A Pandemic Wedding…

I have now lived during a pandemic, had to shelter in place and planned my daughter’s wedding in the midst of it all. Planning that wedding might have just saved my sanity and it taught me a lot about faith and flexibility.

When the quarantine hit our state, I quickly scurried across the mountain pass to pick up my daughter from college. We packed up our Honda to the absolute brim, in fact I should’ve taken pictures of that car. It was packed to maximum capacity when my daughter, Sarah, realized she still had “dining dollars” left. We took the car and parked in a red zone in some alley behind the student union building. We then purchased everything we could that did not require refrigeration and used up every single dining dollar she had left, including buying the custodian lunch. We came back to the car and literally hid granola bars by the spare tire and under the seats as there was no room in that car.

Nevertheless, we made it home over the mountain, leaving her fiancé behind, five and a half hours away. The big wedding was slated for August 15, 2020 and they were now separated by a mountain range and a pandemic. But we settled into our quarantine routine. We cleaned closets, purged old clothes and binged watched tv. My two college children attended their online classes, while I learned to teach first graders remotely. It became a learning co-op as on more than one occasion, I would trade some of their tech support for helping with a college discussion board or research paper. After about two weeks, the closets were cleaned, I knew how to upload pdfs and their quarter was almost over. Then what?

Wedding planning! Sarah and I began calling around to various vendors. The alterations lady was scheduled. Check. The photographer scheduled. Check. The caterer scheduled and down payment paid. Check. We went through Pinterest and looked for DYI projects that would personalize the wedding. We even tried a few. The Rubik’s cube made with engagement pictures was a fail – and some money down the drain, but occupied us for a couple days. Sarah worked on their wedding website and registry. We broke quarantine at one point to meet with a friend and made the veil. Sarah just kept plugging along. She had faith that a pandemic would not stop her wedding

In between the long days of wedding planning, teaching and taking classes, Tel would sneak over for extended weekends whenever he could. Sarah and Tel celebrated their quarantine birthdays. He surprised her another weekend when she went to the door thinking it was pizza delivery and there he stood. Our family gathered at Easter and enjoyed sitting outside and having a picnic supper together. We played lots of ladder ball and went on lots of long night time walks and binged our favorite show, “Below Deck.” But, things on the Covid-19 front were not getting better. We had “flattened the curve,” but still weddings were under some tight regulations. Other brides and grooms canceled their weddings. But my daughter is as stubborn as I am. When asked if she was certain there would be a wedding in August, she would reply with, “We are going to speak life into this situation. There will be a wedding.”

The photographer called me and asked, “Just between you and I , is there really going to be a wedding in August?” I said, “One way or another there will be a wedding.” And things did start to loosen up. We went on a vacation to Orcas Island up in the beautiful San Juans. Tel joined our family and we were enjoying being on a beach, with family and less thoughts of quarantine and masks and frankly, just getting away from our house. The engaged couple were counting down the days until their wedding – less than a month.

Then the news came. The governor was tightening up on weddings. After August 6th, weddings would be very limited. There were some tears. We had gotten so close to that August 15th wedding date. So, after some tears, Tel and Sarah decided to move the wedding. We each took our phones and headed into town for cell service and started making calls. Within 30 minutes, we had a new wedding date – August 2nd. Same venue. Same photographer. Same caterer, Same cake. Same flowers – the only thing that changed was the DJ. Otherwise, we had successfully moved the wedding up two weeks.

The week after vacation was a blur. But an exciting blur. After doing nothing for so long, all of the sudden we were frenzied and happily working towards finalizing a wedding. The day of the wedding came and we prepared for a Covid wedding – some changes in protocol that would have bothered a bride if it was any other season, didn’t matter anymore. Of the many lessons quarantine and Covid have taught us, flexibility stands among them. We can’t pass the appetizers? Ok – put them on a table. The cake spills after hitting a speed bump? Not a problem, Safeway down the road was willing to help us out. Some friends feel like they shouldn’t come for health reasons? Totally and completely understand and respect that. The pastor forgets to bring the communion supplies to the ceremony? Eh, they can take communion together later. This wedding, during 2020, taught me about flexibility and faith. Trust in God and He will bring you the desires of your heart. You might have to bend and be flexible and perhaps give up your picture of what everything should look like. But that letting go, is a huge part of faith and His picture for you, is going to be worth it.

