Where There's Room For One, There's Room For Eleven

Last weekend we met up with Dustin's sister Phoebe to attend her first auction. She has a new job as a jewelry buyer for the Phillips de Pury auction house. We went to lend our support.

Neither Dustin nor I had ever been to an auction before. It was crazy! Everything moved so fast. The auctioneer was a most refined fop. He was smooth and had a good sense of humor: "Are you sure? Come onnnnnn... you've come this far; what's another hundred dollars?"


In addition to people present in the auction room, there were participants over the phone and internet.


Phoebe's friend had to leave early, so she left it up to us to bid for her on a couple of items. It was thrilling!


Afterward, we got down to the real business of the day: heading up to Massachusetts for the high school graduation of the youngest Stephens sibling, Tommy.

We rented a car. I swear to God, people who work for car rental places are among the most bitter, jaded employees in the world. They have absolutely no sense of urgency and not even the slightest bit of care for customer service. Every time I've rented a car I've encountered the same types of cold, uncaring, humorless people. The only people with bigger chips on their shoulders are those who work for the DMV. Jeez.


But soon we were off!



Since Dustin's license is expired and no one on earth wants to see me drive, Phoebe did the honors.


I have to say, for as much as I love New York, there's nothing like getting out of the city once every while to breathe some fresh air.



After three short hours, we arrived at North Mount Hermon prep school for the graduation-eve dinner and dance. We walked in and the place reeked of teenager. High school has such a specific atmosphere to it.


The already-present Stephenses had saved us some scrumptious cafeteria food.


The whole family made it up, including Caitlin, just back from a semester in London (with her friend Nick),


... and even Luis Jose made it up from Santa Barbara.


And so began the obligatory family photos.


But there was little time for that. There was a high school dance goin' on!


Dustin got into a bit of a tangle with the balloons.


And though it was stiflingly hot inside the gym, there were ways to cool off.


The music was a-pumpin', and boogie-ing commenced.


The Stephens offspring were together once again!


I guess I hadn't learned my lesson from Dustin's previous entanglement with the balloons.


Don't worry; I made it out alive.


After the dance, there was pretty much nothing to do but go to Mim's Market.


They have one table.


That's all we nine needed.


After catching up over some iced tea and coffee, we headed out... but not before Caitlin showed us the tattoo she got while across the pond. It's big.


Half the family stayed at an inn down the road, while D. and I and his parents had rooms at the Moor Cottage nearer to the school. It's sort of a bed-and-breakfast, without the breakfast. Just a big house with rooms to rent. It used to be a girls' dormitory, I think. The second we walked in, the first thing I said was, "This place is totally haunted." You can just feel it. Dustin said, "Nah, it's just an old house." But come on. Look at this place.



I mean, look at this wallpaper.





You're telling me it's not haunted??



Unfortunately, there were no ghost sightings, and we had a good night's sleep. There was just a lot of noise coming from the tenants upstairs. All night we kept saying, "What are they DOING up there? Who's moving furniture at 1am?" Sure enough, the next day when we saw Caitlin, before saying anything about the cottage, she immediately said, "Ohmygod that place is sooooo haunted! They say that people hear furniture moving in the middle of the night." Weird.

The porch was cute though. I would have loved to just sit out there with a nice cup of coffee in the morning.


But there was no time for that either. We had to all pile into the car to get to the graduation.


And to have all seven kids singing along to the new Fiest song.


Luckily for us, there were muffins and coffee at the school. Thank God.


I would not have been good company without that coffee.



We all traipsed down to the little field they had set up for the ceremony.


There were only about 80 kids graduating from this little school, a far cry from the 700 in my senior class.

Wouldn't it be amazing to go to a school with structures like these around campus?


Dustin and Caitlin did their usual hamming it up for the camera. It's a Stephens tradition.


While waiting for the ceremony to begin, it was a pretty typical gathering: Dustin and I took cute pictures of ourselves....


... and Phoebe sat around fabulously, looking like a celebrity.


Mom and Dad Stephens watched the procession proudly, their last child about to graduate from high school.


It was a generally proud moment.


... for all 80 childrens' parents, who crowded around the graduates' seating area to take photos.


This woman was seriously decked out for the occasion.


And Dustin captured it all with his new digital SLR camera.


