I have to start this post by saying this: I usually don't care about weddings of people that I don't know. Especially celebrities or political figures. But I, along with a bunch of other crazy people, am up at 6 am to watch Prince William and Katherine get married. I didn't plan on getting up to watch it. I was actually going to go to my friend Jayme's house (even though she is completely unaware of that fact) and watch the wedding at a more Kristen-friendly hour. However, the baby woke up at just before 6am and I couldn't go back to sleep. So I'll blame it on my defenseless 8-month-old.
I am SO glad I woke up for this. I turned my tv on just in time to watch Kate and her father driving to Westminster Abbey. All I could think of was that apart from this girl, who is about my age, being on her way to marry a PRINCE, she is a daughter. Can you imagine? Riding in a Rolls Royce with your daughter so she can marry a PRINCE??? If I were Kate's mom, I would so be thinking "I have MADE IT!" Being the mother of 2 daughters, this was my first thought. My second thought was of how beautiful Kate looks. Her dress is so classic! It almost looks understated, but I'm sure if I were close enough to see the detail, that wouldn't be the case. Her sister, Pippa (cute name!) is the maid of honor and her dress is amazing as well. I think the cowl neckline is my favorite part.
When I saw Prince William and Prince Harry walking into the sanctuary, dressed in their royal finery, my hand immidiately flew to my heart. This is the ultimate fairy tale. In less than an hour, Kate will be an honest-to-goodness Princess. Every little girl wants to be a princess. When Kate reached the front of this impossibly long church, Will told her that she looked beautiful. I almost cried...lame, I know, but for my generation of Disney-Princess-movies, this is so romantic. Except for the whole part of the wedding where the bride and groom goes to sit down and they all sing...that's weird to me. But still. She's becoming a Princess. That's the important thing. Wait no...this is her wedding day. Everything else should pale compared to that fact. It's hard to think that this is the wedding of two people because of all the pomp and circumstance. I couldn't handle it for sure. I mean, MILLIONS of people are watching. Trafalgar Square is PACKED and everyone is waving British flags and singing. That is so much pressure!
Random thoughts:
The Bishop of London opened the service with the statement, "Every wedding is a royal wedding, for we are all subjects of the King of Creation." I loved that statement.
I thought trees as part of the wedding decorations fit so well in the interior of Westminster Abbey. They looked awesome!
If I ever have a 3rd wedding, there will be a full orchestra, a boys choir and flipping horse-drawn carriage. And a full cavalry. Definately.
**Update: Kennedy is ticked that I didn't wake her up to watch the wedding. She was so into the whole thing when she got up for school. We watched the Prince and Princess travel to Buckingham Palace in the carriage and Kennedy said, "Mom this is just like a fairytale. All that's missing is a dragon." HAHAHA!! Also, she gets so embarassed when she sees 2 people kissing, but she almost missed her bus to see them kiss. Awww. :)
Friday, April 29, 2011
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Everything Changes
My mom used to make fun of me for hating change. She is happy to narrate stories from my childhood about how I didn't like to throw things away, even tights with holes in the knees. For the record, I did like to keep things because I was always sentimental, but the tights thing? I don't recall that. But, if Mom said it, it must be true, right? I DON'T like change. I'll admit it. Tradition and sameness (I think I just made up a new word!) symbolize stability for me. Those of you who know me and my family, there were definately some times of instability in my childhood, so who could blame a kid for trying to hold on to things?
Every holiday from my childhood had a certain dependability to it. Tradition, if you will. No only did I want to hold on to that solid stability, but I looked forward to all the fun we always had. On Easter Sunday there was a big family dinner with aunts and uncles and cousins, and usually an Easter program of some kind at church. July 4th (MY FAVE HOLIDAY!) brought a huge picnic with all of the church members, water balloon fights, softball games, volleyball games, and then everyone getting together again in the evening to watch the city fireworks. Thanksgiving had the Macy's parade, getting dressed for dinner at my Grandparent's, watching movies and playing games with aunts, uncles and cousins. Christmas...that was just a HUGE ordeal! Aunts and uncles and grandparents, all nine grandkids (25 people altogether once we all got married), presents stacked to the ceiling, Grandma's Hungarian sausage and eggs and Christmas cookies (clothespin cookies and date pinwheels, omw), and then dinner and breaking out all the cool stuff we got for Christmas.
Does none of this sound awesome to you, my readers? Who would want to change all that? Even as a grown up this sounds like good times. These days, things are different. Sometimes we go visit the in-laws for July 4th because it's my father-in-law's birthday (still fun, but way more intimate and quiet), everyone is too busy for dinner on Easter, Thanksgiving is just a fractured mess because all the grandkids are breaking off into their own separate family units, and Christmas is pretty much the same way. It's not so much that I hate change, I just want my kids to know the fun of friends and family and holiday hoopla that I knew when I was little. I hold these memories so sacred. Now it's time for our family (Bryan and I and the girls) to formulate our own traditions...but nothing that we come up with can compete in my mind to the big, loud, gettogethers of my childhood.
I don't hate change. I hate the loss of fun, extended family, and of being a kid. So really I think it's the growing up part that sucks so much. If I could have stayed 10 years old forever, that would have been a-ok with me.
