ohana means family, and family means no one gets left behind

hoco char ball

this throwback thursday, let's take it all the way back to a year ago when i spent a great deal of time in the dingy place below caldwell hall with 10 other crazy people. back in august 2012, we sat in the dingy cellar and there was quite the disagreement between one timothy mcevoy and casey lilley. the community craving tim mentioned how excited he was to be like a family by the end of the year and the ever skeptical casey lilley remarked that we would never be more than his co-workers. by may of 2013, casey had retracted that statement and started referring to us as ohana.

christmas cellar night…

…got a little weird

what am i talking about? last year at cua, i was a student minister. what the heck is a student minister? short version, a student who works as a liaison between students in the residence halls and campus ministry and builds supportive and personal relationship with students through regular conversations, events in and out of the res halls, and prayer. they promote fellowship amongst students and partner with ra's to make the residential experience as awesome as it can be. student ministers also plan weekly, monthly, and yearly events for the entire students body and build a community with their fellow student ministers that is supportive and prayerful. yeah, thats the short version.

the only way to shop at costco

so as a community, us crazy 11 got together several times each week for: meal time, prayer time, mass, fun time, pastoral staff meeting, business meeting and then the events we planned and did. so you can imagine that we got pretty close after 36 weeks of that.

reunionizing at times this one time.

over the course of last year, and the time we spent together, we really did become our own sort of family, each person with their own certain role. we totally lived the "if plates fly, let them!" policy as papa frank so eloquently stated. except maybe one time it was a bowl and it was intercepted. whoops.

spongebob cellar night #socollege

but at the end of the day, even if we disagreed on whether or not we should use the card scanner, or what the most effective way to do the job was, or what color the luau t-shirt was, we were a family. sometimes we were irritated with each other, sometimes we were giddy with excitement to spend time together, but we always loved each other.

luaupaloozaaaaa

resident ministers of 2012-2013, praying for you all today and alway!

#highschoolfieldtrip

kings, ice cream, and the olsen twins.

the glory days of consuming mass amounts of bidet coke. 

so i'm pretty sure everyone has that one friend. the ashley to your mary-kate. the free bar water to your bar dancing. the "ditto" to your "wanna just watch a movie and eat ice cream." if you don't, i'm so sorry. but this is the story all about my bffl, and how sometimes, #friendsarethefamilyyouchooseforyourselves.

moving out of quinn. sad dayzzz.

rylee and i met freshman year at cua and her posse kind of adopted me towards the end of october/early november. we were going over another friends house to bake christmas cookies and went to the eddie j  beforehand. ry sat across from me and i remembered being really confused as to whether or not i was a contestant in the game of 20(thousand) questions or what. seriously, homegirl gave me the third degree.

grunchy brunch.

fast forward to senior year, and after living together for a semester and a borderline ridiculous amount of sleepovers (considering our buildings are on the same campus) we are still besties. lady is getting married this summer and i am so excited for her and the future hubby but also secretly slightly melancholic that we'll never live together again (unless tim okays me moving in. tim?)

but essentially, rylee is the type of friend that every girl needs. she scolds me when i'm being stupid. we enjoyed heated debates that reach no conclusions cause we're stubborn (literally, i was totally unaware that this wasn't normal.) ry forgives me for ruining so many surprises. she invited me to hang out with her and her mom in florida over spring break. then she let me drink too much wine and forgot to tell me to stop talking. whatever. and when we say we're actually going to go out this weekend, we both are secretly happy when we resolve to mix drinks, eat ice cream and watch a movie. basically, sometimes, we're barrels of fun. and even when we're not, we are. so there.

when people text us to ask what we're doing and we respond with a picture of us to tell them we're lying and bed and watch a movie. the usual. 

i'm super lucky to have such a friend as rylee and to be able to count her as a part of my many "families." I'm ultra jazzed to witness her journey into this next phase of life with her timothy, but please all, cross your fingers and say your prayers that we'll end up in the same city so i can steal her from time to time for some much needed raising helen and coffee heath bar crunch.

side note. we're actually the worst at getting pictures together. because its usually one of us behind the camera. awkward.

feehan family

so, there are a lot of ways to build a family. welcome to the part of the blog where i talk about my selection of "non-traditional" families.

in eighth grade, i went to an open house at the local diocesan high school. my dad was sold when the student speaker said "at feehan, its cool to be smart." i was sold when i figured out i would have the entire school know my family like at the public high school in my town, i can almost hear the "little ballous" now.

low and behold, i found myself at orientation for feehan in fall 2006 and looked like the catholic school newb i was with my knee length plaid skirt. don't worry, that quickly changed. little did i know that it was going to be nothing like i expected. in a good way.

feehan has always been big on "the feehan family." about how it is more than a school and really a support system. feehan was a place that raised me. it helped me lose some of my bratty tendencies (i said some) and lead me closer to my faith. it taught me to live the fourth. it brought me to some of my closest friends. it taught me that every day is better with at least 3.6 hugs. and most of all, it taught me to set my hear on things above, and not on goods of earth.

