This is my favorite picture of my family because it really captures our true essence. Believe it or not, there was quite a perturbed photographer who took this picture out of frustration at our lack of listening skills. Anyways, my family is quirky just like me and I figured I’d tell you a little bit about them.

My Dad has been working in the concrete business for 30+ years and is so passionate about it that he even looks at concrete on vacation. No joke, we have literally pulled over to the side of the road so he could jump out and look at the sidewalk. And our one and only Disney World vacation was a cover for my dad to attend The World of Concrete, which is a real, legitimate concrete convention. Also, one time he was a hand model.

My Mom is a non-Catholic who works at a Catholic school. For some reason she was crazy enough to marry into the family, even after her first time meeting my dad’s family. Coming from a typical sized family, she wasn’t used to the big, crazy, Irish-Catholic family thing. The first time they all sat down for dinner, they said their 2 second grace and everyone dove into the food. My mom sat back with her mouth open while my dad slopped food on her plate yelling “If you don’t take it now, you won’t get to eat!”

My Brother is currently a professional waterskiier in Germany. That sounds fake, but isn’t. Right now he is being paid to waterski, drive boats, and shoot off pyrotechnics while also having time to travel Europe. It’s a rough life. But while he’s the luckiest guy ever, he can also be the unluckiest guy ever. Just ask his wrecked motorcycle, lack of an appendix, and the shoe imprint that stayed on his face for a good two weeks. (All separate stories, but wow, imagine if all of those happened at the same time!)

My Sister is a union carpenter who, despite being 7 years younger than me, is dating someone I graduated with. But he is cool and also puts up with our crazy family, so it’s all good. It is even better because of their first conversation that went a little like this:

Him: I’m a welder.

Her: I’m a union carpenter. You know what that means?

Him: No, what?

Her: I make more than you.

She’s sassy and I like her. Especially because now I’m raising a carbon copy of her.

Quirky Family Facts

Weirdest injuries:

• (Dad) Almost completely severed his hand with a saw
• (Mom) Almost severed her toes while mowing the lawn
• (Me) Cracked my head open falling off of a waterskiing pyramid (read about that here.)
• (Brother) Broke his collarbone, shoulder-blade, and road rashed his back, leg and foot when his motorcycle brake locked up
• (Sister) Fell off of a tiny teeter totter as a toddler and broke her arm in 2 places

Weirdest place we ever roadtripped to: When Medford opened Minnesota’s first roundabout, we drove there, drove around the roundabout, and then drove home.

Normal things we did as kids:

• Broke every laundry basket my mom ever owned. Even now they are all broken.
• Convinced Molly to take the first turn jumping out of the hayloft without realizing my dad took away most of the hay. She couldn’t feel her legs and Mason and I ran away like the good, upstanding children we were.
• Set up the croquet set and attempted to play polo on our bikes. It didn’t work so we morphed it into Calvinball.

Funniest car accident: When a car drove through a yield sign and hit my mom (damn teenagers!) and made my sister smash her face into the piece of peanut butter toast she was holding.

And for some reason, Andrew decided to stay with me and marry into this quirky family. Even though the first time he came to meet them, Mason made him listen to a 15 minutes sousaphone solo that he played from his truck bed (and that Andrew very politely stood in the driveway and listened to) and Molly mooned him. We might not be normal, but we sure have a lot of fun.