Saturday was the day of grandma’s memorial service. After a nice breakfast with the family we all got dressed up and went to St Joseph’s Catholic Church in Richardson, TX (just north of Dallas) for the service. I was responsible for the second reading and met 3 of my other cousins before the service for a quick run-through. We were all pretty nervous.
The service was nice, and pretty much all of the cousins (Cay’s grandchildren) were able to participate. After the service there was a reception with more pictures and some snacks. The service and just after was a pretty rough emotional time, but once the reception was well under way everyone pulled together and had a good time.
A large part of the event was picture taking. This was the first time that this much of the family was in the same spot at the same time, not to mention all dressed up! My favorite two pictures are the one here with all 17 of us together, and this one of Shannon, Ryan, Kevin, and I that was supposed to be a replica of a picture of the four of us taken some 15-20 years ago.
After the reception we all went our seperate ways to change and then met back in Murphy, TX for a gathering and dinner hosted at my uncle Hugh’s house. Dinner was Bar-BQ catered by my uncle Sean’s boss. It was really awesome of him to do that for our family. We visited for hours and I even had enough time to go upstairs and play with legos with my younger cousins! I haven’t built anything out of legos in years….
Even though this gathering was prompted by the passing of our grandma, this weekend has been one of the most memorable trips I have taken in a long time. In life and death, grandma has given us one of the best gifts of all: family.
