Week in Review: Former Press Secretary, Former Cottage Days, Former Cat Names

 One day I'll have more time and energy to post more than just a weekly wrap-up, but for now these are scratching the motherly itch I have to document our family memories and milestones.  Good enough is good enough, I suppose.

Lucy Doodle patiently waiting to start our evening walk so I can link up to Elisabeth

Last Friday, Phil and I attended a fundraiser dinner for the Mass Citizens for Life and we got to hear from former Press Secretary, Kayleigh McEnaney, who was awesome.  She's a brilliant Harvard Law grad, with great stories that show how spiritual she is.  She was friends with Charlie Kirk and spoke about him and his mission for a good ten minutes before she started her planned talk.  She just had her third baby 3 months ago, and was starting a new morning show the next day.  What a woman!

We also heard from a young woman who was able to use the resources from MCFL to get help with an Abortion Pill Reversal (when a woman takes medication for a medical abortion, regrets it, and can take another medication to reverse it).  That baby she kept is now four years old and "the best thing that ever happened to her" after what she thought was "the worst thing that ever happened to her".

Mom and Dad

We went with our pastor and friends from our parish, and it was a really fun night.  OH!  I was recognized by someone who reads my blog!  She was very kind to stop me and say she knew me and I was thoroughly embarrassed and delighted.  Now I can't remember her name but HI!  

When our pastor and seminarian walked in I looked at them in their black outfits and made the comment about how nice it must be to always know what you are going to wear to any event.  Our pastor shared that my boys had served Mass that morning, and Father had asked them if we were excited to go out to the dinner that night.  Declan and Brendan decided to share *in detail* how many dresses and shoes I had tried on the night before to see what fit and finally pick one out.  There are no secrets when you have kids!

We all ended up in Black and White

On Saturday was our parish picnic, which Maggie graciously brought the kids to while Phil worked at The Cottage and I cleaned and decorated the house for fall.  It's so much easier to do those chores when I have the house to myself, which is not often.

Fun with Father

Funner with Father

Speaking of The Cottage - we are now closed for the season!  Yay!  We took the non-workers out to dinner on the last day, and got the workers takeout to celebrate.  We were running out of flavors (which is kinda the whole point on the last day) and ended up closing three hours early.

Nine flavors left out of 35+ normally in stock

JP had a week off between "Blocks" at school and flew home for the week for some R&R.  It's been so nice to have him home since he left at the beginning of July.  He also used some of his newly learned skills to adjust my back.  I'm not saying he's my current favorite but I'm not saying he's not either.

In Franciscan news - Eamon intented to a household.  It's really early to do that as a Freshman, but he pretty much knew he wanted to be in the same household as Andrew and his friends.  They already shaved his eyebrow and he had me order him a hammock for some intent event coming up next week.  I don't even know.  Andrew found this on his apartment steps:

And now never wants to get rid of "Beery" changed to "Lana" changed to "Charli":

I suggested the name Kit.  

Kit Cat.

If only Declan and I weren't allergic

I picked up Xander from Cross Country practice on Tuesday and he nonchalantly said "we ran seven miles today".  That's like, a lot of miles.  He was very thirsty, which reminds me of my latest purchase to help reduce the water cup clutter.

Xan is the man on the left

Declan starts basketball practice tomorrow, while he is in the middle of soccer season.  So he has a soccer game at 9:15, then basketball practice from 11:30 - 2:30.  Maggie has a home game at noon, and then Mass is at 4 pm.  Phil starts teaching Religious Ed classes on Sunday.  I think weekends need to be at least three days long to fit everything in.  Thank goodness Brendan's swim meets don't start for two more weeks - just practices three times a week now.

Mutual Respect

On October 1, FAFSA's opened and guess who got three FAFSA's done on that very day?  This girl!  I would have done JP's but he has to do his own now.  It's crazy that we will have three in college and one in med school next year.  Maggie already applied and got accepted to Franciscan, her top (and I think only) choice.  She has a 4.5 GPA, is 8th in her class, Varsity sports for 4 years (Captain for 2 years), Student Council, Campus Ministry, served on mission trips, volunteered at the Wound Care unit, is a manager at the shop, and I could go on and on.  She's just such a great girl.  She could potentially get into an Ivy League but then wouldn't want to attend, so she's making it very easy on us.  No college drama!  Maggie is thinking of going into Nursing and really wants to get married and have all the babies in the future.  Sounds familiar ;)

I hope you all have a beautiful October with-summer-weather-weekend!