Week(s) in Review: Valentine's Weekend, Winter Break, Maggie's Mission and Lenten Days

 Hello!  Welcome to Lent 2026!

I am trying to go through the Crux program on Ascension this Lent, because after hearing the Irish Franciscan priest speak, I just couldn't refuse.  Irish + Franciscan = me in a nutshell :)  Lent never seems to get any easier for me, but I'm hoping it's a lot like exercise and I'll keep plugging away:

This week has been February vacation week here in Massachusetts, but we stayed home and did a few fun things, scheduled a few appointments, and I went to work but only for four days since Monday was a holiday.  

For Valentine's Day, Phil and I went out to dinner at our favorite local Italian restaurant:

Chicken Parm for me and Chicken Florentine for he

The next day, we took the youngest three boys to a hotel on the Cape for an overnight.  They swam and we went out to dinner and ice cream, shopped a little, drove by the houses of my childhood and went to Mass at the church where Phil and I got married.  It was lovely!

The hotel has a little arcade

Not Your Average Joe's in Hyannis

Shake Shack (our first time!) in Hyannis

Our Lady of Victory in Centerville

We shopped at Trader Joe' before driving home & Declan begged us to buy a dragon fruit.  Disgusting!

Maggie did not come with us because she was packing and prepping for her mission trip to Florida this week.  She is with a church group that is doing corporal works of mercy (and a little maintenance work) while staying in a beautiful retreat center.  She even leaned to dance the salsa from the residents of the nursing home they visited!

Andrew has recently started dating a girl we can.not.wait to meet, and gave her the sweetest Valentine's Day gift:

The framed photo is of "The Port" on Franciscan's campus, a chapel replica of St. Francis' Portiuncula in Assisi, and where 24 hour Adoration is held on campus.  After a dinner date where Andrew officially asked her to be his girlfriend, they went to pray at the Port and he took a picture to commemorate the moment.  She loved it!

Snow + Love are in the air

Eamon went to Topgolf with a group of friends, thanks to one of the girl's families who came into town to visit and treated them all:

Sorry, but are all the Franciscan freshman this good-looking?

Andrew's mission group met up to plan the retreats they will be holding for the students in Arizona next month:

He also had his best friend come visit and the group went to the casino, in what looks like their pajamas??

JP has been busy studying - even during the Superbowl game:

Honestly, the game was pretty disappointing so I can't blame him!  We canceled our plans to watch the game with people as the stomach bug had been going around our house, but the kids still got their Superbowl Sundaes:

Walking the dog before the game, and we saw a house with this cute Patriots setup.

JP also sent a photo of the Mass that was held for the healing professions at Duquesne, at which he read the Prayers of the Faithful:

And just like that *snaps her fingers* Ash Wednesday was upon us:

Nice ash

I hope you all have a lovely weekend and a fruitful Lent that's just Lenten enough for your soul.  I'm excited for Stations of the Cross tonight... I made this graphic for our church so if anyone is in the area, feel free to join!