niamh and finn: Happy Birthday, Auntie Mary!

Happy Birthday, Auntie Mary. Niamh and I ditched Steve and Finn and took a little trip all by our own girlie selves to San Francisco to my Aunt Mary's Surprise 70th Birthday Party. Niamh missed Finn terribly, she seriously did. The moment we stepped up to the check in counter, she said, "Mama, can we call Finn? I want to tell him 'I love him'." How sweet is that? And, when I was showing my parents pics on the computer, Niamh became very melancholy and said, "Stop, Mama, I don't want to see any photos of Finn. They will make me sad."

Anywho, I don't know how, but I managed to get not one single photo of Auntie Mary all weekend long. She looked good though, very surprised, and very happy, especially because her brothers Dermot and Brien (the 2 flanking my dad in the middle) flew in from AUSTRALIA and Eastern CANADA for the shin dig.

We also got to meet the newest addition to the family. This is my 2nd cousin once removed (third cousin to Niamh) (my dad's cousin's daughter's son) (confused yet?), Liam. He is cute as can be and looks nothing like anyone in our family. He must be a Janos, he looks just like his Dad.

I'm really glad I took this self-photo of myself and Niamh. Not only am I glad because I now see the need for botox around the corners of my eyes, but because it was one of the rare moments Niamh paid any attention to me all weekend. She was too busy hanging with her cousins.

Here she is with Cousins Deirdre and Keira at the party at Golden Gate Fields (horse racing for all you who don't know it.) Our group of maybe 40 people definitely helped bulk up the crowd that was there. If it weren't for us and the large group of nuns (I'm sure gambling is a sin), the place would have been very empty.

There is no such thing as ONE day of partying with the Shaws and Murtaghs. After the day at the races, we had a BBQ that night at my parents' house, and then ANOTHER BBQ the next day at my parents' house.