Crowds, Flowers, Doughnuts.



I am graduating in 19 days. This means I am leaving the District in 20. I love this city and don't know if I am ready to leave just yet. So we decided to take a day to take advantage of this place where we live which gave me mixed feelings about leaving.

Gourmet Doughnuts and Fried Chicken. An unlikely combination. Surprisingly perfect. Something I definitely won't find in Northern Indiana.

Cherry Blossoms and Monuments. Beautiful and so good. Check, check.



Finding best friends who quote Mary Kate and Ashley movies as much as you do, definitely going to miss this.



Casual beautiful views? Actually, not casual.

 

Having to take a picture of every historical thing I see to send to Tim; indifferent.

 

Photobombing friends and sunnies: priceless.



See all of those great feelings of a city that I love and a place I will sorely miss. All wonderful things. And then there is one thing that throws confusion into the mix and makes you question living in a city ever again for the next three months, crowds. The constant fear that you will get trampled, pushed into the tidal basin, or hit by a car can suffocate you. Uff.

 

I still love it though. That Saturday excursion with the greatest people. I love them too. 

FDB

Founders Day Ball. My absolute favorite. Enjoy a dance at a beautiful location without having to leave CUA. Take advantage of the weather and the campus with the best student body this District has to offer. Have I sold you yet? Okay great.

FDB is planned by Program Board and occurs in a huge open tent by our very own basilitron. Photo-ops galore so prepare yourself for a picture oriented post.

The whole House was there with a Polaroid camera and propurtunities.

Cubicle friends are friends for life.

This pretty lady helped me use this night as hair and make-up trials for the big day. She works hard to make me look good, I repay her in dining-dollar Starbucks. You can decide for yourself if it's a fair trade.

I love, love, love this lady. I am so glad we got to live together this year because I do not think I would have survived without her.

Love life. Love yourself. Love Renew.

Dancing faces are the best kind of faces.

I am 89% positive that I am dancing to single ladies with my residents here. I love them a whole heck of lot.

I was invited to be STB's date to the RA social at the end of the night. It included ice cream and karaoke. So to you, Regan Roses, I present 3/4 of Regan singing Ignition. Wish I had videoed.

Dyngus Day

Alleluia, Christ is truly risen! Have you been keeping up with anything the Holy Father has said during Holy Week? Well you should because, “The message which Christians bring to the world is this: Jesus, Love incarnate, died on the cross for our sins, but God the Father raised him and made him the Lord of life and death. In Jesus, love has triumphed over hatred, mercy over sinfulness, goodness over evil, truth over falsehood, life over death.” We are so blessed to have Papa Francis you know?

I stayed in DC for Triduum this year because I love Holy Week on campus. I will tell anyone who will listen, and you, internet, are a dear friend that always listens. I love celebrating these liturgies with the people you prepare with. It is a beautiful thing to go to the Easter Vigil and see college students as Lectors, and Liturgical Ministers, and Catechumens. It is such a striking thing that gives so much hope for the future of our church. Then there is also the fact that with about 40 students on campus that become involved in the Liturgy Committee there is a lot of work to be done. There was total transformation of the chapel 3 times and between those transformations there was a lot of deep cleaning going on. There were all 40 of these people to be feed, both spiritually and physically. There is just so much to do. And taking part in that in such an involved way really brings you into the celebration. When you are removing the decorations for Good Friday, it makes you think of why in a whole new way. When you are on team flower power, it makes you wait with joyful anticipation for what we know is the Good News. When you cook a meal for the Liturgy committee, it calls you to remember the work of the church and how many people there are to be grateful for. In the preparation, you are wholly swallowed up by the Season, not by the mechanics of it but by the reason for the season. I love it. Not to mention, it is a peaceful time when most students leave campus and you can grow close to people you’ve never known and be super productive.

 

I guess that was just a really long and exaggerated way of saying Happy Easter! And Happy Easter for the next 50 days! So good that we celebrate for longer than we repent because, “We are the Easter people and alleluia is our song.”- Blessed John Paul II (I am patiently waiting 5 more days for the canonization!) So let’s start Easter off right with Dyngus Day. I am not Polish at all but I am from a very highly Polish populated area where this day was commonly referred to as Dyngus Day instead of Easter Monday. I am also told to tell you Happy Patriots Day from my soon-to-be home state. Enjoy your celebrations no matter what you call this day!

