Wedding Day!

Last night was Kurt and Victoria’s wedding.  Here’s the wedding party.

Back row:  Caleb, Maria, Jared, Robin, Victoria, Kurt, Amanda, Luke

Front row:  Emma, Natalie, Jacob, Wendy, Brett, Joanna

Last week I asked our niece Katie how much we owed her for sewing two of the bridesmaids’ dresses for us – and learned that her mother, Annette, my sister-in-law, had already paid her for her daughter Amanda’s, and I only had one left to pay for.  I’m repeating myself, but ... people sure are nice to us! 

Katie’s sister Rachel made the tiered wedding cake, and some of the other sisters made sheet cakes and even supplied some of the ingredients.  It takes a lot of cake to feed 450 people! 

One of our friends paid for fruit salad for everybody.  Kurt’s grandparents bought the ice cream.  The flowergirl’s parents, cousins of Kurt’s, paid Victoria for the dress she got for their little girl, and it was rather pricey.  One of Larry’s cousins got dozens of miniature white pumpkins with which to decorate the tables.  Another gave us the use of their beautiful china for the main table.

We very much appreciate the helpfulness and loving generosity of so many dear friends.

Katie told her cousin Victoria that after the wedding Victoria would be Katie’s niece, too.  That, because Katie’s husband Bernie is Kurt’s uncle.

Reckon Susan will have to play “I’m My Own Grandpa” for a processional, one of these days?

Some friends were discussing the abundance of emails they get, and how it’s difficult to keep up with them.  They asked what I do.

Well, I read my email while I’m curling my hair, eating breakfast, lunch, ... and now and then when I need a short break from whatever else I happen to be doing.  I have my email program (Outlook) set up to play different noises or songs when various emails come in, so I know without looking at my laptop who has written to me.

Kurt and Victoria with flowergirl & ringbearer, Natalie & Jacob

As for groups such as the quilting/sewing groups I belong to, I keep up with some, but not at all with others – for instance, the 78,000-member Facebook quilting group.  Every once in a while, I skim through it and look at the pretty pictures... and if a Big, Bad Disagreement pops up, I skid to a halt and read that.  I’m like that little girl Gypsy in Night of the Grizzly, when she came out of the General Store and, spotting her brother Charlie having an altercation with some town boys, exclaimed in delight, eyes all alight and a-twinkle, “Oh, boy!  A fight!”

So... while email and group posts may not take up too much of my time, dear me, all that has to happen is for someone to send a link to a picture of a quilt on Pinterest, and then I spot another pretty quilt down below that one, and then another, and then — Aaaaaaaaaaa!  I have things to do!  Places to go!  People to see!  Get thee away from me, Pinterest!

Okay, now, I’m not going to discuss politics, really, I’m not, even though I just said I was like Gypsy in The Night of the Grizzly.

But because a friend from New Zealand (I gotta blame someone, don’t I?) mentioned that the election news from the USA is ‘interesting stuff’, I just have to tell you something funny I heard on the radio.  The announcer for our rural radio station, in talking about election news, remarked with a sad twang in his voice, “Every morning after I get up and make my coffee, I get a stick and turn on the TV.” 

(For you city girls and boys, if you don’t catch the significance... sticks are what we use out here in the boonies to scrape objectionable stuff off our shoes.)

See?  I didn’t discuss politics!  (Did I?)

Tuesday afternoon, Victoria’s cousin Amanda and friend Robin came to help Victoria pack, and another day her friend Josie came to help.  Later that evening, Kurt, his brother Jared, and his father Bill came and moved out some of her furniture.

That girl is taking away more stuff than all her combined siblings took when they married and moved out in bygone years, I do believe!  Maybe it’s because they each left things behind for the younger ones... and then finally the youngest winds up with the whole shebang? 

I finished the ringbearer’s pillow that night, after Larry and I drove to town to get the ribbon Victoria had forgotten at her house.  I took my camera; a few photos of their house are here.

When Hester paid to have my piano tuned as a birthday gift to me, she also paid to have Victoria’s piano tuned, as part of her wedding gift to them.  It sounds so pretty now.

I worked on the Blossoms bag Wednesday.  If I can wrap my brain around how to put it all together now, it shouldn’t take long to finish it.  What in the world did I do with the cute little bronze buckle and accent pieces I planned to use on it??

Siggghhhh...  They’re probably right on my cutting table, where I laid them – and there’s probably plum-colored confetti strewn all over them. 

