there really is something about mary's

have you heard?? the mary club initiated it's newest member a couple weeks ago! on march 20th mary colleen sweeney made her grand entrance into the family and we are all smitten!

especially big brother



and big sister



(big brother jack was also very excited about his baby sis. he wasn't, however, a huge fan of the hospital. i mean, what 3 year old is??)


our little girlfriend was happy to finally have some room to stretch out. go on with your 10 pound self!



her fellow mary cousins were able to visit while their aunt recovered in the hospital. they honestly would have stayed there all weekend if i let them.






talk about old pros!





lord only knows what their hair will look like while i'm in the hospital. (no offense, dan) i'm thankful i got these awesome pics just incase i need to pretend colleen is baby hauck in the future.

mary #4 was battling a nasty ear infection all last week so she wasn't able to hold the littlest mary until today. she just loves "baby colleena"



now i'm sure some of you are wondering...what the heck is up with all the mary's???

well, we just like the name and it's none of your darn business!!

i kid. i kid.

it all started with mary ryan. when dan & i were discussing her name he asked if i would like to carry on the o'rourke tradition of naming all the girls mary and calling them by their middle name. you see, all of dan's aunts on the o'rourke side are mary's...including his grandmother.

i was all for it because a. my mom is mary jane, b. i liked the way mary ryan sounded and c. We were giving the poor girl a "boy" name....we might as well make her first name girly.

(oh yes and we cannot forget about their aunt...the true mary hauck)

and so it began...the mary club in which my mother is the queen! (if you know my mom then this is no surprise that she has crowned herself queen mary!)

little did i know then just how many girls we would have or that my sis would jump in on the fun! (molly, mary elizabeth, is named after both her grandmothers.) so, of course when colleen was born she couldn't be the only girl cousin not in the club.

"is it confusing that they all have the same first name?"

it truly isn't as confusing as one might think. sure we get asked all the time why we chose to name all our daughters mary. we also have to be very specific at the doctor's office and make it known at the beginning of the school year that they go by their middle name and probably won't respond when called mary. however, that's really where the confusion ends.

honestly, in this day and age with all the new and creative names people are coming up with...having more than one mary doesn't seem all that weird to me. it's actually quite traditional from a catholic standpoint. after all mary plays a pretty important role in our religion.

once i explain why we did it, people understand.

i know lisa & pat were debating wether or not to make colleen a mary...but i am so very happy they did. now it's our own little family tradition and who knows maybe a couple of these these little mary's will carry it on someday.

just think of how cool it would be for the queen to have some great grand mary's!!!