First Holy Communion

I'm playing catch-up again. Here are some photos from Catherine's First Holy Communion on May 5. The second grade religion class had 35 children this year, the church's biggest class in quite a few years. Catherine had several friends from school in her class, including Gabe, who we decided is her longest friend in Santa Barbara, since we met him at Notre Dame preschool in 2009 and they both attend Peabody now.

The weather was more like Seattle than Santa Barbara, very gray and overcast, but at least it didn't rain. Catherine was very excited to be receiving her First Communion and especially to wear her custom-made dress, direct from excellent English seamstresses, Granny and Auntie Juliet. Catalina and Molly even had matching dresses! Not that I am biased, but I think Catherine's dress was one of the prettiest ones!

Catherine and Rebecca



Catherine and Gabe

Catherine and Elizabeth

This is just one-half of the group!

Sharing a laugh with Gabe



Family picture time

Oops, someone was missing from the first one!

Happy New Year!

I started this entry in early January and then time got away from me. I pick up where I left off...

Greetings one and all. It's hard for me to believe that it is 2013 already. It seems like we were celebrating the dawning of the new milennium just a couple of years ago. Y2K? What was all the fuss about?

Anyway, whether I like it or not the year is indeed 2013 and I say "good riddance" to 2012. It certainly started off fine enough and the first of the year was a good but the second half definitely took a turn for the worse. Richard and I have high hopes for the new year but prayers are always appreciated as well!

Thanks to Papa, we were able to spend Christmas in Portland with the American side of our family. It was fantastic! We didn't realize how much we have missed spending Christmas with family...until we spent Christmas with family. We arrived on Christmas Eve eve and had a wonderful visit with family and friends in Portland.

Catherine and cousin Alyssa had a great time together, even getting a sleep-over at Papa & Nana's! Little Finn was a sweetie but unfortunately, we weren't able to get any photos of the 3 grandkids.  Next time!

A few days after Christmas we headed to Sunriver and THE SNOW!! We all think this was the highlight of the holidays (sorry, Santa!). We tried to build a snowman but the snow in Central Oregon is so powdery it falls apart. We went cross-country skiing - we even got Catherine out on the trails. And she said she enjoyed it. They groom the golf courses with cross-country paths so we were able to get out whenever we wanted.

Richard hard at work

Attempting to shovel snow.

Helping Nana with the salad for dinner