Whew, But In a Good Way

The past few days have been an absolute social whirlwind for all of us here in my little family. I took off last Thursday to clean the house and prepare for our guest and old buddy, Mee O, to stay with us while she was in town for my sisters in laws party. Claire and Heather have been together 10 years and decided to throw a big party so all of their friends could meet each other. On Friday, my Aunt Carolyn called to ask if she, my Aunt Rose and their friends from Germany could visit. Please understand that, in the 18 years I've lived in Pittsburgh, my Aunts have come here three times to visit me. One of those was for my wedding. We could'nt say no but the weekend was out, so Monday became Aunt Day.

Everything about Claire and Heather's party was lovely, including the people and the food and drinks and the tablesettings. They made such a good looking couple that I almost felt guilty bringing Donovan. Ladies and Gentlemen of the Jury; Exhibits A and B:





He really was a very good baby the whole time we were there. He ended up charming Mee O who declared herself his new Aunt and left his general vicinity on a couple of occasions to stop herself from putting his feet in her mouth.

There is no Shanley event without some sort of Post Shanley Event Event so we went over to the in laws place to hang out with the out of town folks--again, a clean sweep for Donovan in the popularity division. On his second night up past his bedtime he remained just as happy and sociable as could be.

Today I woke up feeling overwhelmed by the prospect of my Aunts' visit. You have to understand that our house, tho better for the day I took to clean, is still very much a work in progress. You also have to understand that my Mom's family has always been very dedicated to their cleaning schedule ("God Forbid" my Mom, the lone dissenter of the system would say, "that anyone die on laundry day"). They are in their 80s and they still clean their house themselves and it is, indeed, spotless.

Yikes.

Mike and I got up, had breakfast, fed the boy, rocked him in his stroller intoning "Pleaseohpleaseohpleeeeeasefallasleeepwehavesomuchtodo!" It worked and, as soon as Donovan was down, Mike and I managed to squeeze the huge new/used couch into the front room. So Mike was then dispatched to the store to buy lunch for everyone and I cleaned like a fiend.

Mike got home, spelled me off, I showered and we waited. Not like the Aunts to be late. When they showed up carrying cups from Wendy's, we knew the lunch we had put off having was going to be a little late in coming.

The Hirsches are a family with whom my Aunt Carolyn has been corresponding since 1954. I thought they had met over care packages my Mom's family sent to post WWII Berlin but 1954 sounds more like its connected to the Hungarian Revolution--must check on that. When I was in highschool and college the two Hirsch boys were a minor bane to my existance as my Aunts would always talk about what wonderful jobs they had, and sooo much education! This usually would come up when I'd mention being a telemarketer. Joking aside, they are a lovely family and they brought Donovan a fantastic handmade teddybear--photos will follow. We had a nice visit and I'm sure everyone else thought he was fine, but Donny had obviously had enough with the socializing. He was never bad, he just was'nt the Uber Baby Zen Well of Patience and Smiles that he usually is. Nevertheless, everyone got to play pass the baby. Tonight, I am going to meltdown some old silverware and make a medal For Jack Hirsch for bravely and boldly driving a rental car full of old people thru Pittsburgh and into the heart of Polish Hill. Its the least I can do.

Mike took a few photos but the ones with both of my Aunts did'nt turn out well. This one of my Aunt Carolyn, tho, is pretty sweet.



Aunt Carolyn was born on Leap Year so she is 22.

After they left, all 5 of us (I'm including the cats) collapsed on various pieces of furniture in the front room and slept. I was the first one up and I should go down and check on everyone. An odd postscript to all of this is we have fancy catered food and huge opened bottles of booze left over from Claire and Heather's party plus we have the lunch stuff we bought that was not used today. If we wanted to, we could have roasted asparagus, croissants and Dewars for dinner tonight. Not bad!