THE GATHERING

On Friday night eighteen women from Michigan, Illinois and Wisconsin met Plymouth Inn. The women of the Sheboygan County Branch welcomed the out-of-towners with beautiful hand-made name badges and goodie bags filled with treats, necessities and information. After the welcome ceremony and ritual setting aside daily concerns, we attended the opening of Alive in the Arts, A Joan Kohn Juried Art Exhibition at Gallery 110. Renowned local artist Kitty Lynne Klitch had generously given invitations for the Celtic Women to attend the opening of the Joan Kohn Exhibit which included works of her adult students as well as the juried entries. Many of the artists were in attendance. Live chamber music and wine and appetizers added to the festivities.

Next we headed to 52 Stafford, a local Irish Inn for dinner. Sean and Jackie O'Dwanny were kind enough to have provided their Root Soup recipe for us to share with CWI. It was included in a souvenir book of poems and recipes contributed by members of the local branch (the book was in the goodie bag!).

EXPLORATION OF THE RICH IRISH IMMIGRANT HISTORY OF THE REGION
Saturday morning dawned dry, cold and windy. We decided to be grateful for the dry air and at 10AM our stalwart group headed out down Hwy 57 to Adelle to begin a cemetery tour at St. Patrick's Church and graveyard. The Friday night gang was joined by additional Sheboygan County members We were met at the church by Janet McMullin, chair of the Preservation Committee, and Beth Dippel and Katie Dippel, of the Sheboygan County Historical Research Center. Janet and Beth gave us a history of the church, the Irish families that settled here and the tenuous situation that the church itself is facing. St. Patrick's is no longer a working parish and faces possible demolition.

The church, built of rock and mortar, was constructed in 1854 The congregation of Irish and German farmers brought rocks by wagon from their own farms to the site. The sand and gravel came from the Lake Michigan shore eight to ten miles away. This 150 year old building is in danger of being demolished if a way is not found to fund it. The Celtic Women were struck by the building and the history. We wandered through the cemetery in the wind. Imagine the delight of one of our Illinois guests, Anne Mc Caffrey who found three Mc Caffrey stones in the graveyard. The group was touched by the sadness of possibly losing this beautiful structure with its history and importance to the Irish history of Sheboygan County.

Next stop was a sumptuous lunch of chicken salad, fruit and hot dinner rolls (and hot chocolate!) at the Madison Avenue Inn in Cascade. We were treated like royalty and the food is to DIE for. Such a treasure to have in the community!

After lunch we moved on to St. Michaels Church outside of Parnell. Also in a somewhat tenuous position, it is more secure than St. Patrick's because a trust was set up for its maintenance many years ago. St. Michaels is a beautiful country church in a lovely country setting. Surrounded by it's graveyard, it is used often for funerals, weddings and notably on the 2nd Sunday in August Mitchell Reunion. This Gathering of the Clans is a picnic held in the graveyard among the graves of our ancestors. This started out as a picnic for three families and has mushroomed as more descendants of the settlers and farmers wanted to attend, and then anyone who was Irish. Last year over 400 people came! An interesting fact about Irish tombstones: most often the county in Ireland that the family came from is etched on the stone.

Beth Dippel gave us a history of the church and told wonderful stories of the older residents that she interviewed and knew in the past 20 years or so, many of them now gone. Despite the wind blowing cold and damp, we toured the cemetery before heading back to the Plymouth Inn for tea, with tasty treats baked by the Sheboygan Branch members along with cheese and truffles from Kri House of Cheese.

Sylvia Bright- Green, the Uncanny Granny, a local psychic was on had to do readings for those who wanted them. About half of our group went to Kohler Auditorium to listen to the wonderfully uplifting speech of Maya Angelou as part of the Kohler Distinguished Guest Series. Ms. Angelou said, "When there are clouds in our life...think of the pople who are our Rainbows.. think of our past and whom we can create for our successes because they were our Rainbows.” She encouraged each of us to be the rainbows today in others lives. We kept marveling at the wonderful rainbows in clouds that were happening in Sheboygan County during our Spring Fling.

We finished the evening back at the Plymouth Inn, enjoying a glass of wine and cheese and crackers with wonderful company and conversation. This was an opportunity for the local Celtic Women to forge friendships with the Celtic Women from out of our area. We all have a common bond in that we are dynamic women with ancestors or marriage bonds with someone who came from one of the 7 Celtic Nations.

SUNDAY
Sunday morning, many of us we went “up the hill” to St. John the Baptist Church to worship together and to thank God for the friendships that had been formed this weekend. The members were delighted as Mary Fellenz, St. John's choir director, recognized our Celtic Women and had the choir sing a very special prelude, The Irish Blessing for us. Other Celtic music was also included in the service.

THE SCATTERING
Following Mass we gathered at Antoinette's, at the bottom of the hill. We were treated again like royalty and fed a wonderful meal. More members of the Sheboygan County Branch were able to join us for this final feast of the weekend. Prior to eating, Peg Payne from Sheboygan, Anne McCaffrey from Chicago, Mary Schultze from Michigan and Rosemary Beaumont from Milwaukee, lit candles that had been saved from a retreat that several of our Celtic Women had attended earlier this year. Then the four women, together, lit a center pillar candle to make one flame from the four. Finally, Mary Kunert had one more challenge for the group. She pasted a sticker on each person attending the lunch that stated. “Who I am makes a difference.” She gave each person two identical stickers to take with them. They were told to go out in the world and find one person who they feel makes a difference and paste a sticker on them, then give them the last one to pass on to one more person. Hopefully we can start a whole movement of letting people know how special they are.

It was hard to leave each other after such an intimate and exciting weekend, but leave we had to. We took a group picture and hugged a group hug and said many goodbyes.