Happy Easter!

I hope you had a wonderful Easter! 

After silent retreat, I had Thursday and Friday off since my kids were still on Spring Break. On Thursday night, I went to Holy Thursday services at a nearby parish that I hadn’t been to before. The service was really nice, with inspirational music and a former Jesuit pastor. 

Good Friday morning was perhaps the most aggravating morning of my 8 months in Los Angeles. (Very) Long story short, John and I had to reassemble our kitchen because the landlord put in a new floor while we were gone. Yes, a new floor is nice, but white tile gets DIRTY fast and SHATTERS everything. So far we’ve lost a salt shaker, 3 bowls, and a wine glass. Yes, we need to be more careful, but it’s frustrating! I miss the gross linoleum… Anyway, after that rather annoying morning, Julie and I went to a Good Friday service at the Our Lady of Angeles cathedral downtown. The service was nice, but felt kind of impersonal because it is just such a large space. 

On Sunday, we went to Gospel Mass at the church down the street! It was perhaps the BEST way to celebrate Easter I can imagine. The joyful music and the lively congregation were so inspirational, and celebrating Easter with about 20 JVs was just so cool. There’s no better way to say it – it was a really nice morning. Afterward, we had everyone (about 30 JVs!) over to Casa DK for brunch. Everyone brought food and John Don dominated in the kitchen. It was a lovely day . I realized this is my third consecutive Easter away from home, and as much as I miss celebrating with my family, I’ve had some really unique experiences. I was in Peru on Easter Sunday two years ago, and at BC with some wonderful friends last year.

 

 Along the side you'll see Casa DK with our guest of honor, Jacques, and LMU student and leader of the De Colores trip that we have all been on!  Below is some of the JV crew celebrated with us.

And finally, after we, the ladies of DK, gave up meat for Lent, we celebrated Easter with lots of Julie's favorite food: Bacon! In the back, John Don dominating the eggs. He was the all-star chef of the day!

This week we had low attendance at Urban Compass. There was stuff going on at the school and I think the kids needed to get back in the groove of things after their break. It was nice for me, though, because I was under the weather, so chasing after 15 munchkins instead of 40 was a relief! On Friday we said goodbye to the guys who volunteer from LMU with a little party.  I made them finals care packages and we said our goodbyes for the school year. They are a fantastic group and have really bonded with the kids over the course of the school year. Friday’s just won’t be the same without them! Tonight we “appreciated” some of our other volunteers with a dinner here at DK. We had four of our regular volunteers come over, and also two of the FJVs who lived in DK last year and work at verb. It was a really nice evening with lots of appreciation going on. Thanks to my roommates for their help in getting the casa ready for the party!