summer memories~chicago

On the way home we stopped off to see my brothers. I love my brothers. We stayed with each of them and their families, first my little brother, next my big brother. The kids got to see their cousins. We took Shawn to visit University of Notre Dame and we also briefly visited my alma mater, Saint Mary's College. It was a great way to end of summer travels.

summer memories ~ my hometown

In some ways the most simple part of our summer, staying in one place! Sky flew into town to be with us. We settled into our house trade home. We spent lots of time with my parents, hosting them for dinners, visiting them in their home, and we showed them a hilarious Jerry Seinfeld special. Gary and I went clothes shopping, Sky and I went to garage sales, I visited my grandparent's old house in the city, we rented movies from the library and watched them with my parents, and we all went out to dinner at an Italian restaurant for my birthday. I spent a special afternoon with my mom, we went out for lunch and then walked around her charming downtown.

I love my parents so much. They are the sweetest people ever. How blessed are we to have spent time with them!

summer memories~dc and philly and friends

I love the east coast of the United States and all of the history I have there. I love the trees there and the flowers that blossom in the summertime, the sound of crickets at night, eating freshly picked raspberries, and seeing fireflies. I love the architecture and old buildings. But mostly I love the people there.

After time with my sister and her family I drove back to DC and met Gary there. We went to see Amma where she was making a stop on her North American tour. We had a great time with Amma and all of our friends in that community, catching up, enjoying the delicious Indian food, meditating and being inspired by Amma. Amma was very happy to see us as she gave us one of her famous hugs.

Then we stayed with some old friends in DC for a few days and relaxed, sans any of our kids, for the first time ever. We played music, sang, went hiking in Great Falls, and shared meals.

We drove back to Philadelphia and visited one of Gary's college friends and stayed with him and his family for a couple days. It was nice to get to know them and their sweet young adult son with his epic long hair.

We surprised my sister's kids one more time, this time Uncle Gary came too. The boys loved reading a book about baseball with their uncle.

My dear childhood friend Dawn met up with me in Philadelphia. She was visiting the area for her mother's 80th birthday. I had rented a room in a beautiful house for us. Gary ended up joining us because his flight back to NY was cancelled. Dawn and I had a great visit, and we got to spend a couple days together, reconnecting after a couple years of not seeing each other. This is a friend I met when we were eleven years old! So a long friendship. I sadly bade Dawn farewell.

Then Gary and I drove back to my hometown in upstate New York and started our time there. We had arranged a house exchange with a family we had traded with several times before. When we got there, we felt immediately at home.

summer memories ~ visiting my sister

After visiting my buddy Janel I rented a car and drove to a suburb of Philadelphia. I cannot explain the joy I felt on this road trip, playing music, talking on the phone hands free, using modern technology to text people with voice activation. I was connected and yet free. Living on an island, one can only drive so far, so road trips are rare. It is so fun to get in a car and drive to a new state. Not to mention what happened afterwards. I arrived at my sister's house. She hadn't told any of her kids I was coming. So I got to surprise them, one by one. The looks on each of their faces was priceless. I had such a great time with them all. I had never visited them by myself, I was always Aunt Theresa, the mom, in the context of my family. This time I was just plain old aunt Theresa. I received a hero's welcome. It was like being a celebrity. Everyone wanted to sit near me, make me food, talk to me, hang out with me. I love all of my nieces and nephews. They are a precious piece of my siblings. I made a point to spend time with the kids. I slept in my teenage niece's bed, surrounded by her cute room, including my sister's and my childhood dollhouse. As a kid I spend many an hour making tiny things for that dollhouse! 

We launched rockets with the boys at a big open field (heat wave didn't stop us), we had wonderful home cooked meals, (my sister makes three warm meals a day for her family, she is a rock star wife and mother), we walked through their small town, went through the kids' art portfolios (they are all very talented), went to church where my niece sang. I went to a book club with my sister and met her friends, had an intelligent discussion with lovely women. For my birthday my sister took me via train into the city and we got pedicure/foot massages, shopped at the original Anthropologie, and got lunch. This country girl got a nice taste of the city!

It was a great visit. There's more to that story later.

christmas 2016

This year my parents came all the way from the east coast to visit us for the kids' holiday break. We had a great time. It was very special having them with us as it had been some years since they had visited us in our home, and we got to spend Christmas and New Years together. They flew to California and saw Sky and then a couple days later the three of them all flew in to stay with us. We enjoyed decorating our tree, shopping for gifts, cooking lots of meals, seeing Shawn's school exhibition night, Christmas eve mass at St. Theresa's Church (yes I am a saint hahaha), going out to dinner and brunch, playing board games, watching movies, walks on the beach, having them meet lots of our friends, seeing all of the tropical flowers in bloom, our New Years Eve neighborhood party, and of course, lots of laughs.

Our family has a tradition of writing letters to one another every Christmas. It started when the kids asked me what I wanted one year and I asked them to write me a letter. It has evolved over the years and now Gary writes letters too. My parents enjoyed getting letters from the kids this year.

What a blessing family is. How lucky am I to have the love of so many people in my life. Sometimes I am astounded at how I ended up with the richness I have. The deepest richness, I have come to see, is in the people.