Some people find February a slow month in the garden, but it shouldn’t be. Spring will arrive before you know and everything will need doing at once. So make the most of February as it is your last chance to finish winter-work and get a head start on Spring. Clear your beds and borders of…
January begins with new promises and resolutions for the year. One of the most popular new year’s resolutions is to eat more healthily, especially if you enjoyed lots of selection boxes and chocolate coins over the festive season. It can be hard to break out of a habit of eating sweets and chocolate but you…
At various times over recent years I have worked with young people preparing for the oral Irish exam in their Leaving Certificate. Apart from the challenge of developing a level of fluency in Irish most of the students also face the challenge of developing and expressing their own opinions. Our education system does little to…
Baking with ground nuts is so much fun compared to using flour. But there is a little flour included in this recipe to help the cake rise. This cake is also delicious made with hazelnuts and orange zest instead of the pistachios and lemon. You can make the cakes without the icing too if you…
As you look forward to the year ahead, I am sure that like many others you have made resolutions and hope to keep to at least some of them. Parents have a the most responsible job in the world because your every action, gesture and word impacts on your children. When you stop to think…
Three feast days are approaching next week – all within just a few days of one another! The feast day you are probably most familiar is the feast of St Brigid on February 1. So you will no doubt be gathering bunches of rushes this weekend to make St Brigid’s cross. Traditionally, her crosses are…
Ireland never lets go of an Irish heart. The further we go from our homeland, the stronger it calls us home. French Canadians were never known for singing maudlin ballads lamenting the day they left Paris. English immigrants to Australia were not known to weep out of a heartfelt yearning for Suffolk. Yet we Irish…
With the Christmas decorations long gone and packed away until next December, the home can feel a little bare without some festive spark. And it’s a long wait before you can start making Easter decorations. January can be a miserably long month, especially when Spring is yet to arrive. But you can welcome Spring into…
There are times in the Sunday liturgy when the priest has the option to read a shorter version of the Gospel. This Sunday is one of those times but I find myself hoping that priests around the country will opt for the longer version. Why? This Sunday we find ourselves in the early chapters of…
It’s nearly the middle of the month and with the new year breaking in, it’s time for a fresh new notebook for storing all of your daily to-do lists. Keeping all of your to-do lists in the one notebook is a great way of looking back on everything you have achieved at the end of…
Paul Gargan
Erin Fox
Bairbre Cahill