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Photos - Late this afternoon I worked on this photo album. The first half contains pictures from Easter Sunday. The second half is pictures from Abby's 1st Holy Communion.

Overall these two weeks should be great for Abby — at least in theory. She had gifts from Easter. She had a few gifts for 1st Communion. This Thursday she has a sleepover birthday party. Nevertheless, I'm sure she'll find at least one hour to tell us that she's bored and expect mommy to be "Julie the cruise director".

Flash - While taking some of the pictures today, I found out something I didn't know about my camera. I was outside and had removed my external flash but was holding it near the camera in my left hand. I bought that flash a few years back as a secondary "bounce flash", one you aim upwards to fill the room so that indoor pictures don't look so dark. Well, even though it was disconnected, it still fired when I took pictures. Like the corny old thermos joke, "how do it know?"

This opened up a whole new opportunity for me. I can now capture shots in portrait mode, rather than just landscape mode, and still use the flash to bounce light off the ceiling. It need not be attached at the flash shoe, which would bounce the light off to the left or right when you turn the camera for a portrait shot. Still, I'm puzzled at how the flash knows to fire…

Communion - So after months of anticipation, Abby finally made her First Holy Communion early at a 9am Mass. It seems like just yesterday it was Claire. (See also here...) Michelle and Claire went but I took the boys to the YMCA. We just didn't think that they would be patient that long. It was their first major trip in the new Jetta. They got a kick out of the sunroof. Even though our Accord had one, they rarely got to see it since they usually go around in the van.

After Mass Michelle took the girls to their gymnastics class. While they were out I did a little tweaking of our home network. When I switched routers a few weeks back, I hadn't re-configured our Airport Express. It allows us to stream music from anywhere in the house and to print to the laser printer from any computer. After gymnastics Michelle took the girls to out to the local "dollar stores" since Abby had been asking for quite some time. Later in the afternoon I took the girls to confession and brought home some take out dinner.

Vacation - The week ahead is New Hampshire's school spring break week. I'm not sure how Michelle will survive. Typically school breaks mean lots of kids over, but this week may also have several friends on a vacation away from home. We'll see how it goes…

Feast Day - In case you've forgotten, this Sunday is Divine Mercy Sunday.