i see the feehan family thriving in my life still. the people i see around campus wearing feehan gear, i always remember and always say hi to. i still consider some of my fellow shamrocks my best friends and hopefully will be living with some of them next year in boston. fingers crossed. also, i don't think a week goes by where i don't utilize the phrase "shamrock'n'roll" #homecomingohseven

from the mixed up style files of one shannon t. ballou

k, so way back when, rylee told me I should be doing outfit posts. i hate taking pictures but I am gonna try it out once a week over here on the blogosphere and see how it goes. ideally, this will be a little "weekly wear wednesdays" but as you see its thursday. #whops. here goes nothing. shield your eyes from the awkwards.

monday:

shoes: j. crew factory scarf: j. crew (old) pants: j. crew  shirt: loft (old but similar) jacket: gap (old but similar)

#selftimerintherho

 Tuesday:

boots: madewell shirt: calvin klien (old) sweater: j.crew (old) pants: j.crew necklace: j.crew

#awkwardselfie

what happens when you use self timer

well now, wasn't that sufficiently awkward for everyone? RAwesome. till next time, internet.

the notorious GMB

in march 2007, i became an aunt to my favorite girl in the entire world, the notorious GMB, as she is affectionately called. a few years later (because we are the ballou family) i became GMB's God mother and she has been one of the biggest blessings in my entire life, and in the life of my whole family. and she has taught me so much. 

GMB is joyful. she is smart. she is wise. she is funny. she is loving. she is kind. she is bossy. she is a reader. she is a singer. she is a dancer. she is a taylor swift fanatic. she is simply amazing. she shows me the joy of Christ in every encounter we have.

some of GMB's finer moments:

since she was three at her baptism, she stood near the baptismal font. she needed to lean over it and my brother instructed her to do so by saying it was just like brushing her teeth. of course, this lead to GMB leaning over the font, and just like when she brushed her teeth, she spit into the font. father steve was oh so over-joyed at this. and i laughed for the remainder of her baptism. 

on Christmas morning when GMB was four, she opened a package of sox and exclaimed "just what i wanted!"

when she was five, GMB pulled me outside, pulled on a tutu, and pulled off a spontaneous back deck concert for me and all her stuffed animals. all the songs were GMB originals. 

when GMB was four and i was leaving for college, she told me she would miss me so much, but not to worry, next year she would be at college. and she'd probably choose the same one. 

this summer, when GMB was six, we had the best conversation about transubstantiation. Yeah. I know.

GMB has been known to fall asleep while, literally, in the middle of a good book. But also simply loves to read. 

even though she is just shy of 7, she has already mastered several #outfitoftheday poses. she's just too good. 

she loves to shop, and of course, she only has the finest of tastes. 

and she always knows how to cheer me up when i'm feeling blue. 

my nana

so in my family in european history class we've been talking a lot about how families rarely get attached  and are more about economy than anything else. my own experience could not be farther from the truth. maybe its the difference 500 some odd years makes? jokes.

anyways, i was reflecting on this idea and i was thinking about how my nana is one of the people who has taught me, and still teaches me, what it really means to love. she is one of my biggest role models.

prom '010

my nana is the daughter of irish immigrants who grew up in a big family in hyde park. her and my grandfather were high school sweethearts who's dates would consist of going to confession on saturdays and then over to the drugstore for a soda #whatdreamsaremadeof. anyways, they got married when she was in her early twenties and made the big move to the uncharted territory that was "the suburbs" where they raised six kids, my mom being the oldest.

excuse my appearance. i was young, naive and fresh from work on a farm. 

so how exactly has this nana of mine taught me what it means to love? well, i have a hard time remembering a day of my childhood when my nana wasn't there. since my mom was sick, my nana came over every day to help out and hang out. once she didn't show up and my mom was sleeping in so i called 911 because i couldn't find my nana and she was supposed to be there. turns out my mom was trying to give her a day off. you know, four year old solutions, call the police, totally logical, don't even bother to ask anyone.

so my early childhood is filled with memories of my mom, my nana and i taking the hospital or the mall (or both) by storm while my brothers were in school. my nana is so cool she even had an auntie annie's frequent buyer card. i know, right. then after my mom had passed away, my nana still came over every day. she put us on the bus each day so my dad could leave for work and she got us off the bus each day. i was lucky enough to be in morning kindergarten so we would go to friendly for a grilled cheese and a sprite every once in a while when the brothers were finishing up their afternoon. then, come summer time, we would go to maine and spend the summer with my grandparents while my dad worked and visited on weekends so we didn't have to go to daycare. basically, this is why my aunts joke that my brothers and i are the 7th, 8th and 9th children.

so this is all well and good, but how has my grandmother taught me to love? well she has taught me that love is sacrifice. i couldn't even begin to count the hours and dollars my grandmother had put towards me and my brothers. how many times i gave her a horribly hard time (i had a tendency to be a brat as a child, still working on it) and she loves me anyways.

