AAM Monday: Project Life Week 17

I always think the weather doesn't affect me much. Let it rain, let it rain. But of course I am as affected as the next person and lots of rain makes me really want to snuggle in and do very little. Well  read and watch movies. Maybe eat popcorn. Week 17 was nothing like that with the sun shining on my cherry blossoms. However, that would come to an end in week 18 when they became a soggy mess. I hate to sweep them up when they are so so pretty but more often than not I pay the price.

That wedding dress only had the beaded sash removed yesterday. I guess it was fitting that I did it on Mothers' Day. It's a mother kind of job, isn't it. And as much as I gripe about the heat, I was just about done with all the rain we had last week. I even watched a movie in bed. It was that kind of week. It just wasn't week 17 which says I'm a bit behind with this Project Life thing. Not that I care much. Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good I say and mostly I believe that.

AAM Monday Project Life Week 13

The last of the wedding images I think but then you never know. And check out those eggs! Don't you wish they were at your house! Just a quick word today...rain, and then it's been more rain and I expect to have rain every day this week. Fortunately I don't have to go anywhere. So inside, with the heat on (seriously!) and books to read and tv to watch.

AAM Monday: Project Life Week 12

The week The Wedding started. Some house things as the cold held on but knowing that the warm days were coming. Also coming were my son and his fiancee Stephanie. The weekend at the end of this week would be what we had been waiting for! Lots of pictures this week!

Travel With Me Tuesday: Across to Rock Hall

Now onto the wedding rehearsal photos. Remember the bride and groom had made all these plans for a MD wedding when they were living in SoCAL. Then in February, his Fairmont Hotel was sold to Marriott. 60 days to get new jobs somewhere in the country and do all the final, move AND do all the bits and pieces of the wedding. It's amazing how much they did and are now both living and working at jobs in downtown Boston. Kudos kiddos!

The groomsman Kurt and his wife Jenn from Seattle meet Dick in the sitting room of the Inn. It was a long trip for them so shortly after this they rested after their flight.

Jim the co-owner of the Inn but, for a change, with no dogs about.

We all went outside with Mary the officiant to rehearse. It was a gorgeous day, the kind we hoped to have for the actual wedding.

One of the dogs had an 'issue' and dragged his rear across the ground for quite a while. This was a heads up to look where we walked and hope there was someone with a pooper-scooper for the day of the wedding.

Matron of Honor Lindsey is 7 months pregnant in these shots and daddy John is minding little Declan.  Merida the flower girl is listening carefully while Derek the Best Man wonders how his 5 month old son is holding up back in the Inn.

Somewhere in the background the father of the groom is not sure where he is to be. We know it will all work out.

Mary gives Stephanie the instructions on passing the bouquet back to Lindsey. With Drama! Fortunately, the dog has completed his 'business'. 

The bride and groom are told to practice a long kiss. One hundred one, one hundred two, one hundred three.

And so the rehearsal went well, the kisses were kissed, and we went off for the rehearsal dinner.

TBT: That Texas Wedding - 50 years Ago

This is the rest of the photos from our friends' wedding down in San Angelo Texas. Carl and Janet became the third couple of the group, back from their Air Force assignment in Turkey, to be married. The majority of the men were still single so we marrieds spent a lot of time together...eating dinner, playing cards and just learning what it was like to be married.

From left to right..unknown, Vince McCarron, Kelly Meadows, unknown, Tom Houlihan. Vince and Kelly are still alive but I wonder about the others in this photo. This was the Vietnam era...

TBT 1967 San Angelo Wedding

San Angelo Texas. We were married and so were our friends Kelly and Sandy Meadows.  This day was the wedding of our mutual friends Carl and Janet.  I wonder what ever became of them...

While I was looking forward to the wedding, I was newly pregnant and just starting to gain weight. I felt so chubby! Little did I know how I'd love to be 'that chubby' in years to come! I did love that knit suit which was one of my work outfits...probably never worn again.

