So how was your weekend?

Friday started out like any normal Friday. The kids did their schoolwork; we walked down to noon Mass, and Joseph mowed our front lawn. Friday night, John, Joseph, and Matthew served for Confirmation. Joseph was a Bishop's attendant and got to wear a special cape (on top of his cassock and surplice) to cover his hands while holding the miter. Until just before the Sacrament was conferred, when he was overcome by the heat. He got to the open window in the sacristy in time to avoid fainting and remove the cape, but then he threw up instead. Poor guy! So John helped Joseph clean up the window sill, and Matthew, the lowly boat boy, was promoted to Bishop's attendant for the remainder of the Mass. He was floating on air when he got home.

He came into my room absolutely beaming and said to me, "Did you hear about the catastrophe at church?"

"No. No one has told me anything about it yet," I replied, putting down the laundry I was folding.

"Oh! It was beautiful!"

"Really? what happened?"

"Joseph has to tell you."

Joseph took the whole thing with good humor. He had felt better and returned to the sanctuary during the Liturgy of the Eucharist and partaken of the celebratory cake afterwards.

Saturday, Joseph, who has started a lawn-mowing business in order to pay for Boy Scout summer camp, had his first job at 7 a.m. Friday night's thunderstorm made the grass too wet to mow, so we walked over, met the lady, saw what she needed done, and arranged to have him come back this morning to do the work. Then, we went out to buy him a baseball glove (which was his long-awaited birthday present) and white baseball pants. Matthew also needed pants--black ones. How, with all the white pants and grey pinstriped pants that we have in almost every size, it still ended up that both boys needed uniform pants, I'll never know. Murphy's law. Thankfully, they did already have the right combination of socks (well, almost--Joseph is supposed to have white socks with a black stripe--we have plain white, navy stripe, red stripe, orange stripe, but no black stripe and no striped socks at the sporting goods store or Target. So he's going with plain white), belts, red t-shirts, protective gear, and cleats.

After the sporting goods store, Joseph came home to do chores until 11:00 when it was time to mow Uncle Dan and Aunt Taryn's lawn. He started in on that, intending to spend two hours before his baseball game. While he was working, he got a call that his game was changed to a practice because the game field was too wet. I guess the practice field was not. It saved John about 90 minutes of driving, so no complaints here.

Joseph spent about 3 1/2 hours on the aunt & uncle's lawn, then went to practice for 2 hours, then came home, begged off on weeding Dan and Taryn's garden until Tuesday, finished his home chores, hung out with a friend for a few minutes, ate dinner (glad I made Irish stew so he had something hearty), checked his email, and went to bed.

In between driving Joseph places, John finished Patrick's financial aid application, started putting the polyurethane on the cabinet he's finishing for the art supplies, and went to work on the thousands of dandelions in the yard. We're renting, but we're still supposed to keep the yard looking presentable, and in this neighborhood, that means digging up dandelions.

I also did some driving to pick Joseph up from lawn mowing and drop him off at baseball practice, went to the organic market for milk and to Target for night-light bulbs, batteries, and a failed attempt to find a mesh thingamajig to put over the end of the washing machine hose to reduce the amount of lint going into the basement sink drain. Not that it keeps it from overflowing the sink at least once a month, but, hey, it must be keeping it from overflowing the sink every week, right? Right? Still. Didn't find one. I was sure I got them at Target last time.

Then, I made Irish stew with the leg bones and leftover lamb from our Easter feast. And Irish brown bread. Yummy! While the bread was baking and the stew was, well, stewing, I went out to pull weeds in the garden beds. I did about a one-square yard area before I ran out of time. There are so many weeds here, I can see that it's going to be a daily chore for everyone all summer to keep up with this garden. Good thing we homeschool so we're home and have plenty of extra time every day.

ha!

Sunday, John and the boys served Mass, and it was our weekend to set up and clean up the  post-Mass social. This is actually not a hard job at all, and we do it with Dan and Taryn, so it turns out to be fun. It takes time, though. We got home at about 1:15, and Joseph helped John cook brunch while I made the fruit salad. John and I went out to look at a couple of houses--nothing spectacular yet, but when we saw a house on a good street that we hadn't even known was for sale and is already under contract, we realized that we really need a realtor.  Lesson learned. When we got home, I sent an email to the realtor Dan and Taryn worked with last winter.

While John and Meghan very industriously went outside to pull more weeds, I snatched an hour to read. For fun. Ahhhhhh! Sunday rest! 0:-D

The boys were at the creek with friends: a well-deserved playtime for Joseph. They stayed down there until almost 6 p.m. when Joseph went off with John to Boy Scout Troop Leader Training at church. I made a simple dinner for the rest of us: leftover fruit salad, a raw veggie plate, leftover tzatziki, and some cheese and crackers. After Meghan and Matthew were in bed, I finished my book. Hooray!