and she's tech saavy!

she has taught me that love is honesty. the woman responsible for my incapability to tell a lie or keep a secret is my nana. all it takes is a look from my nana and i spill the truth. how many times she would ask me if i cleaned my room, i'd say yes, then she'd move to the stairs and i'd confess.

she has taught me that love is forgiveness. no sooner did i admit that i didn't clean my room, two seconds later she'd be offering to help me.

nana and my aunt mary rockin' vintage mccarthy aprons

she has taught me that love is unconditional. when i found out that my brother was having a baby and unmarried, i was a little upset. but then my dad went over to tell my grandparents and my devoutly catholic nana called me laughing and saying that babies are happy things and now i couldn't agree more.

she has taught me that love comes from God. i still remember nights in maine saying my prayers with my nana and going to mass with my nana. my nana and i still love talking about the church and god and how our faith shapes us and i know my nana is a big part of the reason why i continue to hunger and thirst for a deeper relationship with God. in my nana, i see the perfect example of a saint. she preaches the gospel with her actions, and with her life of love.

the ballou's

as i mentioned previously, i intend to detail out the many persons i would consider family and i figured the best place to start would be with my first family. my family unit. my household.

i was born on april 8, 1992 in massachusetts into a nice little family with a mom, a dad, and two older brothers.

my mom: she grew up in the suburbs of massachusetts where she was the oldest of six children in a catholic family. her name is sharon, and because she is awesome, she hyphenated when she got married. for her undergrad, she went to an art school in new bedford that no longer exists and later got her masters from cranbrook academy of the arts in environmental sculpture. she has red hair and is incredibly beautiful. she is kind, smart and loves to read and take notes (i've rummaged through a lot of her old books in our basement). a friend called me out the other day for never talking about my mom, but the truth is, when she was 37 (i was 3) she was diagnosed with ovarian cancer and though she fought like the mama bear she passed, she died on november 2, 1997. though i remember a lot about her from our early days at the mall with my nana while my brothers were in school, a lot of what i know about her life before she was a mom comes from my dad, my nana, and her 4 sisters and 1 brother. like the time she painted snoopy and woodstock on my grandfathers car. or how she met my father while they were both working at the foxborough company one summer when they were 18 (and got married after a quick twelve years of dating at age 30). and how she was an amazing women.

my dad: he also grew up in the suburbs of massachusetts and was in the middle of a catholic family with six kids. he got kicked off the football team in high school after taking his senior portrait lying down on the bench. he used to have long blonde hair and now he has short brownhair and is quite conservative politically. he has worked in computer science since graduating high school and took a few classes at northeastern along the way, but never finished his ba. he made us eat all natural and organic food before whole foods was a thing (i don't think i ate a single grain of refined sugar until i was 6) and is a workout and healthy eating fanatic. he doesn't drink because "have you seen how people act when they have alcohol?" and works out for at least 2 hours almost every day. he loves baseball, both watching the red sox (but not the yell at the team "we" language stuff) and coaching adolescents in his free time. he's the kind of guy that will pay for a kid on his team to take the sats and drive him there at 7 am on a saturday but usually only goes to mass if i'm home. he is thoughtful, considerate, and practical and enjoys letting his children make there own mistakes, only intervening when they ask for help. he is incredibly intelligent both in useful information as well as the completely useless. he's the smartest and best guy i know.

the oldest: my brother has blonde hair and blue eyes and girls love him. he is athletic but his version of healthy eating is gatorade and buffalo chicken. doesn't drink any soda. is 26 and a townie. he is an amazing dad to his 6-year-old daughter  (gmb) and loves being "the boss." if you think you can convince him that he's wrong, think again. he loves football, baseball and played both in high school and now enjoyes yelling at the tv when the patriots are flopping. he has a deep love for taylor swift, superheros (especially iron man) and velcro wallets.

the middle child: this brother of mine has red hair (that has gotten a little blondish lately) and is colorblind. he used to be really quiet, skinny and gangly, until he moved away to umass boston when he started speaking up a lot more and turned out to be quite funny. he's not afraid to call me out (in a respectful way) when i am being a total brat (which can happen) and is currently putting his history degree to good use by following in my dads footsteps of working in the computer world at harvard and attending grad school there as well. he is 24 and loves living in boston and being independent as well as the occasional hard cider.

the youngest and the only girl: i am 3 and 4 years younger than both of my brothers and my name doesn't start with a b like theirs do. because of my family standing, i became very accustomed to things being my way and have had a tendency to get very upset when they don't. its something i've been working on for the past twenty-one years. i love pink, brunch (have i mentioned this) and have a shopping addiction that my father constantly reminds me to be careful of. i struggle on the daily to authentically follow Christ in the way i am called to, but i'm working on it. i suck at driving and love living in the city where i can uber and walk all i want without getting strange looks. i strive to show love to every person i interact with.