Family in Feast and Feria

I had a lovely day. It was all about spending time with family. In the morning I joined 3 of my sisters and my mother (and the children) for breakfast. Dh was playing golf in the morning with some of the brothers-in-law, one of my brothers, and friends--the annual 4th of July family golf tournament. ;-)

I'm learning to say "when" and ask for help this pregnancy. An small incident in the morning made my blood sugar plummet, and then a run to the grocery store caused some cramping. So the rest of the day I did a lot of sitting and directing.

It has becomes a bit of tradition after the golfing that dh invites everyone over to our house. When I say "everyone" I should explain. I live very close to many of my siblings and their families. One sister with 3 boys is a 5 minute walk, another sister with her two is 1 minute away by car. My youngest brother lives a few minutes away, and he has one son. My parents live a few miles outside of town, and another sister with her four children live 15 minutes away in a neighboring town.

Two siblings live elsewhere, one brother in California (with 2 children) and one sister in Nebraska (with 5 girls). Except the Nebraska family comes to Virginia periodically and stays for visits. Friday will bring to a close a month long visit. :-(

Yesterday we didn't have a huge crowd (as in all the family couldn't come)--15 people in all, 7 adults, 8 children. My parents also were part of the mix. The day a little like "Stone Soup" because I didn't have a set menu. Dh bought hamburger meat, hot dogs, and bratwursts. I said "ya'll come" and "bring whatever" and we ended up having lots of food with great variety. We were able to squeeze several tables onto our screened porch out back and everyone ate outside. The thunder and rain threatened but we didn't get a drop yesterday.

God has blessed me a hundredfold with my family. My parents and all my siblings love and live their Catholic faith, are raising their children Catholic. And all the spouses are on similar pages, and the brothers-in-law get along--they are actually friends. This makes for comfortable gatherings and conversation. We all are starting with the same values, so there are rarely discussions in politics, religion, news that we aren't on the same page. Don't get me wrong--we fight, and still have our squabbles amongst ourselves. (We're a spirited family!) We don't all raise our children exactly alike, and we all very opinionated. It's just so nice to share the same foundation. We love to visit and talk to each other, but there's also the "comfortable silence" in parts of the day.

Fourth of July means family day to me. The day was so lovely, the children played outside various sports including croquet. Having some older responsible cousins in the mix was a nice break for some of us with just littles.

At nightfall, everyone left in search of a fireworks display (to see from the car). I stayed at home, and was delighted to discover that we can view our local fireworks display from our front and back porches. It's not the crystal clear view we had in the townhouse, but it's still comfortable viewing from our home. Next year bring your chairs and bug spray!

May God bless our country.