Ten Years

Just to give you fair warning, you may want to skip this post if you don’t enjoy looking at wedding pictures.

Today is our tenth anniversary.  It seems a little weird.  I know ten years isn’t much, especially for people like our grandparents who had marriages that lasted over fifty years, but today we’re happily celebrating ten years.

A friend framed our invitation for us, which was nice, because I probably wouldn’t have thought to do that. 

We got married at the Table Rock State Park, which is beautiful this time of year. 

The building is very pretty, so we didn't need to do much decorating.

We had our wedding and reception inside, but the patio was available for anyone who wanted to spend time outside. 

There are some gorgeous views from the lodge.

Even a lake view.

We took most of our pictures outside.

Nick and the groomsmen did some formal pictures.

And some more fun pictures.

And some fun ones with the bridesmaids.

And I had some fun ones with the groomsmen.

I loved the bridesmaid dresses, and I think the green looked great on all of them.

Butterflies featured heavily.  I made these to mark the reserved rows.

There were butterflies in my bouquet.

I also made the centerpieces for the table, with butterflies, of course.

For our wedding favors, we made a family and friends cookbook.  We asked everyone for recipes, and then compiled them into a cookbook.  With a butterfly cover, of course.  Almost everyone gave us at least one recipe, so we had quite a collection.  It took a lot of time to make the cookbooks, but they were very well received, and we have a lot of great recipes.  Time well spent.

We had a very informal reception, with no assigned seating.  We wanted everyone to be free to mingle and have a good time. 

The food was buffet style, with no assigned order.  Again, we wanted things to be fairly informal.

Our cake flavors were strawberry, Italian Cream, and traditional white cake.  Of course it had butterflies.

We played a wide variety of music at the reception, so practically everyone danced.

We both love oldies, so our play list included quite a few oldies.  The advantage to that, is that all of the older people danced.  They taught the younger people a few dances.

Even our youngest guest had no trouble finding dance partners.

Shoes, jackets, and even tuxedos were abandoned as the day went on.

It's hard to believe it has been ten years.  Time flies! 

November Wrap-Up

It’s hard to believe that tomorrow is going to be December 1st.  The last few weeks of November seemed to fly by, but was actually mostly good.

I’ll start with the best news first.  We finally got rain!!!  I’ve never been so happy to see rain.  We had a tiny bit of rain in the early hours of Thanksgiving morning.  Then we had a little rain Monday night.
We’ve had lots of rain today, and it has been wonderful.

The smoke got really bad last week.  Because of the way the wind was blowing we were actually getting smoke from two different fires.  There was a haze of smoke inside at work last week, and at home it smelled like a bonfire.  I was convinced we would be evacuating.  Once again, Nick was the voice of reason, and was right, no evacuation for us.

I ended up going to the doctor to get medications for smoke-related breathing issues.  I’ve had a terrible cough that just won’t go away.  It turns out that it’s due to inflammation caused from the smoke and all of the coughing.  I’m two days into the medicine, and already feel so much better.  Being able to breathe is a wonderful thing!

Our cat, Joey, has asthma, and our vet has had us increase all of his medications, and even added in a few more.  Hopefully now that we’ve had some rain, and the smoke seems to finally be clearing, we’ll be able to taper him back down to his normal dose.

We celebrated my parents’ 42nd anniversary with them the weekend before Thanksgiving.  We brought a cake, and Nick made calzones, which were incredibly delicious.  It was a little weird, because we had to check on the status of three different fires burning near us before we felt comfortable leaving to go that far from home.  Fortunately everything was fine, and we had a good time with my parents.

Thanksgiving went really well.  I got the food to the hospice house on time.  I was really worried about running behind.  I told them I’d have it there between 12:30 and 1:00, and made it about 12:50, so I’m counting that as a win.  Bonus win, I had very minimal spilling on the drive there; just a little green bean juice spilled in the trunk.  Considering the amount of food I took there, I’m counting that as success.  I’m fairly proud of myself for packing it up efficiently.  I saved shipping boxes for a while, so I’d have boxes to put the pans in.  I put everything in disposable pans so there would be no worrying about getting dishes back, and labeled everything to make it easier in dealing with leftovers.  We even remembered to buy paper plates, etc. to take.

