Ain’t No Party Like a Little Village Party ‘Cause a Little Village Party Don’t Stop

I Know that I was talking about our partying ways last week, but we’re still at it! Last night our house had a Christmas Party. It was a classy Christmas Sweater party, which meant that I wore a dress with a Christmas cardigan. We had cookies for decorating and ornaments for painting and Michelle made wassail (both spiked and non-spiked). We invited all the Amate volunteers and a bunch of alumni. The weather kept some people away, but we still had a great crowd, and the party was a lot of fun. Today it’s still snowing out so I’m sticking around. It is the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe and the local church is dedicated to her so I’m going to check out one of their special Masses…and then come back home for our weekly Christmas movie.

This week was busy with accompaniments to the Daley Center. On Monday I had two clients with cases and went to court with one of them but we were early so I was able to stop by the other client’s court room. The client I went to court with was there to get guardianship of her adult twin daughters who have autism. They are very shy and do not like direct questioning but the judge had to ask them if they objected to having their mom named as their guardian. One of them nodded but then burst into tears so the judge quickly decided to grant guardianship and let them get out of there. But let me back up—in the courtroom of the client I visited there was a lawyer with the build and beard of Santa Claus. He had a cast on his foot and instead of crutches, he had a large wooden walking stick and was holding it up while he sat. Then, I went back to the courtroom with the client with whom I came to the Daley Center and noticed the clerk—who looked like a leprechaun. At first I was thinking he was an elf because I had just seen Santa Claus but then I heard his Irish accent and noticed his leprechaun dolls. He was very helpful, if a bit irritated that we were missing a couple of papers. After we walked out of the court room, I went back to get a copy of the order the judge signed, the clerk told me that, because of the crying, despite his many years of working as a clerk in the Daley Center this was the first case that truly touched him. I touched a leprechaun’s heart!

I had a couple more cases in the Daley Center this week, but they were quicker and less eventful. I also went to St Juliana’s School with Sr Kathy to give them Advent mission banks. The school is over twice as big as the school where Kerry and I went last week, so we split up. I mostly got the younger kids and they were very attentive and cute. A kindergartener even thought I was pretty. Up next…more parties! I have two work-related parties on Friday, back-to-back. But, I’m coordinating the second one so I don’t know if I’ll actually be able to go to the first…

Life in Party Central

Between November 15^th and December 15^th, our house celebrates five birthdays. This is particularly significant because there are only nine people in my house. Birthdays three and four were this week, Elissa on Tuesday and Jessie on Saturday. For Elissa’s birthday, I fortunately had time to decorate the house because I didn’t have to work in the morning (Tuesdays I work from 12-7, unless I have an accompaniment in the morning). Elissa likes penguins so each of us colored a penguin coloring page and put them up around the dining room. I made her a card out of poster board and trimmed a little off of the bottom and used that to make a crown. I drew kissing penguins and cut around them and it made a crown! I did the same things for Chris’ birthday, but with dinosaurs. I also tried to make “sushi” but I have never made it before and was using corn husks instead of seaweed because I live in Little Village, not some place where they have seaweed. It didn’t turn out at all like sushi, but it’s the thought that counts, right?

For Jessie’s birthday we had brunch. We surprised her by inviting some people that lived in her house last year. The brunch was delicious and a lot of fun. After brunch we went to McKinley Park (by South House) for ice skating. Since I cannot put on ice skates without embarrassing myself, I joined Carlos, Ann P and Jen from South House outside the rink. Carlos, Ann and I made a snowman. We named him Al Capone Daley Jr. He was super fun and super big. We were getting cold so we went back to the ice rink and eventually our friends decided to leave. About ten minutes had passed since we left Al behind but he was already destroyed. And by destroyed, I mean that parts of Al we strewn across the field. After ice skating some of us went to North House and then Elissa’s friends’ house to celebrate Elissa’s birthday with them Ann K and I joined them in going out to bars in Wrigleyville, which was a lot of fun.

For work this week? Some highlights include: going with Kerry to a school on the southwest side to talk about Taller because they are doing an Advent spare change campaign for us and going to Sr Kathy’s house for a staff meeting to talk about the strategic plan. I spent all day Friday at St Agnes which made for a boring afternoon because no clients came in. The beginning of the week was crazy busy but things have calmed down a bit.  I do have a lot of accompaniments scheduled between now and Christmas, though.