Author: michardillo
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The Pearls of a Lifetime
June 10, 1989, St. Patrick’s Catholic Church, Port Sulphur, LA, processing out as husband and wife! Thirty years. One husband, one wife. Two years dating, five months engaged. Two c-sections. One back surgery, one ankle surgery- her. One neck surgery – him. Two daughters. Two baptisms, two confirmations. Countless stage performances. Seven nephews, two…
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Breaking News
Today, Friday, May 10, 2019, I am currently propped up in a recliner in my den, watching BBC America and writing on my laptop. My left leg is jacked up on multiple pillows on the recliner extension, draped in a blanket. I am surrounded by tray tables, pillows, and the minutiae of a normal life:…
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Birthday Party Trends
Check out my latest article in Washington Family Magazine! http://digital.washingtonfamily.com/issues/May-2019/index.html
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End in Sight: Tips for Fighting the Fourth-Quarter Blues
http://www.washingtonfamily.com/family_life/article_bbf36b0a-685f-11e9-b3fb-7f5670bba115.html
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Leaned into Lent; Leaning into Holy Week
So, we are in the final countdown. Finish today and Monday, make it through “circus day” (no, really, a circus is coming to my school) on Tuesday, and half-day on Wednesday…and then, EASTER BREAK. As a full-time teacher, I am 100% qualified to tell you who looks forward to school breaks more, students or teachers:…
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Language Learned, Passport Packed
Sunday, March 17, 2019: This morning, the Second Sunday in Lent, Fr. Gabriel, our parochial vicar, began his homily at 10:30 Mass with, “How is your Lent going?” For the first time in a very long time, I felt as though I was fully prepared to say, “Good!” For a few weeks before Ash Wednesday,…
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Writing through Lent: a Spiritual Exercise
Dear friends and followers, today is Ash Wednesday, and for Christians, the beginning of Lent. For these forty days of Lent, I will try to focus my writings and thoughts on more spiritual things, helping me to center myself on these three things: prayer, fasting, and almsgiving. For so long, Catholics were asked to give…
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Book Review: The Lost for Words Bookshop by Stephanie Butland
You know that feeling when you have a bug bite that has scabbed over and you pick at it and pick at it and make it bleed even though it is hurting and you know that you are making it hurt? That’s sort of the feeling I had while reading Stephanie Butland’s novel The Lost…
Michelle Blanchard Ardillo 