I ended up bringing turkey, dressing, gravy, mashed potatoes (made to stand alone, so they wouldn’t necessarily need gravy, and could be a vegetarian option, per Victoria’s suggestion), sweet potato casserole, macaroni and cheese, green beans, rolls, jellied cranberry sauce, whole berry cranberry sauce, two pumpkin pies, a cherry crunch, and a chocolate cake.  I ended up scaling the menu back a little bit, just to make sure I got everything there on time, but I think there was still plenty of food.

The staff was so nice, and kept thanking me over and over again.  They made me cry (in a good way, just by being so nice).  I told them they had just been so kind when GrandMommy was there, and that we really appreciated them.  I cannot imagine doing their job.  They kept saying they’re happy to do it, especially when people appreciate it.  I didn’t stick around very long.  I didn’t want to intrude on anyone’s grief, or get in the way of people trying to work, or eat so they could get back to work.  And I wanted to get out of there before I turned into a total crying mess.  I called Nick’s mom on the way home, and cried to her instead, Like, I said, it was mostly a good cry, though.

Once I got home from hospice, I started cooking smaller batches of Thanksgiving food for us for when Nick got home from work.  I started the desserts on Wednesday afternoon.  I have pictures of the desserts, but somehow managed not to take a single picture of the food before I left with it on Thursday.  We figured out that out of about a 30 hour period I cooked or baked for all but about eight hours of it.  It was fun, but I totally crashed on Friday.

On Friday, the most ambitious thing I did was a little online Black Friday shopping.  I’ll admit, I never even got out of my pajamas.  We ate leftovers, watched a few movies, and did a little online shopping.  It was nice to have such a low-key day.

We put the tree up on Saturday, and had a friend, Cathey, over for some apple cake.  She had gone out of town for Thanksgiving, and we started talking about how everyone had spent Thanksgiving.  We told her about taking food to hospice, and she loved the idea.  Her first husband was sick off an on for years before he died, and she has ended up taking care of a lot of different people over the years.  She has spent pretty much every major holiday in a hospital or similar place at some point.  She said one Christmas when her husband was in the hospital someone had brought in some Christmas goodies, and it just made such a difference to her that someone did that.  So she came up with the idea for us to take Christmas goodies to the hospice house.  We won’t be able to go on Christmas, but we’re planning to go a few days before and leave some Christmas foods.  Cathey makes a lot of the traditional candies and fudge, so will do that.  I haven’t figured out what I’m going to make yet.  I’m open to suggestions.

The tree looks good, and so far Frankie is the only cat really messing with it much.  One of the presents is in a fairly large box, and he’s using the box to stand on to access some of the higher branches (where we put the ornaments we really don’t want the cats messing with), so I think that box is going to end up being moved away from the tree.

We’ve finished most of our Christmas shopping.  I think we have about four more things to buy, and then we’ll be completely finished.  I’ve also finished shopping for Nick’s birthday (he’s a Christmas Eve baby), and am just waiting for a few more online orders to come in.  I’m hoping to finish up all, or at least most, of the wrapping this weekend.  I enjoy wrapping presents, but it seems to take me forever.

I can’t go into details because most of the people I shop for read my blog at least occasionally, but I’m really excited about a few of the presents.  I also know what some people we’ll be celebrating with have gotten for each other, and I think everyone is really going to love their gifts.

So what about you?  How was your Thanksgiving?  How are your Christmas preparations going?  I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving, and that you aren’t dealing with smoke!

September 19th

September 19^th is a pretty important day for us. It’s the day Nick and I met in person for the first time. As I’ve said before, we met on E-Harmony. My Mother-In-Law met her husband Alan that way, so Nick decided to give it a try. My Aunt Diana met her husband Lane that way, so I decided to give it a try.

Nick and I were matched, and went through E-Harmony’s guided communication process, then we exchanged emails and phone numbers. After several very long conversations we decided to schedule our first date. It ended up being September 19^th, at a little Italian restaurant.

I didn’t know it at the time, but September 19^th is also Nick’s grandparents’ anniversary. I love that we met 48 years to the day after they said "I do". Today is eight years for us meeting, and fifty-six years for the Grands’ anniversary.