I haven’t put away the plum-colored taffeta, lining, and chiffon, in case I might need a piece or two for this or that... but now it’s over and done.  Tomorrow I’ll put all the stray wedding fabric into my fabric closet, and I imagine those little bronze pieces will be right there where I last saw them.  This is why I rarely work on more than one project at once! 

I may or may not use the bronze pieces; haven’t decided yet.

Somebody sent me a video of a totally inept guy trying to get stuff out of his refrigerator while his small twins kept clambering to the door to ‘help’.  He hadn’t the faintest notion that a child can be told to ‘stay there’ – and an obedient child (yes, even one who can only crawl) – will do as he or she is told.  Furthermore, the duffer was slower’n molasses in February, and by the end of the video clip he had doubtless equalized the air temp between kitchen and refrigerator interior.

Contrary to popular opinion, babies who are able to go somewhere are perfectly able to stay somewhere.  When they are old enough to pick something up, they are old enough to be told not to pick something up.  This isn’t hard, and one doesn’t have to be mean.

People raise brats and pre-prison-inmates these days, because they think, Oh, this innocent little dear is too young to know better! – never mind the age or the subject matter. 

They’re wrong.  

You can teach a puppy!!!  Why do people think you can’t teach a child, who is infinitely smarter??  Even dumb babies are smarter than smart dogs.  

By Wednesday, I’d gotten over the worst of the cold, though I still had a sore throat.  I often have a sore throat, sometimes just from post-nasal drip.  Why couldn’t they come up with a politer name for that malady?  Like, oh, I don’t know, Lilac Confettiosis, or something.  That would be much better.  “I suffer from chronic Lilac Confettiosis.”  It has a good ring to it.

That afternoon, our neighbors brought us yet another big bag full of tomatoes from their garden, along with a dozen and a half eggs from their chickens.  I need to make them something in return – they refuse to let me pay for the products! 

Uncle Clyde is continuing to improve, but slowly.  Last Monday, he was glad when they let him have fluids without thickening them.  (They thicken fluids to keep people with swallowing troubles from choking.)  He exclaimed in disgust, “They keep ruining my water and my milk!  They even ruined my Mt. Dew!” 

Elderly people sometimes don’t live too long after such a severe trauma.  But Clyde is strong, and a determined person.

Meanwhile, the trauma at our house was more likely to concern such things as running out of white mints before all the favors boxes were filled.  Whew.  It was a constant surprise that the globe didn’t start spinning backwards.

A quilting friend wrote from upstate New York:  “Snow was blowing like crazy this morning...”

Hard to imagine, when it was 74° here in the middle of Nebraska!

I put the third and last load of clothes into the washing machine, filled the bird feeders, and remembered to eat breakfast – Great Grains Cranberry Almond Crunch, with sliced bananas on top.  By late that night, I had the lining of the Blossoms bag done, and got the ruched piping put on both the front and back.

Thursday, Friday, and Saturday I went on working on the Blossoms bag, and each day fondly imagined (mistakenly) that there was a real possibility I might get it done.  But, in addition to multiple interruptions, I keep boxing myself into corners with all my design irregularities.  I have no pattern, no plan, no previous experience (well, not much, anyway), but lots of optimism!

I sewed pockets onto the insides of the front and bag – and that foiled my plan of putting the lining in as one entity, sewing the tops together and leaving a hole, and then turning it.  I put enough interfacing into some areas that it can’t easily be turned wrong or right side out.

I’ll have to sew a couple areas of the lining into place by hand.  I have a strong, long, curved needle that would be perfect for the job.  I knew right where it was, too.  Except... it isn’t there.  It seems somebody has ‘borrowed’ it.  Do I recall hearing something about a truck seat needing to be repaired?

An unexpected side effect of all these pockets and zippers and extra interfacing:  this bag is heavy.  I think I’ve made Joanna a suitcase!  Let’s hope the thing doesn’t weight more than she does.  Maybe I should mount it on a roller skate?

Friday afternoon, I heard a familiar little chirp, peered out the window, and saw that the juncos had returned!  They’re such cute little birds, with their gray tuxedos and white cummerbunds.

Wedding rehearsal was that night.  We are happy about this wedding, because we agree wholeheartedly with Victoria:  Kurt is the one for her!  As an added blessing, we love his whole family, and they love Victoria.

