Estella Holmes never dreamed that one day she would visit Ireland with the Fountain Hills Community Choir and San Tan Chorale.

A soprano with the local chorus, her income from cleaning homes would not allow the expense. For that reason, she never surmised anything suspicious about being hired by a Church of Ascension member to clean a house in advance of a party.

While Holmes prepared the house for company, her client asked Estella to taste the food that she was preparing to serve her guests.

“Little did I know that I was cleaning the house and sampling food for my own party,” said Holmes.

The women, along with other contributors, collected money for Holmes to travel June 12-21 to Ireland. Holmes soloed on a spiritual “River in Judea.”

Another bombshell hit Holmes while researching her birth records and applying for her first passport. Growing up in a foster home, she had been led to believe she was born in Scranton, Pa. Actually, her birth place was Harrisburg. From this information, she was able to locate and meet her birth mother.

Possibly relatives

The friendship between Shannon Daly McGinnis and Kathy Youngren began five years ago with the two sopranos sitting next to each other at choir rehearsals.

Youngren began talking about her Irish ancestry by remarking that her maternal great grandfather’s name was Thomas Daley from Cork, Ireland. She knew that he sailed at the age of 15 to New Brunswick, Canada, and eventually settled in Caribou, Maine.

McGinnis’ relatives also had the surname of Dailey and came from Cork.

“We were amazed. Only the spellings of the name Dailey were slightly different,” said Youngren. “We decided we might have relatives in common. I certainly think we look as though we could be related.”

McGinnis’ grandparents emigrated from County Cork to New York State at the turn of the 20th century. The surnames of both were Daly.

“Her relatives lived not far from mine, so who knows? We may be related,” said Youngren. “I would like to have Shannon get her DNA done by Ancestry, as it would verify if we were actually related by our DNA.”

Youngren said her DNA test indicated that she was 43 percent Irish.

On a previous trip to Ireland, McGinnis visited the town where her ancestors lived and located a relative by happenstance while attending a church service.

Proposal on cliffs

Over-the-top marriage proposals have become customary for young couples. Nathan Moody had been waiting for the right place and time to propose to Alexandra Nguyen.

Two and a half years ago, he planned to ask her to marry him on a hot air balloon flight. Before he could arrange the surprise, one of her girlfriends got engaged on a hot air balloon ride. That eliminated that idea.

In March, Moody considered opting for a Disneyland special moment engagement package where the resort organizes and photographs every detail of the proposal. He rejected that plan after another friend of Alexandra’s was engaged there.

No location could be more picturesque than Ireland, thought Moody, so he packed the engagement ring in his luggage. Once he saw the Cliffs of Moher, he decided that would be the place.

“You can’t beat that location,” said Moody after the proposal and her acceptance. At the last minute, he could not find the ring so he purchased an inexpensive replacement ring in an Irish gift shop. They have not set a wedding date.