20 Kids and Counting

Aside from a spouse, God can bless a girl with one best friend or He can bless her with three best friends.  Lucky me ... guess which one I am?  Since one of us is due to deliver a baby anytime now, we decided to throw together one last hurrah, one little potluck meal before her baby boy arrives and is followed by the arrival of another girlfriend's baby in early March.  When we get together, we invite our two parish priests and they often come.  So once everyone is here, there are 10 adults--four couples and two priests--and 20 kids.  Yep, 20 kids from the age of 8.5 all the way down to unborn.

Within the last year, all four of us have had a baby or will, soon.  I missed the memo about the timing of pregnancy ... Sarah was at the end of a pregnancy when I became pregnant with Maria, then Staci became pregnant in the last weeks of my pregnancy with Maria.  Then ... bonus! ... Jen announced a pregnancy and Sarah announced another pregnancy.  Oh, for the love of new life!  I love having girlfriends, especially girlfriends who stay home with their children.  There is always something to plan, always something to do.  There is always an e-mail string beginning in the morning and ending when our husbands come home from work.  We do playdates, lunches together, meetings at parks and the zoo when it is nice outdoors, meetings at homes when it is not.  We trade I-can't-believe-it-happened stories and maternity clothes, recipes, woes, worries, prayers, and successes.  We're all in the same parish, our children are in the same school, so even when we don't plan get-togethers, we see one another almost every day.  The best part of having multiple girlfriends is that even when one or two people can't make it (to whatever), one or two other people can.  When there are multiple girlfriends, there are multiple talents.  One of us is very good at one thing, another is good at a different thing, and so forth, until we have a very powerful collaborative of brain power and helping hands.

Could I ask for more? No.  God has filled my cup and it is overflowing.  Deo Gratias!

Monsignor receives hugs from several of the children.  He handed out little gifts, after promising them that he would, after they finished their supper.  He even sat on their "picnic blanket" with them and ate with the children.  They adore him because he's so good to them.  He is an amazing man, a wonderful spiritual father.  Having been in our parish for almost 20 years, he's baptized the majority of the children present this night.

There's really no need to empty ice into a beer cooler when there's an endless supply of snow outdoors.

Clockwise from left: Matt, Jeremy (almost hidden), Father H, Jeff, and Nathaniel: a collection of wonderful husbands and one very hard working priest who was ordained nearly 2 years ago.

Maddie, Maddie, Maddie ... Not my Maddie, although I'd take her for my own in a second.  She belongs to my friend Sarah.

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Okay, so I stole that cute little title from friends of mine, but I like it and it's fitting for this post!
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Apparently, I failed to take pictures of my friends and me or ask a husband to do it, but they're all really pregnant anyway and probably didn't want a camera pointing at them.  :)  If you are curious about these wonderful girlfriends of mine, go HERE to see us together.