It wouldn’t be long now, and I would have only Larry and the cats to blame when I find my things misplaced.  And it won’t be long, and Victoria will have to scrape her own burnt eggs from the skillet.  ((evil sniggle))

I charged the main batteries for my camera body...  put new AA batteries into the separate flash... put an 8 GB card into the camera...

Question:  would my new shoes stay on my feet?? 

After the rehearsal, we were invited to Kurt’s grandparents’ home, along with all our families and all theirs, too.  My goodness, there must’ve been 100 people there.  They had trays of fresh fruits and vegetables... dip, cheeses, crackers, sliced lunchmeat, cinnamon rolls, cookies, and sparkling vanilla lemonade or some such concoction.  Hester was keeping the drink dispensers full.  Since the kiddos were playing ball outside, they were thirsty, and kept coming to refill their cups.  I can’t imagine how many gallons of whatever-that-stuff-was they went through.

Kurt comes from a very hospitable family!

Okay, now I’m curious, and want to know exactly what the sparkling something-or-other was.  ((...writing to Hester...))

And just that fast, here’s her answer:  “It was lemon lime soda and a syrup I made out of sugar, water, almond and vanilla extract.”

“Ah,” I replied, “I liked it better than I usually like fizzy something-or-others!”

“Vanilla makes everything better!!” she responded, to which I said, “Yeah – except for the time when I was wee little, Grandma Swiney was making oatmeal/raisin cookies, and the vanilla – real vanilla – smelled so good I tried a spoonful all by itself.  :-O”

I invited several friends to watch the wedding service online.  “Thanks for the invite,” wrote one lady.  “I won’t have to dress up!  I can even wear my bedroom slippers.”

“Unless we turn the cams around,” I warned her, “and flash shots of all the online viewers on the church’s big screen!  You never know, in these days of technological advance.  If the cameras aim your way, just tuck your feet cleeear back under the pew.”  snicker

Anytime anyone is planning a Big Event, others like to tell them horror stories that occurred at their Big Events.  One lady wrote to tell me that something ALWAYS goes wrong at every wedding, and then she proceeded to enumerate all the calamities that happened at her wedding, and her children’s multiple weddings.  (That is, each child had more than one and sometimes more than two weddings.)

Kurt & Victoria with the nieces and nephews

Well...  I didn’t look for the wedding cake to fall off of anyone’s car seat... or Larry to refuse to walk his daughter down the aisle... or everyone to drive off and leave me stranded, with nothing to drive to the church.  The caterer would not forget to bring the food... nor would some of the wedding party run out of gas on the way to the church.  The bride wouldn’t forget to wear hose, lose her shoes, and get married barefoot.  The minister wouldn’t lose his suit pants, and have to wear jeans instead.  (Why would a minister only have one pair of suit pants anyway?!)

Another friend told of the bride and groom getting stymied at a Florida airport on account of a hurricane.  There were tornadoes in the vicinity, just before Bobby and Hannah’s wedding; but we proceeded on just the same, and the tornadoes politely skirted around the town.

Actually, it’s been a bit like a hurricane, to be anywhere near Victoria the last couple of weeks; but ’ze weathuh, she iz fine’!  It was 66° Saturday, sunny and lovely... and we are to expect more of the same for the next several days.  I see that the area of Colorado where Kurt and Victoria will be this week should have mostly sunshine, though it will only be in the mid-40s.  And of course it will be snowing now and then in the High Country.  They’re taking coats, jackets, sweaters, and gloves.  I wonder if Victoria’s boots over there in the living room were supposed to go, too?

There was a bit of a fuss the afternoon of Teddy’s wedding, when he thought the alterer had ruined his suit, and created a rumpled twist in the back.  This, he thought, as he was peering into a mirror behind him, standing all in a twist to see it.  As soon as he stood straight and let me look, the rumples straightened out like magic. 

“Just don’t stand in a twist at your wedding, Teddy, and you’ll look fine and dandy!” I told him – and I didn’t dare laugh or tease him, because I could clearly see that my big, strapping, handsome, twenty-year-old son was on the verge of tears, and a false word from his mother just might do him in.  That Teddy of mine!

In any case, the important thing is that the Lord’s presence is there at the wedding, as He was (in person) at the marriage in Cana of Galilee, and that He guides a young couple through the rest of their lives.  Cakes and shoes and suits... that’s just the froth atop the hot chocolate.