Meeting the New Boyfriend…

A week and a half ago, November 3rd, was a special day for our family. Sarah, my youngest daughter and her boyfriend, Tel got engaged. It was beautiful… He invited both families to be a part of the proposal and it was perfect in every way! We are so excited to have him in the family and I fondly look back at the day we met him.

It was Homecoming weekend at Sarah’s college last year and Shane and I started over the mountain pass to take in all of the activities that were being offered. But to add an interesting twist, Sarah phoned us the week before to let us know that she had met “someone special.” They weren’t officially dating yet, but she said he wanted to meet us and I could tell that she definitely wanted to show off this new love interest. Maybe even wanted some parental opinions.

We arrived at her dorm and she hurried us off to the Homecoming parade. “I told Tel that you guys are going to the parade. He will meet you at the parade, because I am on a float.” Meet us at the parade? I wasn’t sure how that was going to work logistically. Were we just supposed to stumble around and find someone on the sidewalks, in the dark, at a college parade? I was glad it was a small town. As we approached the parade route, I kept my eyes peeled. It was a good thing I had previously stalked the poor guy and at least had an idea of what he looked like…tall, red hair, I was guessing probably a baseball cap. But still, it was dark. Shane got involved in the parade. Truthfully, it was asking a lot for my ADHD husband to look away from a parade and scan the crowd for an unknown, future boyfriend. Soon I found myself, watching the parade more and scanning the crowd less, when I felt the presence of someone behind me. I turned and knew that Tel had found us first. He looked nervous – and who wouldn’t be….”go find my parents – they are on the sidewalk at the parade and I will catch up with you.” Really? Anyway, I put out my hand and asked, “Tel?” He smiled nervously and said hello. I kicked Shane who was still watching the parade and introduced the two men. About this time, Sarah and her float came by. We waved and then turned to walk towards the end of the parade route to meet her. My husband and Tel were instantly talking about small towns in Lewis County, guns and politics. We found Sarah and moved on to phase two of our night.

Phase Two started as we drove back towards the main college campus. We headed to a hockey game. Although I used to be an avid athlete, I had never attended a hockey game. I was excited to go. We got there and the seats were almost full so we looked hard for four seats together. As we started to sit down, Shane kept shaking us off trying to get us to move to another spot. But they were good seats, so we overrode his decision and sat down. About a minute after sitting down, we realized that in a college of over 13,000 students we had sat down behind Sarah’s ex-boyfriend and his whole family. Awkward. They turned, smiled and waved. Shane had tried to warn us. Eventually the violence of the hockey game became a distraction and we enjoyed the game. Our team was way ahead and with a couple minutes left in the game, we headed out for a late dinner before everything shut down.

We traveled to the local Mexican restaurant. It was late but we ordered dinner. As we waited for our food Tel opened up and was telling us stories about his family. He was a good storyteller and easy to listen to. Just as our food arrived, Tel excused himself to go to the bathroom.

Sarah leaned across the table, “So do you like him?” She asked.

“No,” Shane said blankly.

I looked at him with wide eyes and Sarah repeated her question, “I said, do you like him?”

“No, I’ve had enough.” Shane said firmly.

For about three seconds I stared at Sarah and then it hit me. Shane doesn’t hear well.

“No, I said loudly, she asked if you like Tel not if you would like some of her food” I said pointing to her plate.

Poor Shane had thought Sarah had asked him if he would like some of her dinner. With the confusion resolved, Sarah’s adrenaline died back down and we laughed. Shane than went on to say that yes, he really liked Tel. Tel rejoined our table and we had a great dinner.

