It's been a while!

I can't believe how long it's been since I posted! I was going to on Monday...but that never happened. This week has been insanely busy because we started Drama Camp.
Anyway, here are pictures from Confirmation:

All the confirmati--there were eight of us.

With my sponsor, Mrs. Gerdes

At the reception afterwards with gorgeous friendies!

Later that day, we went to the graduation open house of a good friend, and had lots of fun! We got back to Brookings around midnight. The next day was fairly relaxing, but on Tuesday Drama Camp started, and let's just say I haven't gotten much sleep. Our musical is coming along nicely! We made a lot of progress today. Hopefully I can get some rehearsing pictures next week, as we will be practicing on the stage.

And I still have school to do! My science class has not yet ended, so I've been missing classes. I do the work when I can. Also, I have to finish the Paradiso and write an essay on it, hopefully before next weekend. 

And Tessie and I are playing/singing for a luncheon we were asked to do on Sunday. And Mom is going to a homeschool conference in Minnesota tomorrow. And we sent in stuff to get passports today.

And on top of that my body expects me to sleep. Go figure.

My Confirmation

Today, after a sleepover and shopping with some of my friendies, I went to my confirmation retreat! I'm being confirmed tomorrow morning, and I'm sooooo excited! The retreat consisted of Father walking us through the rite and Monsignor and Father both talking to us about the importance of confirmation. Then we had adoration, confession and Benediction. It was short and sweet, and I feel good about tomorrow. Having a quiet afternoon for prayer was nice to sort of calm down from life and really prepare for such a wonderful sacrament.
Hopefully I'll have pictures of tomorrow to post soon! We are also going to a friend's graduation open house, so I'll see if I can post pictures of that, too.
The other day I was comparing medieval knighthood to modern-day Christianity. I've read that it's good to view the world as a fairytale sometimes, in a sort of black-and-white image so you can fight evil. Knights have a code of honor; Christians have the Ten Commandments and the Beatitudes, and all the Church teachings. Knights take vows of chivalry; being a Christian is a promise to follow God's Law. Knights fight for their lord; Christians fight for their Lord.
Soldiers of Christ.
In a very real way.

Back in SD

I returned to South Dakota yesterday with a lovely smattering of cold symptoms. (A phrase which is not fun to say if you're congested.)

But we had a wonderful trip, and the weather here is nice! (I've been too busy sleeping to enjoy it at this point, but I will.) 

It was so fun to see relatives! And to go places I hadn't been to for years. 

I don't have any pictures from our trip to the zoo yet, but I will try to get some and blog them. We saw a baby lemur that was so tiny, it looked like a beanie-baby! It was really cute. 

Back to sleeping for me! Or maybe reading...

Texas update

Today Grandma, Mom and I went out for some shopping and lunch. We ate at a French bistro, and had soup, salad, quiche, and mini-desserts. Yum yum!

Yesterday we visited my aunt's zoo in Gainsville, and Tessie went to uncle Dave's house and got to hold a barn owl.

And, of course, we've been enjoying delicious weather! It will be hard to go back north.

A new college graduate!

This morning was Gus's graduation! His class had 340 people. The ceremony was held outside, and the weather was beautiful. The commencement speaker was George Weigel. 

Last night was the Mass and president's gala. It was also beautiful weather then. It was enjoyable, but now I'm very tired!

After the graduation today we all had brunch at the place my grandparents live. Then Dad left for a conference in Alaska. He'll meet us back in SD.

Congratulations, Gus!

First morning in Texas

Here we are at Grandma's house! The plane ride went smoothly, and some relations took us to an Indian place for dinner. Yum yum! Today we will probably go swimming, and then we have a Mass and reception as part of Gus's graduation. À bientôt!

Blogging from the airport!

We are in the Sioux Falls airport waiting to board a flight to Dallas! We are going to Gus's college graduation, and we will be gone five days. We'll also see my grandparents and some aunts, uncles and cousins! We're gonna have a blast! (I'm mostly doing this to try out the Blogger app in Mom's phone.)