Here are some photos from Friday night:  Last date, new gym, lunch at Steve & Diana’s

Victoria went shopping in Omaha with her cousin Amanda, and she got some gold rings set with crystals to put on the ringbearer’s pillow.  So Saturday I sewed them on.  And that was the last thing I needed to do before the wedding.

Or so I thought.

Saturday afternoon brought on a whole lot of gallumping up and down the stairs – Victoria and her friend Robin were packing up more things, and filling Victoria’s suitcases for her honeymoon.

I kept myself safely downstairs in my sewing room, out of the line of fire and the lanes of traffic, making braided handles for the Blossoms bag.  It’s taking longer than expected, since a number of things must be done by hand.  That could have been avoided, had I known the route and the destination before I began.  But I seem to have no GPS for this project!

Lydia playing the Boston in the church vestibule before the service.

After the Sunday morning church service, Larry and I came home, had a small lunch, and then began dressing for the wedding.  Family pictures would be taken at 4:00 p.m.

But... where was Larry’s new tie, the tie Victoria had given him?  Larry hunted for it.  I offered suggestions.  Then together we launched an all-out major scavenger hunt.

Yes, Larry has a gazillion ties.  But yes indeedy, the girl would have noticed, had he worn a different one.  The girl would have noticed.  I nearly upended the entire closet, searching for it.  Couldn’t find it, couldn’t find it.  Where was that elusive tie??  Larry doesn’t usually lose stuff!

I went into the living room, tapped on the hope chest Kurt made Victoria, and asked, “What’s in here?”

“Victoria said it was empty,” Larry told me.

I moved his laptop off of it... he opened it... there were two empty Wal-Mart bags and a crumpled bit of white tissue paper inside.  Larry started to close the lid, but I reached in quickly and picked up the tissue paper.  

There was something in it.

A silk tie, in a small, narrow, subtle plaid of black, charcoal, plum, and ivory.

Now, why did that girl put her father’s tie into her hope chest??!  It’s a wonder the chest hadn’t already been hauled off to their house by then. 

So we had the tie... but it did smell strongly of cedar.

We would later learn that it was Kurt, rather than Victoria, who had put the tie into the cedar chest.  Victoria had originally stored all the shirts and ties for the wedding party and for her father in the chest.  She’d retrieved them the previous week to dole out to the proper persons, left Larry’s tie atop the lid... and Kurt, not one to leave things lying about (he even gets up after dinner, rinses his plate and stacks it in the sink, for goodness sake!), and not wanting it to get lost or dirty, had carefully laid it back inside the chest for safekeeping.

Anyway, we found it in time, so Larry was bedecked with the proper tie, and the world kept turning.

Next, the answer to the question of whether my shoes were going to stay on my feet:  No, they were not.  They really were not!  I tried them with the elastic strap behind the heel... then atop the foot...  No deal.  They were not going to stay on.

And it was almost time to go!!!

I stood there a moment and looked at those troublesome clodhoppers, pondering.  I pulled out some other shoes, just in case.  They clashed.

So I dashed downstairs, pawed rapidly through my fabric, came up with a piece that almost matched, grabbed some elastic, and made a second band for each shoe. 

This makes me nervous, doing things at the last minute.  I hate doing things at the last minute.  My hands shook.  I stabbed myself with the needle.  My hands shook.  My thimble fell off.  My hands shook.  The straps twisted.  My hands shook.  I jabbed myself.  My hands shook.

Did I mention that doing things at the last minute makes my hands shake??

I had just gotten the last strap tacked on good and tight when my phone rang.  It was Hannah, asking for more plum-colored satin, so they could remake a couple of the covered buttons, as they had popped apart.

This makes my hands shake, I tell you!  I snatched up fabric, scissors, thread, needle, thimble, and ------ where’s the button-making kit?????  Where is it where is it where is it...  Oh.  Here it is.  I stuffed everything into a bag, and out the door we flew.

By the time we got there, one of Robert’s daughters, Michelle, who’s the same age as Victoria, had brought out the super glue and fixed those buttons up quite nicely.  Guess I’d better go buy some pretty pearl buttons and dole them out to all the ladies with the plum-colored dresses as replacements for the covered buttons.  The fabric is slippery, and doesn’t stay on the button.  I should probably buy some nice black suit buttons for Kurt’s and Jacob’s vests, too; they were made of the same stuff.  Lydia made the vests (I put in the buttonholes); Hannah made Kurt’s tie.  You know, it occurs to me that I could’ve solved the covered-button problem by simply applying fusible interfacing to the back of the fabric.  Shouldn’t I have known that already??!