The rest of the weekend was fun. The four of us went to the big football game the next day, walked the Spokane River Walk and went out for a great steak dinner. We woke up Sunday morning and met the couple for breakfast at a local restaurant. We were able to get in lots of good conversation. We saw that Tel was a man of God and we saw how happy our daughter was. The following weekend Tel introduced Sarah to his family and they officially began dating. We are so glad these two found each other, the story of how they met is probably not mine to tell, but clearly God had his hand upon them from the very beginning and I believe that God will continue to bless them now and as they begin married life. We are excited for their future.

Who Doesn’t Want to be a Flower Girl??

In first grade we spend a lot of time early in the year talking about friendship, empathy and how to deal with strong emotions. As I was teaching one of these lessons on jealousy – one of my favorite stories from my children’s younger years popped into my head. And my students loved it! They could totally relate…so this story and a Junie B Jones book about a jealous flower girl and we had a heck of a lesson on jealousy.

The story starts at my cousin’s wedding. My oldest daughter Hannah was about four or five and had already been a flower girl on two other occasions. This was not one of the those occasions. On the way to the wedding, her dad and I explained that while this is a relative’s wedding and they really love her and think she is super special, they had chosen another little girl to be the flower girl. Hannah was not taking the news well. She spent most of the car ride processing what this meant to her. I have a pretty dress? I have done it before and know what to do? Why wouldn’t they choose me?

The wedding was held in a tiny, historical church up in the mountains. We filed in and let Hannah sit on the aisle so she could get a good view. The music swelled and the bridesmaids started coming down the aisle. Then the arrival of the flower girl. She had a beautiful, full white dress with pink flower accents and long blonde hair curled to perfection. She had a beautiful basket and was very carefully throwing petals with just the right Mona Lisa smile. When…out of nowhere, Hannah jumped up and tackled the flower girl around the waist, pulling her into our pew. The flower girl looked alarmed and confused. Hannah quickly hissed something into her ear. I leaned across the two girls and forced Hannah to release her grip on the poor girl. The flower girl untangled herself from my daughter and went back to her job, albeit a little shaken.

It happened so quickly. I grabbed and Hannah and whispered, “What did you say to her?”
“I told her that I could do this job better than you can.” Awesome. Can’t wait to see the wedding video. At the reception, all was forgiven and the two girls played together for hours.

My class of first graders loved this story so much, they wanted to act it out. Poor Hannah. Jealousy is an ugly little green monster!

My Daughter’s Getting Married…

Our oldest daughter Hannah was getting married to Matt!! We were thrilled and excited to plan a wedding. Weddings have emotions and budgets and Grandmas and bridesmaids. The nice thing for us was that Hannah was good at making decisions and practical with her budget. But she was living on the other coast, so some of her decision making was made through proxy – me and her little sister Sarah.

Our first decision was the dress. Hannah was visiting us from the East coast for Christmas and the dress sales were on. Problem was she hadn’t actually been proposed to yet. Would it be too weird or presumptuous to buy a dress before poor Matt even asked? We decided to risk it. Arriving at our scheduled time, we were rummaging through the racks of dresses. There was another family there, kind of puppy guarding the dress they liked. They didn’t have a consultant so the policy was they weren’t allowed to pull the dress off the rack. We did have a consultant so I politely but assertively reached into the sale rack and pulled a dress off the rack. And that was the dress. It was the third one she tried on and it was definitely the one for her – the perfect style for a barn wedding.

The wedding was slated for the end of August. We started talking about food. Hannah wanted a soup bar. Really? In August? “I really like soup, Mom.” So I had an appointment to sample soup from a soup guy in Seattle. Just before the meeting, Hannah switched to a different plan. Phew. And we found a local, healthy, farm fresh caterer that was reasonably priced.