It’s also International Talk Like a Pirate Day. I found this great Pirate Personality test to determine what kind of pirate you are. I hope you’ll take it and share your results in the comments. Here are mine:

You are ...
The Cap'n

Profile: Some men and women are born great, some achieve greatness and some slit the throats of any scalawag who stands between them and unlimited power. You never met a man - or woman - you couldn't eviscerate. You are the definitive Man of Action, the CEO of the Seven Seas, Lee Iacocca in a blousy shirt and drawstring-fly pants. You're mission-oriented, and if anyone gets in the way, that's his problem, now isn't? Your buckle was swashed long ago and you have never been so sure of anything as your ability to bend everyone to your will. You will call anyone out and cut off his head if he shows any sign of taking you on or backing down. If one of your lieutenants shows an overly developed sense of ambition he may find more suitable accommodations in Davy Jones' locker. That is, of course, IF you notice him. You tend to be self absorbed - a weakness that may keep you from seeing enemies where they are and imagining them where they are not.

The Best Vacation(s) Ever

Carrie at The Slow-Dripped Life is having an incredible give-away.  You can read more about it here.  I am definitely participating in this one!

This week’s question is “What was one of your most cherished travel memories/trips?”

I’m going to answer this in two parts; my best travel memory as a kid, and my best travel memory as an adult.

Pandas at Zoo Atlanta

As a kid it was definitely when we went to Disney World.  Somehow, when I was thirteen years old, I won a free trip for four to Disney World.  The closest we came to figuring out how I managed this was that I must have been trying to enter to win a stuffed animal or something (I used to fill out tons of the entry forms for all of that stuff in the grocery store while my mom shopped) and just hadn’t paid attention to the fine print.  I was thirteen; fine print didn’t really matter to me!

It was a rainy Sunday afternoon and we were baking cookies the day the letter informing me I’d won came in the mail.  My parents didn’t believe it, and very nearly threw it away.  I pitched the kind of fit that only a thirteen year old girl can, and convinced them to at least call the number and make sure it wasn’t real before getting rid of it.

Tiger at Zoo Atlanta

It was one hundred percent legitimate.  It was five day, four night, all-inclusive trip for four to Disney World.  It included air fare, all meals, accommodations, and more passes to parks than we could possibly use. 

It was truly an amazing experience.  We didn’t take very many vacations when I was a kid; my mom was a stay at home mom, and my dad worked all of the time just to make ends meet, so vacations didn’t happen much.  When we did go on vacation there was always concern about how expensive it might be, but not this time. 

This place was interesting!

We went to all of the Disney parks, ate in fabulous restaurants, and stayed out until we are practically dead on our feet.  It was also the first time my sister and I ever flew.  We had so much fun, and we were able to see our parents kick back and have a wonderful time too, without worrying about paying for anything.   I think it’s probably the best vacation we ever took as a family.

My favorite vacation as an adult has been this year’s anniversary vacation.  My husband and I haven’t been on very many vacations together, but this year we went to Atlanta for our anniversary.  I had always wanted to see panda bears, and he really wanted to see the Jimmy Carter Museum.  We also went to Coca-Cola World, and the Margaret Mitchell House.

The highlight of the trip for me was the zoo.  I finally saw panda bears!!!  They are such beautiful and amazing creatures.  We spent hours at the panda bear exhibit.  They sleep a lot, so we came and went from the exhibit quite a bit though out the day.  We also had some wonderful conversations with some of the volunteers at the zoo who were fellow panda bear fanatics. 

This was also the first trip where we went to places that only one of us was seriously interested in; the Margaret Mitchell House was pretty much my pick and the Jimmy Carter Museum was pretty much Nick’s pick.  It turned out that we both had an excellent time at both of them and learned a lot of new things.

We take this kind of picture every year.

I thought an anniversary trip was the perfect time for learning that we were more interested in some of each other’s interests than we thought we were.  It was also just nice to get away.  We weren’t able to take a trip on our anniversary last year, so it was wonderful to get away this year.

I was also reminded on this trip how lucky I am to be married to my husband.  At the Margaret Mitchell House there was a lot of information about how much her husband helped and supported her in her writing.  I’m not sure if she ever would have written Gone With The Wind without him.  My husband is very supportive of my desire to write, and encourages me to keep going, even when I think we need to have a big bonfire.  I think I sort of took that for granted before. 

Also, when we checked out of our hotel, everyone at the front desk said they were so sad to see my husband go because he was so nice and pleasant.  A few people even said that he made their day a few times when he came in and smiled and said hello.  I’m lucky to be married to the person people hate to see go, but sometimes in the course of daily life that’s easy to forget.  This trip reminded me of that.