Here’s a picture of Larry and me.  It looks sort of like I had a lobotomy, with residual swelling, but I’m not squinting, so ... well, you have to take what you can get, eh?

I have Benign Essential Blepharospasm, which makes the muscles and nerves around my eyes want to shut them tight now and again.  Makes driving a chore, which is aggravating, because I’ve always loved to drive.  I have to work at it to keep my eyes open, and sometimes when I blink, I have to purposefully open them back up again – they don’t always just blink automatically.  Doesn’t matter how fast you do that, it just isn’t as fast as when they do it properly, on their own!  At least it hasn’t harmed my eyesight (other than the fact that one can’t see too well if one’s eyes are squinted shut); I’m thankful for that.  My eyes are usually pretty good at home, and if I go for a walk, they’re almost always fine if it’s not too windy.  In a crowd, in public, they get worse.  So it’s a combination of nerves and muscles, brought on as a rare side effect of rheumatoid arthritis.

There, did you ask me for my doctor’s report?? 

Lawrence was bound and determined to come to the wedding, and come to the wedding he did!  Here he is with Norma, Kurt, and Victoria.

The wedding service and ceremony went smoothly and without a hitch ------ no, that’s wrong.  There was a hitch; there’s always a hitch at a wedding, right? – that is, when the groom is hitched to the bride! 

It was a beautiful wedding, with a touching and fitting sermon.  It’s God’s blessing that’s the most important part of the whole wedding – and the entire rest of the marriage, isn’t it?

A friend, after watching the wedding, commented on all the people going through the reception line, wondering if they’d gone around the spinney and started over again.  hee hee... There were maybe 450 people there... so it took a while to push them through the chute! 

That reminded me of the time somebody took me to the circus when I was about two years old.  A dinky little car came out onto the oval track and began circling.  It went around... and around... and around... and finally, about the time the audience started to get good and bored, it stopped, and a clown got out and stood up – and up, and up, and UP!  He was about 15 feet tall, when he finally got to full height.  I knew nothing about stilts; I thought he really was that tall.  Then poodles starting jumping out of that car – and there was no end to the poodles.  They just kept a-comin’ and a-comin’ and a-comin’!  I still remember how hard I laughed at that.

The only event of note (at the wedding, not the circus) that might be considered a small glitch was that one of the newly installed dishwashers was sending steam up into a smoke/heat detector, and a persistent woman’s voice kept coming over the intercom in the Fellowship Hall to tell us all that there was a fire in the building, and we must all panic, scream, and run in the streets.

So we all quieted momentarily, looked around, and then, neither spotting nor smelling anything alarming, and seeing that Robert was in hot pursuit of the matter, we all went back to eating lunch, opening gifts, chatting, and/or snapping pictures.

Once upon a time, when Daddy first went into the ministry, he was trying to marry a couple, and the groom kept interrupting him by planting big ol’ sloppy kisses on his bride smack-dab in the middle of the ceremony, right when he was supposed to be doing all that listening-and-repeating stuff.  Daddy finally said in his solemn preacher voice (he had lots of preacher voices), “It is not time to kiss the bride yet.  Repeat after me –”  and he continued, with no further interruptions until the deed was done. 

Daddy brought that story up now and again, especially enjoying telling it to shy young couples at rehearsal, complete with loud smacking noises.  (They’d blush, and my ladylike mother would say ever so quietly, “George!” – which always made him laugh.)

During the reception, after she’d eaten and just before she and Kurt opened some gifts, Victoria went off to change from her high purple satin heels to some pretty gold flats with rhinestone buckles.  It took her a few minutes, so we were teasing Kurt, asking if he knew for sure where she’d gone, and did he really know she was coming back, and hadn’t he ever heard of The Runaway Bride?

He did not seem unduly concerned. 

Kurt and Victoria left on their honeymoon at about 11:00 or so.  Here are the fathers, offering their last-minute advice.

They (the kids, not the fathers) are going to Colorado.  They stayed in Grand Island last night, and then the rest of the week they have reservations somewhere near Dillon Reservoir in the middle of the Rockies.  They have a deck that hangs out over the Colorado River.

The weather is supposed to be in the mid-40s all week long.  They’ll come back to Long Pine, Nebraska, Saturday, and stay for a couple of days in the little cabin we like up there.  