Wordless Wednesday: May 25, 2016

on the banks of the Big Thompson

TBT: 1966 Dancing an Irish Jig

From my first marriage in April 1966...

I always loved this photo of my Aunt Florence (on left) and my mother (center) dancing an Irish jig with a flock of the cousins. Some are Flaherty relatives of my former husband and some are Carroll relatives of mine.  I remember we went from the polka music to Irish jig music. I also recall that my new husband didn't dance to either! I wonder why I've married two men who can't dance! Funny how that goes.

Interesting to look at my mother and aunt and realize they were only 50 years old at that time. Sadly both women would be dead of either cancer or Alzheimers in a decade. It's really such a shame to have lost them for so much of my life.

TBT: Another Wedding, 1934

My in-laws, Dorothy and Vince, had another poignant story with their wedding. My father-in-law was a Catholic from a NY Irish American family. He had come 'south' to Maryland to live with his older brother who had married and also married into a family business. Vince went into the same business, awnings and storm windows,  and lived in SE Washington DC. Just how he met Georgetown Dorothy is a whole other story but let's just say you should never ask a girlfriend to take care of your 'beau' while you go away! Dorothy came from a VA family that moved to DC after the family's fortunes turned post Civil War. She was raised a Southern Baptist and that difference in religion was a very big deal back then.

The Catholic priest agreed to marry them but not IN the church. They had to be married in the church rectory and it was as close to a civil ceremony as the Catholic Church could make it. Of course, for Vince to have considered being married in the Baptist Church was unthinkable. His mother Martha would have rolled over in her grave - had she been dead - but instead came down from Brooklyn to attend the wedding. Other than their two witnesses, the mother of the bride and the mother of the groom were the only other attendants. I loved my mother-in-law and to the very end she never 'converted' but she would get an exasperated look when ever she talked of the rectory wedding. There are many ways to make someone feel 2nd class, and that rectory wedding tried to make it's mark on her. Fortunately, it failed!

TBT: A Long Ago Wedding

This is a wedding in the late 1930s I suspect. My mother had many photos like this but this is the only one that has a family member in it. My  Uncle Joe is the man 2nd from right in the back row who was killed in WWII in 1945. I also find it poignant that  this photo shows a wedding party that had a lot more money than my mother's family did. While it was wartime in 1942, both my mother and my uncle both had ceremonies that did not include anyone other than immediate family and both brides wore suits not wedding gowns. I often wonder if the brides would have been able to have this kind of wedding had it not been wartime. Nonetheless, I know this played a big part in my own mother's enjoyment of planning my wedding, a task I was glad to share with her.

Flashback Friday 11 07 29 - 1930's Wedding

Here is an old photo of people who must have been friends of my mother. I date this photo to the late 30s. I always find it poignant that my mother had so many photos of high school friends with wedding dresses and apparently 'proper' weddings. I don't doubt that she too dreamed of this kind of wedding.

However, when my parents married there was no money for that kind of thing, and my mother had a pale blue suit. Even the church was an issue because my mother was a Lithuanian Catholic, and my father was an Irish Catholic. I'm told that it was like two different religions and the mixture was not one that was easily approved. I'm sure my parents are not in different sections of heaven right now. At least there, such things don't matter.

Flashback Friday

1966..a quaint custom back then to show off the marketable women. Children were always anxious to catch the bouquet and look at the woman in the orange dress. She was a workmate of mine who was past the usual young marrying age. Perhaps in her late 30s? The 20yr olds were ready to spring but I only remember my workmate as seriously eager.

How times have changed.

Winter Brides

The whole story is over at Once Wed where you may also find 'gently' worn wedding gowns. And check out that little knit cushion for holding the wedding rings. (Knitter ALERT!!) This was truly a winter wonderland, and reminiscent of my own mother's wedding suit.

All photographs are by Calla Evans in Toronto. Don't you wish your wedding pictures had this kind of uniqueness? Or maybe they do... Share them with me if you like.