The day before the wedding arrives and everything is in place. Hannah’s grandma had been working on making her a veil. The veil had a Bohemian style look to it with beautiful lace. But, rookie mistake…Grandma had been making it while the dress was with the seamstress. All of the sudden we realize the colors of the lace don’t match the dress at all. Like the veil – bright white, crisp lace and the dress? Antique white. It wasn’t working. In a panic, Hannah and Sarah rush out to find a veil at Michael’s. I am left alone with the veil. The actual lace is so pretty I think about how we could dye it. I start googling. Hannah’s friend Austin arrives. Austin is her awesome friend who does hair, makeup and costumes. I advise Austin of the situation at hand and then the two of us start ripping the veil together and making tea. I took every kind of tea we had in our house and all four burners were boiling away. Austin and I ran some tests and found the perfect match. We dipped that beautiful lace into a little Earl Gray mixed with Breakfast Blend and the lace matched exactly! Then we found a hair clip and some old costume pearls and put it all together – stopping only to pick out the tea leaves from the lace. I felt like a bad ass Mother of the Bride.

The day of the wedding requires our family of five to take three cars. We got to the venue and hopped out. Austin was there to start with our makeup and our photographer was there taking those early pictures of the wedding party getting ready. Shane and I jumped out of the car and sat on the grass and sorted out the flowers. Hannah had made it clear early on that flowers weren’t that important to her and that she would rather save some some money and just get some flowers from the farmers market and put them in Mason jars. We quickly got those ready and handed off all our decorating the boxes. The venue had been very explicit in that they would do the decorating the day of the event. So, being a first grade teacher, I had boxes arranged for different places – like “Altar box” in which were a lacy table runner, candles and a picture of how they were to be all set up. What I didn’t know was that my 20 year old son had thought it would be really funny to add a 12 inch tall wooden penguin to the “Altar Box” So a few minutes before people started arriving, I go to check out the decorations and see this gaudy penguin standing between the candles. Well played, Tom! I can’t imagine what the venue thought…but I did remove the penguin from the altar and discreetly tucked him in a flowering pot near the front. That little penguin is visible in several pictures.

The Smiling bride and groom and …the little penguin tucked in the flower pot.

Izzy the ever smiling Corgi, stands in front of the bride and groom and captures everything on camera.

In the midst of our preparations and the actual ceremony and reception was our dog, Izzy. Izzy is the cutest, calmest, most people loving Corgi that you will ever meet. Hannah had devised a Go Pro on a dog harness, covered with pink flowers. Izzy was the official “Corgiographer” of the wedding. Tom, my son walked me down the aisle and had Izzy’s leash in the other hand. Izzy sat out of the sun, under my chair for the ceremony and then during the reception we unleashed her and she greeted everyone. Admittedly, the quality of her video was a little sketchy. But it was interesting to see who greeted and acknowledged the dog. The bartender, loved her. She especially enjoyed hanging out by the buffet and seeing if any scraps would fall her way. Several friends bent down to greet her more then once. Some of those friends, had shorts skirts on, so, you know, life lesson -when you talk to a corgi with a camera on her back and you are wearing a short dress, keep your legs together. I especially liked when Shane, the father of the bride went forward to give a toast, that Izzy followed him and sat right next to him, without ever being told too.

Izzy gives her approval to the Father of the Bride’s speech.

Throughout this day, as Mother of the Bride, I made a very purposeful decision to enjoy the moment. I didn’t take pictures of my own, I didn’t worry when the heat soared over 95′ because there was nothing I could do and when the cake started to melt and my mother-in-law was freaking out about it, I said, “I guess we will eat melted cake. And that will be part of our memories.” When Hannah and Matt got ready to leave, we pulled out Grandpa’s classic car – a 1963 Buick Riviera. Impeccably restored. Matt and Hannah got in and Matt hit the gas so we could all hear that engine roar to life. Little did people know that three miles down the road, they pulled over in a gravel parking lot to change out of their wedding clothes. Really? Says the Mom of the Bride…just don’t let anyone see you, that’s weird. Later that night we picked up the Rivera and Grandpa drove it home….it broke down. Yep, all dressed up driving down the road, the bride and groom long gone, the Riviera is on the side, my sister in law has pulled over, I pull over, Shane pulls over and all of the sudden we have four cars on the side of Hwy 18. I am running down the shoulder, barefoot, with a corgi under my arm and an anxious son sitting back in the car. We got things going, but it was quite a picture and quite an ending to a wonderful day. Live in the moment. Nothing is perfect and it’s those imperfect moments that make perfect memories. Be present and be mindful not mind full.