One really cool thing about the ceremony was that the commencement speaker was Malachy McCourt, the brother of "Angela's Ashes" author Frank McCourt and an author in his own right, plus actor, playwright, and grandfather of an NMH graduate to boot. He is an old Irish sod, and despite having grown up with less than nothing, NOTHING, he didn't talk at all about how hard he had to work to make it in the world, to pull himself up from complete poverty, to gain success in any way. He gave the graduates advice on how to fully enjoy their lives, how to not worry about what adults tell them to do, and how to watch out for conservatives. He started off by declaring, "Any day above ground is a good one," and ended not only with a slew of Irish blessings ("May your roof never fall in, and may the people under it never fall out") but also, finally, by singing one of those traditional Irish songs. You know the kind, where one guy starts singing in the pub and soon everyone is singing along. He got everyone in the audience to sing this beautiful Irish song about friendship and life. Except me. I couldn't sing. I was too busy crying.


Mom, you woulda lost it too. You would have loved it.

So after that speech, and a few far less interesting ones, they finally started handing out the diplomas. Luckily for Karen, Tommy walked right past us on his way to the stage.


They called his name and we all cheered.



There was a lot of photography taking place.


At the beginning and the end of the graduation, the school had a traditional opening and closing officiation by the actual "sheriff of the settlement of Massachusetts." It was pretty hilarious.


With only 80 students, the tossing of the caps is a little lackluster.


Afterward, we all headed downfield to meet up with the grads.


Phoebe indulged her maternal instincts with their little cousin Isabella.


As did Caitlin, when Isabella revealed the masterpiece she had created as a graduation gift for Tommy.



We couldn't find the lad, so while we waited Caitlin showed off her cool Casio watch from 1986.


Dustin's father, Luis, is a charming, charismatic man who is unafraid to talk to anybody, not unlike my stepdad Tom. So, naturally we weren't surprised when we turned around and he was chatting up Mr. McCourt.


... which was a good opportunity for us all to have our picture with him.


This one's for you, Mama! He loved me. Old Irish guys typically do.


Isabella is so. freaking. adorable.


Strangely enough, while I snuck into a random building to use the ladies' room, the poster they had hanging in the stall was for a college in Arizona. Random.


When I came back, Tommy had just found his fam.


Little Isabella has a big crush on Tommy. I think she thinks he's Prince Charming.



They took many photos together.


In fact, from that point on, the photos were unstoppable.





Even the obligatory ones.


Everyone just loves this little doll. She was very well-behaved for someone with nobody to play with all day.



After a short lunch, we gathered in Tom's dorm room, just, you know, to take another picture.


It's a pretty tight space for eleven people to squish into.


We waited around for... something, I don't remember. We got bored and started doing some "America's Next Top Model" auditioning.




Finally, after the aunt/grandmother/niece trio left, we went out for Japanese food in the nearby town of Northampton. I'm not a huge fan of sushi, but I made do.


There were plenty of menu options.



Of course, a toast was in order for young Tommy, who has not only completed his studies, but is on his way to a fine music college on scholarship for jazz drumming.



We had all signed a card for him...


... and there was an awesome book about jazz and a DVD as well.


But the gift-giving had only begun! We also celebrated Caitlin's birthday (a little late) and Phoebe's birthday (a little early).




They got matching/opposite necklaces. Phoebe's was a white version, Caitlin's was black.


We only have weird pictures of the necklaces, because Phoebe decided to be a renegade and delete the only clear photo we had of them, because she didn't like the way she looked.


She approved of this one, however.


On to the meal. Have you ever heard of snooch?


Most likely not. It's a word Phoebe made up to describe the feeling you get when you eat Japanese food and the wasabi/ginger combination attacks your sinuses in the most intense, painful, and awesome way.


You're like, "No no no no! OUCH! AAAAAH, too much! Wait, give me more!"

We all got it.


Since it's not so often that the whole family gets together, it was hard for the Stephenses to part. So after dinner we got coffee. Isn't this the most adorable little town?


It reminds me of Payson, a bit.


So we got coffee.


And chatted just a little bit more. Dustin finally got to make Tommy confess to his parents the silly and hilarious story of his friend getting arrested when they were staying with Dustin last year.


We made our way outside and it was time to say our goodbyes.


Smooches!



G'bye Stephenses!

It was quite a weekend. It's always nice to get outta town now and then, and when you are like me, and don't have your immediate family nearby, it's always nice to be welcomed into such a warm and fun family. It's always an adventure, that's for sure.

love,
*jenna*