This afternoon, a big box arrived.  It’s a lace quilt from a lady in Cincinnati; she wants me to do the quilting on it.  I have never used my quilting machine on open lace before; I will likely lay lightweight stabilizer over it first.  I’m doing a bit of research; I want to do it right. 

The Schwan man came, and I suddenly remembered that it’s Halloween, and a few grandchildren might show up.  So I bought frozen chocolate chip/peanut butter chip cookie dough and baked some cookies.  That was what I needed to get last night after church – something for Halloween!  On the way home, I said, “I know there was something I needed to get at the store...” and Larry replied, “The wedding is over!  We don’t need anything!” – as if we’ll never need anything again, ever.  Men, tsk.

AAAaaaaaaaaaaaaa!  The electronic mouse trap just ZZZZZZZZzaaaaaappppPPPPPed a mouse.

Time out while I go empty it...        

Victoria’s friend Robin came a little while ago and collected a carload of Victoria’s clothes and a big box that came from Bed, Bath, and Beyond (probably a gift from someone).  Robin is a helpful girl.

I asked Larry one day when it didn’t seem like there were equal amounts of his work clothes to number of workdays, “Did you forget to get dressed one day last week?”

He (who knew perfectly well it was because he himself had washed a load of clothes, including his biking clothes) replied in mock horror, “I don’t know!!” then, resolving the issue, “I’ll wear a double set tomorrow to make up for it.”

My nephew, Robert (Pastor Walker), posted the wedding service.  Here is a direct link:

http://www.bbccolumbus.com/seventeen.htm

Both the morning and the evening services are on this page.  Scroll down to the bottom video for the wedding service.  My niece Susan is playing the piano, and my great-niece Sarah Kay is playing the organ. 

In the ladies’ singing group:  Back row:  Kay Tucker (one of Jeremy’s aunts), Olivia Jackson (niece), Anna Tucker (Jeremy’s cousin).  Front row:  Laura Tucker (Jeremy’s youngest sister), Abigail (my great-niece), Danica (Susan’s daughter and my great-niece), Jackie (a second cousin of both Kurt and Victoria).

When the men’s quartet sings, from left to right is Charles, Susan’s husband, our son-in-law Bobby, son Teddy, and cousin Merle.  I wrote the final verse of their song some years ago.

The violins – Anna, Danica; viola – Brianna (on the right).

Here’s Kurt’s great aunt Sandy playing her harp in our Fellowship Hall.  She plays beautifully.

My father would be so amazed if he could see us now.  When he started our church in the mid-1950s, there were only 26 people in the membership.  Now, there are 391 (and several new babies soon to boost that number up, including one who will be our own little grandbaby, Teddy and Amy’s addition to the family).

People keep wanting to know if it’s going to feel really different with Victoria out of the house.  Huh?!  You mean...  she’s been in the house this past year?!  heh

I’ve been getting used to it for over a year, what with Victoria’s job... dates... and a gazillion other things that kept her busy.  So it won’t be any big shocking difference.

We’re going to be old fuddy-duddies!  Ah, well.  Nothing wrong with old fuddy-duddies – especially if you both turn into old fuddy-duddies at the same time.  It’s only a problem if one turns into a fuddy-duddy while the other turns into the Energizer bunny.  :-O

Here is a picture of our tribe:

From left:

Jeremy holding Ian, Lydia holding Jonathan, Joanna, Bobby, Hannah, Nathanael in front of her, Aaron just behind me, Sarah Lynn (that’s me, heh), Levi in front of me, Larry, Victoria, Jacob (ringbearer), Kurt, Caleb behind Kurt, Norma (Larry’s mother) in front of Caleb, Grant (green vest), Leroy in front of Norma, Maria just behind her, Emma, Andrew, Ethan in front of Andrew, Hester, Lyle, Teddy holding Warren, Jeffrey in front of him, Amy, Josiah, hands in pockets, as always.

There are 31 in the photo, counting Norma.  Lawrence wasn’t there yet; it would have been too much for him to come early enough for family pictures and then stay through the service and the reception. 

Time to get busy!  Shall I finish the Blossoms bag before starting on the customer’s quilt, or shall I do the quilt first?  The Blossoms bag will take another day.  The quilt will take several.  Blossoms bag it is!

,,,>^..^<,,,       Sarah Lynn       ,,,>^..^<,,,