Katie was sick all weekend and pretty much stayed in bed except to do her chores on Saturday and go to Mass on Sunday. She didn't run the neighborhood 5K after all. Her friend and running partner came down with strep throat on Thursday, and by Saturday morning, Katie was feeling horrible too.

Meghan did her chores and hung out at home with Katie. She has had a terrible cold since we got back from Massachusetts last Monday, so she and I opted not to go to Confirmation on Friday. Ordinarily, I might have taken her. Bishops' Masses are exciting (who knew how exciting this one was going to be!?), but it was raining, and I didn't think we should drag her out at bedtime. She was happy to stay at home, which tells me she was tired. Normally, she wants to go everywhere everyone else is going. She did go out with John to help pull weeds in the yard on Sunday afternoon and gave me a minute-by-minute report before dinner.
Back to her old self, I think.

So that was our weekend.

I'm ready for the regular schedule of a regular week now.

Except for the clogged kitchen sink.

Shimoda Mall

Katie and I had a girls' day out on Saturday. We went shopping and had lunch with another mom and two of her daughters. It has been too long since our last girls' day, that's for sure.

We found some cute summer tops for Meghan at a second-hand store, inexplicably named (in English) Don Don Down on Wednesday.

We moved next door to the air-conditioned, TJ Maxx-like-store that must be part of the Avail group, since they accept Avail gift cards.

Katie found some open-toe, scary-high-heeled clogs.

We laughed at the giant pink stones on this pair of high-heeled flip-flops.

These boots are cute. Too bad Meghan doesn't need any.


By the time we finished--Katie scored two pairs of soccer shorts and a cute summer sweater--we were hungry! So we headed to the mall.

But not so hungry that we couldn't stop to try on flowing, tiered, cotton skirts on our way to the food court. Three lovely skirts were purchased.

And then it was lunch time. Cute ceiling in the food court.


My favorite lunch shop is:

You choose your meal and pay at a ticket machine. Then, take your ticket to the counter. You can order a drink there. I chose iced tea, and got it free with a coupon from my last visit. Notice the little foil-lidded cups of cream and sugar syrup that came with my tea.


In a few minutes, the food arrives on a hot cast iron plate. You carry it to your table and wait for it to finish cooking and cool off. This would never work in the States. Someone would burn their fingers and sue the company. Thankfully, I can enjoy this delicious curry beef in Japan. Yummy!

Katie's friend had a hankering for a taste of home.


Katie chose the katsu curry. A fried pork cutlet smothered with curry sauce and vegetables over rice. Also very yummy!


After lunch, we shopped in the mall. I wish I had taken some pictures in the stationery store. Japanese stationery stores are awesome!

Aeon department store is ready to help you with all of your rainy-season needs.



I accidentally failed to get photos of Baskin Robbins, where the girls stopped for a snack before we went home. The line snaked all around the shop. But service was efficient, and the girls were out before their moms got back to meet them.

Perhaps not so accidentally, I also failed to photograph Mr. Donut, the establishment into which the moms stopped while waiting for their daughters. The donuts were for Sunday's brunch. Really. They were. ;-)

Medals

During Lent, I try not to shop much. It's part of my plan to simplify my life and to give myself more quiet time for prayer and reflection, and maybe in some sense to give up a pleasure. Although I don't particularly enjoy online shopping, shopping with friends is a pleasure for me. Sometimes Katie and I shop online together, which is a lot of fun. (As long as it doesn't get out of hand, shopping is an allowable pleasure--one I can "take back" after Lent.)

But I do allow myself a little shopping time for Easter gifts. So that was why I was over at the Catholic Child website this morning. A couple of weeks ago, I realized that Meghan doesn't have a patron Saint medal. This is strange to me. I'm not sure how it happened because all of our other children received medals as infants and wore them pinned to the backs of their shoulders to Mass and at other times. So how I missed this with Meghan and didn't even notice for 20 months is a mystery to me. One reason may be that we don't have a Catholic gift shop or bookstore here, so I don't have occasion to see this type of item unless I go looking for it on the internet. Another may be that my focus has been spread a bit thinly among the needs of our oldest two children, Matthew struggling with asthma, that little thing we call home school, and baby Meghan for awhile now. I have been putting out fires, as they say, but not much else.

No matter the reason, I resolved to rectify the situation and find a St. Margaret Mary or St. Therese medal for Easter. And I was very excited to see the Saints Alive sterling silver medals. These look like they are good quality medals. Even better, they offer more than 120 Saint names. I was delighted to see some hard-to-find ones like St. Thomas More and Old Testament Saints like Benjamin and Daniel. I do wish the St. Margaret medal said "St. Margaret Mary" instead, but I suppose not every Margaret, Meghan, or Maggie is a Margaret Mary. :)

If you are looking for a medal for an Easter or First Communion gift, you might like to take a look. They also have around 50 different patron Saint statues and rosaries (the rosaries are more expensive). Nice to find so many in one place.