What a great day

Such a busy time of the year. A great time but a very busy time. This is my last week with students, then a week of meetings and then another school year will be put to bed. I love this time of year and I especially love it this year because we have both kids at home right now (and even when Wayne moves into his apt in the city on Saturday, at least he will still be in the area!) and because...Sally has a job! Last night her position as a Spanish teacher at Central was approved by the school board. We are so happy for her and so proud and grateful. God is good and we can see His hand in the whole process. It is beyond wonderful and nothing short of a miracle that things would fall in place for this to happen for Sally. Tonight Sally went to Matt's and they went out to dinner to celebrate. Wayne is at the Cubs game with work friends and just texted us that he caught a foul ball. (How many years has he been hoping for a foul ball and it had to happen at a Cubs game??) Big night for us!
I am just about spent... in a very positive way... and ready for bed. I need to rest up because Teri, Brittany and Grace just invited Sally and me to the Glee concert tomorrow night!

Graduation Part 1

Graduation weekend was packed full of memorable moments. I think I am just going to highlight a few at a time, otherwise it is too overwhelming to document and too much to read at one time!

Sally's graduation ceremony was lovely. She participated in the School of Literatures, Cultures and Linguistics Convocation and there were about 200 graduates, including the master's and doctorate degrees. There were only 18 graduates in Sally's program, the Teaching of Spanish. The whole thing took one hour, almost to the minute. At the beginning, there was a bagpiper who lead the faculty into the Auditorium (thought of Marmar). At the end, the graduates sang the Alma Mater. I will try to get a clip of that posted at some point.

After the ceremony, we met up with Sally's good friend, Breezy. They became close friends when they were studying abroad in Spain last year. Breezy is such a delight! I loved meeting her parents. We had a great time taking pictures on the quad with them and then we headed over to Kam's. Kam's has been in operation for decades and I remember many fun times there when I was in college. On the way there, we ran into one of Sally's sorority sisters, Kelly. Sally has always spoken so highly of Kelly and I remembered that Kelly was from Cincinnati. AND Kelly is somewhat of a celebrity as her father, Matt, was Chief Illiniwek when I was a senior/in grad school. I think I may have gone overboard a bit in my gushing when I met him! Matt had worked for Proctor and Gamble since graduation and so he and Wayne talked Kraft and P&G and Cincinnati. We took a fun picture with the Chief and the Illinois grads in the group.
Look forward to another graduation post soon :)

Graduation Preview

Here are a few moments from yesterday's festivities. It was a wonderfully perfect day and we are so proud of Sally.

Big Milestones

Here is a picture of Sally from yesterday morning as she was getting ready to leave for her last day of student teaching and really, her last day of college. As soon as she got home yesterday, she hopped into the car and headed down to Champaign for her last Friday night in college. Jack, Wayne and I came down today. We had lunch together at Panera and now Sally is back at her apartment getting ready for her graduation ceremony which begins at 5:30. Jack, Wayne and I are hanging out at the hotel, biding our time til the big event. The weather is overcast and a bit rainy. I am hoping it will be nice enough that we can get some pictures outside on the quad. Matt is also coming to the ceremony. He went to his sister's graduation at Bradley in Peoria earlier today. It is so nice that Matt could attend both events. After the ceremony, we are going to a restaurant in campustown called Za's. Some of Sally's friends organized a group dinner there for the 12 or so families of the group of friends. After that, who knows??

After work yesterday, I went to see my goddaughter, Grace, as she left for the prom. It is another huge milestone, that senior prom evening. Grace looked beautiful!! Kinda brought a tear to my eye. Here is a picture of Grace and Uncle Steve (her godfather) and me.

Happy Mother's Day

I have had a wonderful Mother's Day and it will be even better when Wayne gets back home from his trip to Cincinnati. His boss, Gary, and Gary's wife Becky had a going away party for Wayne last night. I can't wait to hear all about it.

