Saturday Review

Last week the boys received First Holy Communion at our station church up in the mountains.   My camera isn't working, but a sweet lady from church snapped a picture of our family.     Don't the boys look so cute!   I was crying during the ceremony.   Aidan turned 12 two days ago,  so he made his communion just 3 days before his birthday.   He fought an incredible battle just to get to his first birthday and it suddenly hit me once again how very good God is.   And Paddy had some battles to fight too. So I was crying thinking of both of them receiving the sacrament on the very same day.   God is good. 

After First Holy Communion

Liam, our oldest, isn't in the picture.   He's been up in Oregon working at a computer game company for the past 6 months.  This week his over-18 siblings are visiting him, so it's been quiet for a few days here, after a more active than usual time when college kids were home and a friend from college was visiting. 

Some more quotidian-type highlights:






After about 4 weeks of piano lessons, and after going to a recital, Paddy has started playing the piano voluntarily. Before that, I had to remind him every day. I still have to remind him to practice, but he likes getting on there and trying his old songs.

We found another juvenile flying squirrel in this house. This happens every spring. This one is well past infancy but by no means grown. I was pulling dirty clothes out of the laundry basket and it leaped out and hid in a space between the cupboard and the wall, but I managed to get it out. It is presently in the cage where we kept the three infant siblings last year until they were old enough to be on their own. It doesn't like me very much. I'm trying to figure out how to get it back to its mother, but it doesn't seem to get that.

Flying squirrels are my favorite lower mammals. They are mild and watchful and emotionally attuned to each other. They sleep during the day and rise at night. They do not chew or bite. They have huge eyes for seeing in the darkness, and wide flat soft tails that help keep them airborne.    And they fly, but they aren't grotesque like bats (really, they don't fly, they only fall with style).     What is not to like?  Well, I'd prefer they didn't live in our roof and that their moms would take better care of them, but other than that.