Every holiday from my childhood had a certain dependability to it. Tradition, if you will. No only did I want to hold on to that solid stability, but I looked forward to all the fun we always had. On Easter Sunday there was a big family dinner with aunts and uncles and cousins, and usually an Easter program of some kind at church. July 4th (MY FAVE HOLIDAY!) brought a huge picnic with all of the church members, water balloon fights, softball games, volleyball games, and then everyone getting together again in the evening to watch the city fireworks. Thanksgiving had the Macy's parade, getting dressed for dinner at my Grandparent's, watching movies and playing games with aunts, uncles and cousins. Christmas...that was just a HUGE ordeal! Aunts and uncles and grandparents, all nine grandkids (25 people altogether once we all got married), presents stacked to the ceiling, Grandma's Hungarian sausage and eggs and Christmas cookies (clothespin cookies and date pinwheels, omw), and then dinner and breaking out all the cool stuff we got for Christmas.
Does none of this sound awesome to you, my readers? Who would want to change all that? Even as a grown up this sounds like good times. These days, things are different. Sometimes we go visit the in-laws for July 4th because it's my father-in-law's birthday (still fun, but way more intimate and quiet), everyone is too busy for dinner on Easter, Thanksgiving is just a fractured mess because all the grandkids are breaking off into their own separate family units, and Christmas is pretty much the same way. It's not so much that I hate change, I just want my kids to know the fun of friends and family and holiday hoopla that I knew when I was little. I hold these memories so sacred. Now it's time for our family (Bryan and I and the girls) to formulate our own traditions...but nothing that we come up with can compete in my mind to the big, loud, gettogethers of my childhood.
I don't hate change. I hate the loss of fun, extended family, and of being a kid. So really I think it's the growing up part that sucks so much. If I could have stayed 10 years old forever, that would have been a-ok with me.
Friday, April 22, 2011
Spring Cleaning
April showers bring May flowers. April has been so rainy, I think all the flowers will end up being washed away! We can't have as many softball practices as we need to, we can't take the dog for a walk, and the kids are stuck inside. The perfect activity for this kind of weather? SPRING CLEANING! (I don't really feel that much excitement, but Bryan is super psyched.) So we are going through all of our closets, Bryan is going from room to room with trash bags occasionally stating how much he LOVES throwing things away, and I'm slowly sifting through pile after pile of papers.
You know what was kind of cool about the whole experience? My purses are TIME CAPSULES! Among the dozens of pens and pencils, $5 in change, and TONS of receipts and expired coupons, I found movie tickets from a date that Bryan and I went on in 2005, a bracelet from our honeymoon in Jamaica in 2007, souvenirs from our spring break trip to St Louis in 2008, and subway maps from our New York trip last fall.
All of these items brought back so many memories!! Well, not the pencils and coupons and stuff, but all the other things. The movie tickets were from a theater downtown Indianapolis...it was December, and I remember we took a walk on the canals afterward. It was so cold, but the city looked so beautiful that night. I remember thinking that it would be the perfect romantic time for Bryan to propose. We had been dating for a full year, after all! What was the hold up? The bracelet from Jamaica of course reminded me of our honeymoon. It also reminded me of the crazy Jamaican who snorkled from the public beach to try to sell us drugs that were in a baggie in his swim trunks. The pin from St. Louis reminded me of our life before we had a second child. When it was just the Three Musketeers going off to find razy little adventures on the weekends. Not that having a second child changed that at all, but it reminded me of how it was to just spoil one little girl. And the subway maps were folded and unfolded so many times, they are wearing thin on the creases. I'm reminded of how I was unafraid to tackle the Big Apple on my own. It was kind of liberating and made me feel so much more confident about myself. These maps saved me on my solo trek through New York while Bryan was at his design conference.
Although I hate spring cleaning, I love the things that I end up finding. They remind me of how lucky I am to have lived in the moments that I've lived in. My Grandpa always says to me, "Make as many memories as you can, because when you're old and you can't really do much anymore, memories are all you have left." He's so right! I wonder what I'll find in my purses when I clean them out in another 6 years?
You know what was kind of cool about the whole experience? My purses are TIME CAPSULES! Among the dozens of pens and pencils, $5 in change, and TONS of receipts and expired coupons, I found movie tickets from a date that Bryan and I went on in 2005, a bracelet from our honeymoon in Jamaica in 2007, souvenirs from our spring break trip to St Louis in 2008, and subway maps from our New York trip last fall.
All of these items brought back so many memories!! Well, not the pencils and coupons and stuff, but all the other things. The movie tickets were from a theater downtown Indianapolis...it was December, and I remember we took a walk on the canals afterward. It was so cold, but the city looked so beautiful that night. I remember thinking that it would be the perfect romantic time for Bryan to propose. We had been dating for a full year, after all! What was the hold up? The bracelet from Jamaica of course reminded me of our honeymoon. It also reminded me of the crazy Jamaican who snorkled from the public beach to try to sell us drugs that were in a baggie in his swim trunks. The pin from St. Louis reminded me of our life before we had a second child. When it was just the Three Musketeers going off to find razy little adventures on the weekends. Not that having a second child changed that at all, but it reminded me of how it was to just spoil one little girl. And the subway maps were folded and unfolded so many times, they are wearing thin on the creases. I'm reminded of how I was unafraid to tackle the Big Apple on my own. It was kind of liberating and made me feel so much more confident about myself. These maps saved me on my solo trek through New York while Bryan was at his design conference.
Although I hate spring cleaning, I love the things that I end up finding. They remind me of how lucky I am to have lived in the moments that I've lived in. My Grandpa always says to me, "Make as many memories as you can, because when you're old and you can't really do much anymore, memories are all you have left." He's so right! I wonder what I'll find in my purses when I clean them out in another 6 years?
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