A few quick notes about how our summer is starting off–with lots of fun surprises already! In no particular order:

FIRST Surprise (outside the house): we cut back some bushes on the side of the house and discovered this pretty mama bird sitting on two eggs in her nest.  Lillian and Caroline check up on her every morning to see if her eggs have hatched.  She doesn’t seem to mind that Margaret and Trey play basketball right in front of her for hours. 

SECOND Surprise (inside the house): Margaret got “Larry” the Robo-dwarf hamster for her birthday a year ago.  The kids came upon him the other day lounging with his back against his little house having a drink of water.  Wacky.

THIRD: As you know, we’ve moved our offices for Holy Heroes (got more space, more actual offices, and more room to pack & ship orders).  The day we cleaned out the old office, Lillian and Caroline took this picture with our old office sign (sniff!) and then wrote this “Welcome!” sign for the new tenants to find when they move in.  We have Ken’s office operational (if not completely organized), the order packing and shipping area in working order, and most of the product into a set up that make is possible to find things…

FOURTH: We have already “hit the road” for some conferences.  On the way to the Minnesota Homeschool Conference, we visited the “Father Leopold Celebrates Mass Lego Factory” and got this picture (sorry–my picture-taking cut some kids out of the frame!). Very fun (and we had enough room in our van to pack in another 260 sets on sale here).  Next conference comes soon: the IHM National Conference in Virginia June 24-25.

FIFTH is TWO surprises: As we passed through Peoria, IL, we saw the two spires of a beautiful church just off the interstate, so we decided to stop and visit.  It was the cathedral, but when we tried the doors, they were all locked.  It was closed for major renovations.  Suddenly, one of the doors opened, and a very kind man named Leo let us in to look around.  Gorgeous!  Among the renovations is a side altar for the remains of Venerable Fulton Sheen, whose beatification has been on hold pending resolution of where his remains should be: Peoria or New York City.  Well….in Peoria they told us they were confident the issue will be resolved in their favor, so they are stepping out in faith! Just yesterday, June 14, a breakthrough in the cause as the living relatives of Sheen petitioned the Supreme Court of New York to allow his remains to be transferred to Peoria!  Keep praying!

The Sheen Museum is near the Cathedral, so we spent some time there, too.  We got this picture with a life-sized image of Venerable Fulton Sheen!  He was much shorter than I imagined (and I still kept cutting people off in my pictures….!).  The sisters in the museum were excited to hear that we use Venerable Fulton Sheen’s spiritual adoption prayer in our Holy Heroes Spiritual Adoption Prayer Adventure.  Well, looks like we should start planning another Glory Story!

   

SIXTH: On that same trip we drove off into the Wisconsin hinterland to visit the cabin where Laura Ingalls Wilder was born.  Kinda fuzzy picture inside, but notice how close Trey (red shirt) is in height to his dad (in front of Trey) now! Pretty drive, too.

Well, we hope to visit some other sites this summer as we travel to conferences in Chicago, Tampa, and New York throughout the summer.

PS  We are still posting items for Feast Days on HolyHeroesFun.com, and there are some fun June days coming up!