Marriage Weekend

Guess what. Tim came to DC for a marriage weekend. It really can't be described as anything else. We had hours and hours of marriage prep. Which was wonderful and also really taxing. Fr. Christian is so good to work with our long distance struggles and dedicate a long weekend to us. It was really great to spend so much time preparing for the rest of our lives, Tim has a post in the works about the significance of it for us so I wont go too far and ruin that for y'all.

So it was so good to spend time with him and take him to some of our stomping grounds. Otherwise known as Kelly's Irish Times.

And the weekend was full of some other fantastic surprises by the names of Sarah and Steve. 

And remember when I told you who my favorite dancing partner was? Well Tim might have been a bit jealous.

So we had a big community brunch on Sunday. I love these people more than you could ever know and the blessing of living with people who build you to Christ all while making you laugh until you cry is the best thing ever. I suggest it to anyone who ever has the opportunity.

Ryan and Steve will be altar serving at our wedding this summer, they took this weekend as time to practice with Fr. Christian.

A new meaning to Boys Couch.

After the joy-filled weekend, we still have many more things to do toward marriage preparedness, but I am certain that I am ready to share my life and my loved ones with this man.

A Catch All

A post for all the things that are blog worthy but not documented enough for individual posts. Plus, do you see how behind I am?

^^ We had a Friday Night Event where we invited 100 (mostly) girls over to the House to paint their own pottery. I am so happy with how my mug turned out! If you are looking to host a party in the DC area, definitely look them up to bring their mobile studio to you.^^

^^The people who love me know I love puzzles. The picture on the right is of my puzzle table, a permanent fixture in my room. The people I live with have heard me praise the art of the puzzle a nauseating amount, but why not one more time? I love puzzles. When working on a puzzle you get to see your progress. You know that there truly is only one right answer. You feel so accomplished when you are working on it. You can sit down for hours with it or just do a piece here and there. I love puzzles. I use them to de-stress. If only I had more time to do more puzzles. But I do have many a puzzle to do! 

Imagine my joy and excitement when I get to my mailbox immediately after taking my first day of comprehensive exams to see a puzzle in my mailbox. My favorite, Larabean, had mailed me a 250 piece puzzle of Tim and I! So I took it into the Campus Ministry Lounge and did it right there before going to study for day two. And then Annie saw the giraffe puzzle and thought of me. This one is still in progress but I love it and her so much! Thank you ladies!^^

^^We had next years House community over for Prayer Time and Fun Time. And no community time in our House is complete without Gaga ball so...^^

^^Did you guys know that April 8th was Free Cone Day at Ben & Jerry's? Well it was, so I hit up some Phish Food before going to dinner for Shannon's Birthday in Silver Spring.^^

^^I discovered this selfie when loading pictures onto my computer for this post. Too good not to include.^^

^^ Last week Shannon and I hosted Confessions and Chipotle in Regan Hall. The casual life of a student minister. We hope you stopped by and got one of our hundred burritos, thanks Ines!^^

^^And then remember those people I told you were going to be huge in my life? Well they are. And we had a great Community evening where I think I speak for everyone when I say we grew really close that night. I am so blessed to know them all. They are doing wonderful things for our campus and I cannot wait to see how they are able to glorify Him with the rest of their lives. Our night was super fun and started with dinner on the Basilica mall.^^

^^Anthony had a child, burrito #1: Hector Tres.^^

^^Annie has some pretty amazing photo-bombing skills.^^

^^These guys are less awkward than they look. I think.^^

^^ Fab Five.^^

^^Joe's creative angle photography skills.^^

^^Finally, we started off Holy Week at CUA with Campus Wide Stations of the Cross. It was candlelit and beautiful and one of my favorite Catholic U traditions.

Well, thanks for bearing with me as I documented my Senior Spring. Less than a month til graduation!