto Tuesday, well this morning I was able to say with Leo till it was time to go into class and even then he didn’t want me to leave and wanted me to go to class with him. Thankfully it only took a couple of minutes to get him to go to class and I was able to leave.

Tonight I have Blain as I do each Tuesday night and this week papa will be home from around 2.30pm so Blain will get to see his papa.

Well it is now Sunday afternoon and I am writing this from my brothers kitchen, why because I was asked to dog sit again while my brother and his family are in Sydney for the night Kayla and Leigh are going to the 1D concert and so the whole family went to Sydney for the night and if they are not here I have to dog sit. I asked Tim if he would give me money to get something for tea and he gave me about $9 which is good I think I will get a pizza.

Today there was just me, Tim and Jessica for lunch at my place we had streak and bacon and roast potatoes the frozen type roast potatoes which Jessica isn’t that keen on and Tim said the steak was undercooked, I said well you are the one who turned it out and told me I was overcooking it and didn’t trust I knew what I was doing. Leo didn’t come to lunch as he was grounded for stealing chocolate he knew he wasn’t suppose to have Jess said it is becoming a real problem she has tried everything to get him to stop, she has smacked and yelled and explained it is not something she wants him doing at least he doesn’t lie about taking and eating it. When asked if he took the chocolate he will say yes, when asked why he will say I felt like it or I was hungry. She didn’t leave him home alone, she took him to Tasha’s place and she made him do some homework type stuff.

On Friday Tim bought a can crusher to crush the soft drink cans before I toss them in the bag we collect them for the year and cash them in and share the money between the grandchildren. Anyway Tim is always at me to crush the cans, I told him to be just happy that I was keeping them anyway of Friday he bought the can crusher and wanted to put it outside I said it would be better to put it some place I would use it. So he must have been thinking about it and today he put it up on the back door so it is next to the bag I toss the cans in and as such I will in fact use it.

Well that is all I have for today, I will be back tomorrow to do some more blog reading as I do most days/

Hey hey it’s Saturday and what am I going to talk about today on this lovely not to hot nor to cold Saturday well I will tell you I am going to talk about stockings/pantyhose and yes I am sure I have mentioned in the past that I wear them but today I will tell you a little more about why I wear them and why I think some other women should wear them.

Yesterday while out shopping I was dressed in a nice dress with pantyhose and sandals and while I was rushing to the toilet I heard a couple of teenage girls say “why do people wear stockings” if I had not been in such a hurry I would have stopped and told them why I wear them, but as I said I was in a hurry and couldn’t so now I am going to tell you.

I started wearing them in my 20’s up until then I always wore thong sandals but in my 20’s I wanted to wear other sandals and found I was unable to do so due to how much my feet sweet not just in summer but all year round. I had to have some kind of foot cover and back then you couldn’t get footlets that just cover the foot.

I also started to have trouble with my thighs rubbing together and I was only a size 12 so found pantyhose very good they stopped my thighs chaffing and my feet blistering. As I got older I took to wearing shots under my skirt or dress over my pantyhose as my fat thighs would rub together I was not so fat but my thighs a different matter but that is for a different post.

Now that I am in my 50’s I find my legs look better in pantyhose, I don’t have the nicest looking legs, granted they are not that bad but like most women my age I have knees that look old. Only last week while out shopping I noticed a few women in short dresses/skirts with bare legs that looked terrible. They had old looking legs and I thought they would look so much more attractive in a pair of long pants or with pantyhose on to cover their legs. Now don’t get me wrong if a woman is happy with her legs and doesn’t mind having bare legs then that is all good but I know I myself feel better when I look in the mirror and see nice looking legs.

Of course I do not wear pantyhose with shorts that is just not a good look although 10 years from now I may feel different but I really doubt it…………….lol

I remember when Blain was a baby his other grandmother (fathers mum) told me I shouldn’t be wearing stockings with sandals as it was not the done thing, I told her well for me it is a necessary. Also for many years I was unable to buy sandal thongs they were not common, like they are now in summer I usually wear them and such I do not wear pantyhose but if I am wearing a short dress or skirt with normal sandals I will wear pantyhose.

I also wear knee high stockings a lot and ankle high ones under long pants or skirts for me it is a necessity if you can see my knees then I am going to have them covered with a pair of pantyhose. So if you see a woman wearing them you shouldn’t judge her since you do not know what the reason behind her wearing them is, yes it maybe a fashion statement but it also may be a necessity. Oh yeah I always wear black stockings and knee highs. 

So what is your take on them?

Here are this weeks Five things for Friday

A ghost dog

Nauseousness

New Shoes (not high heels, not flats)

Neck/shoulder pain

So damn tired…………..yet again

Welcome to the first motivation Thursday, some weeks you will get a full post, other weeks  you will just get a picture such as the one above.

When you read the above quote, what do you think, do you agree or not?

I think doing something you love makes life so much more enjoyable.

Well I am late getting around to writing a post today, no real reason just didn’t feel like it earlier, I had to go to the library after I took Leo to school to return a book and re-borrow it, I couldn’t renew the loan as I had already done that once.

Tonight we have Blain here for the night, he doesn’t have his xbox and have to tell you when his mum said he wasn’t bringing it, he said I am going to be sooooooooo bored. So I told him he was free to come but no complaining about being bored I am just not going to put up with that.

I am so tired this afternoon, I could go to sleep right now and it is only 5.30pm think I am in for an early night.

I really don’t have any news and can’t think of anything interesting to write about so not getting much today from me. I will share a photo of my granddaughter Sydney-May on her first day of school which was yesterday.

It was also Liarna’s and Temika’s first day of school