We celebrated with both sides of the family today. We went to Jenny and Jay's for lunch with my side. So much fun. Abbie and Nina totally entertain us at all times. Can you believe that Arne had no idea that I even have a blog? Really! He has no idea what he is missing, does he? We took a few pictures, not my best (what is up with my chins?), but I will share them anyway. Here are two mom and daughter shots:Kjell's baseball team as playing their first double header today. Last I heard, they won the first game.
We left Jenny's and headed right to Francanello Restaurant to meet Jack's side of the family. We were happy to have Mike with us. Mike has been so ill the past few weeks and to see him out and about was wonderful. God is good.
Here is Lauren, Mike, Sue and Brendan.
Here is the whole clan, minus Paul who was home in Fla and Wayne who was in route back from Cincy.

Things have been so hectic here. Well, I should qualify that and say hectic by my standards which are fairly low. Wayne's move has been more complicated than was expected (always is when professional movers are involved I think!) and work is busy and just lots of activity here. Last night Jack and I went to 5 pm mass and then popped in town for a quick bite of dinner. We had the most incredible Ruebens! We were home by 7:15 and went to bed at 7:30. Seriously. We woke up at 6:30 am and I felt like a million bucks. I always need to remember how healing sleep can be.
Speaking of which, I am heading to bed. I promise to update more often for my faithful blog readers. All 3 of them :)

May musings

I am thrilled that it is May. I love that the weather is warmer and that there shouldn't be anymore snow, though now that I have said that we will probably get a rare May snow this week! I love the sunshine and the fact that it stays lighter later. And I love that another school year is starting to wind down. I took this picture on my walk yesterday morning. Here is a similar shot that I took a few months ago on a wintry Saturday morning.
Do you see why I like this time of year so much?

Lately I have been thinking alot about the seasons of life and the ups and downs of life. My family went through a period of cloudy, stormy, dark days with the loss of Dane and Tom and all the hearbreak that went along with those events. It has been so comforting to know that after the winter comes the spring, full of new life (Abbie! Nina!). In the midst of dark days, it can be hard to believe that but time and again, God has been faithful in His promises. There is that old Byrds' song from my youth, lyrics taken from the book of Ecclesiastes..."There is a time to every purpose under Heaven" There is so much human suffering in the world, but so much beauty and goodness, too (don't even ask me about the sweet family at mass last night! I cried all the way back from communion, they were so touching) I am learning to trust a beautiful day and just enjoy that moment. I have to try and not worry about what tomorrow might bring. I often say that my father's greatest gift was the gift of a good mood. Not in an unrealistic way, but in the way that made you feel like you could handle anything. Pawp always modeled a good mood/optimism for us. Below is another picture I took on my walk one morning. This plaque was in the window of a little store in town.
How true is that?! It is hard to see, but that quote is from Anne Frank. I am trying to live up to that and to my dad and to be the one who sets a good mood for others. It is amazing how well it can work, though at times it takes alot of effort!

Catching up

It has been a busy few weeks. Lots going on around here. We are loving having both the kids home with us. It was such a great feeling tonight, having Wayne walk in the door from work and getting to hear all about his first day in the new job. So far, so good. And I love riding home from work with Sally and hearing how her day has gone. I don't take these times for granted at all. I know that this window of opportunity will be gone all too soon.

Yesterday Marmar and Susie and Jenny, Kjell, Abbie and Nina met here at our house for a little visit. It was so fun just to meet and catch up for an hour or so. Here are a few cute pictures from the visit, starting with Marmar and Nina. Next is a picture of Susie, Abbie, Nina and Sally. I was one second away from getting the perfect picture! The next one is Jack and Nina. Nina is no longer afraid of Jack and in fact she loved bringing him things and interacting with him! The girls are a joy to be with and we all walk away refreshed after spending time with them.

The next two pictures are from our latest Birthday Club get together. We had dinner at Teri's house to celebrate Sheila's 50th.It was a fun night. This time we had Mary, Sue and Sheila there, but we were missing Carol. The second picture is of Sheila and Teri.

I can't believe only three more weeks til Sally graduates and only 5 more weeks of the school year.