In the top row in the center is Mary Shaughnessy (my mom called her Nana Shaky--(rhymes with Rocky). She is surrounded by her 5 daughters. Her oldest was Ella (bottom left), second oldest was Madeline (lupper left). Next was Mary Burnadette (lower right). The two youngest were Sarah (Sally) lower middle, and Jane (Jennie) upper right. So clockwise starting with Nana Shaky (center) are Jennie, Mary B., Sally, Ella and Madeline. 

This weekend the descendants of these lovely women on my mom's side of the family will descend upon the Outer Banks for a reunion. It has been a long time since our family has gotten together and actually the last time an event (in the 1990s) was planned the cousin who was going to host it unexpectedly died a few days before everyone's arrival. So instead of a reunion, they got a funeral.

I fully expect that this year's reunion will be better! More pics to come from the festivities. Have a great day! -Monica

It Really Was a Happy 4th of July!

Hello! We just had a awesome weekend with some fun visitors, a parade, lots of pool time and a visit to watch our Washington Nationals win! And the cherry on top of it all was a chance to see the DC fireworks from the rooftop of my office building downtown.

As beautiful as it was though, it was extremely loud and that really threw Danny for a loop. (The pic below captures his feelings on the whole thing very well.)

He was very brave though, and after we stepped inside for a few minutes after the booming began, he acquiesced to being led outside again to enjoy the amazing view. Benjamin had sympathy pains and cried along with him although I suspect he wasn't much bothered by the noise.

It was like a 3 D movie the way that the fireworks exploded so near to us. You felt like you could almost reach out and touch them! If you click on this picture you can see a fun 30 second long slide show of some of the other highlights of our 4th of July! Bye now.