Post Wedding Events

     You may not know this but some post wedding events are almost as good as the pre-wedding events. OK, not too many but there are some worth noting. The night after the wedding, George and I were invited to dinner with the bride's entire family who was still in St. Augustine. We met at a lovely restaurant on the top floor. Definitely classy. I sat near my two boys (men) and looked at them with their lovely wives. It was quite a moment as I contemplated how they had matured into wonderful men right before my eyes. 

Of course, there is one person that has not matured as fast as they have, and that, naturally, would be me. I had pre-arranged with the server to bring Jeff a special dish of his very own. Our Kraus traditional dish of rubber chicken. Here is Jeff contemplating that Mom has once again passed off the rubber chicken to him without him suspecting it in advance. Notice Ashlee wants to get away from the rubber chicken in the picture. But wait...this is a different rubber chicken.

R.C. hanging on a straw

 It is smaller, it squeaks and it lays an egg out of its bottom. This causes great merriment for about 15 minutes at the table as the rubber chicken is posed in many pretty disgusting ways and the papparazzi snap every picture for posterity (no pun intended).

Very unattractive pose

HELP!

 Guess they are not as grown up as I feared. Well at the end of the dinner and the rubber chicken was hoping his time was up, Jeff kept trying to sneak him in my purse without me knowing. (He gets extra points if I go home with the chicken).  Time to involve the Srednick's in the rubber chicken tradition. 

Here are the Chicken Relocators now. Rich and Deb.

Debbie was thrilled to be the Carrier of the Chicken and a clandestine e-mail that night certified that the "Chicken has been placed under Jeff's pillow, where he will locate it's rather slimy essence when he puts his hand under his pillow. Wow! Great partners in crime!

The Wedding

   

The Happy Couple!

     Well, the wedding is over. The memories will last a lifetime. The groom was handsome, the bride was beautiful and all was right with the world. But if you think it was all about them, well, think again.

    As the mother of the groom, I played a most important role in the festivities. I think that I surprised both my “boys” with the cleaned up version of Mom, complete with professionally applied make-up and a coordinated outfit. And panty hose.

       Here is how I looked in case you are wondering. I'm the one on the right. The other one is my handsome hubby, George, who also cleans up pretty nice.

   Jeff and Cory were wondering. “When did Mom get cleavage?” This is what I get for shopping for a push-up bra and putting on that excess weight so that it would migrate to my boobs. No respect.

Pantyhose From Hell

    And let me tell you about the panty hose. I have not worn them for probably about 10 years at least. I bought control top ones for…well, you know why. They looked like the width of a yardstick when I took them out of the package. George and I had to team up to hitch them up to my waist, they were so tight. He reminded me to take care to pull them all the way up after going to the bathroom. I didn’t.

   So during the mother and son dance to Rascal Flatt’s song, My Wish, my panty hose started to roll down off my rear. As Jeff is telling me how nice I look, I am afraid that the darn things will roll all the way down and fall in  a pool around my ankles by the end of the song. But we made it. They rolled themselves down to the tops of my legs and clung precariously there till I could get to the bathroom.

  But pantyhose and cleavage issues paled in comparison to the looks on the newlywed faces. Priceless.

Oh Rhett, you take mah breath away!

Out On The Town (Take 1, 2, and 3...)

     Well with three weeks left to go before the wedding, George and I made plans to have dinner with my almost-daughter-in-law's parents. We had a great time, but part of my evening was devoted to creating a photographic memory of our time together. 

     My idea was to put a picture on Facebook with a message to our kids from us old fogies. It turned out to be more of a project than I expected, but twice as fun.

Fountain

     After dinner we thought we might take a picture with a backdrop of a fountain behind us. Here is the fountain. Pretty huh? Well, we decided to do a test shot with my model, George.

Take 1
 George did not look so good. As he had
already predicted, we could not stand in front
of the fountain with my point and shoot camera. So we moved.


Take 2
We turned George around to face the other way. Still a bit dark. But at least he was smiling.

 Take 3
George lost his smile right about here. We had
moved down the street a bit to the front of the restaurant.


Take 4 Who is that bearded man?

A little farther on. 

 

 

Take 5  This will never do.








Take 6

Rich and Deb have lost interest in the project. They are wondering what
kind of family they are getting into. George, well, you can see how George feels. 
We are actually inside a mattress store, where we have asked permission to take a picture. We all promise faithfully to buy a mattress there some day in the future.


Take 7 Score!

Not only have we taken over a mattress shop, we have asked the sales man to take our picture. It's a wrap!

The Wedding

     In 5 weeks from today I will be a mother-in-law for the second time. We are inheriting not only a wonderful daughter, but also her extended family, which we love so much already. Wow! Add to that the fact that my sister, Diana, has recovered successfully from the cancer in her leg and will be at the wedding and well...life is pretty good. I even have my MOG dress (mother of the groom). As you may recall I made the fatal error of ordering one online. It was lovely. I looked like a stuffed sausage in it. But that is all over. I have a new dress and I am ready. Well almost.
      Since I rarely learn from my mistakes I ordered shoes online and returned them, then we headed out to DSW and got some comfortable shoes that will allow for standing, walking, and dancing. 

I'm a Brand New Chick!

     Speaking of dancing, my son and I have planned our mother/son dance, which just blows me away, the thought of it. He asked me for my input. I had two ideas, neither of which were chosen.  One was "I'm a Brand New Chick!" and the other was "Detachable Penis!" 

Not even Rosie the Riveter could get that bra on.

     We settled for a more motherly love song, which I will not reveal at this time. But today was the piece de resistance! I had to go shopping for a strapless bra. Big deal you say. Yeah! I have never got one before and I hope to never have to get one again. It was torture. 
     Since my midsection has expanded much larger in later years, I was about 4 inches off in my estimate of what size I would need. It took a while to get to where I could pull the darn thing up without choking. Strapless bras, it turns out, have that rubbery stuff on them to stick to your torso better and it makes them really hard to put on. I was wishing my first daughter in law, Ashlee was there to help. 

Results of Bra Shopping

I knew my waist was too big!

In the olden days, making your waist smaller.

     I also picked up a thing that makes your waist smaller and makes you look like Scarlett O'Hara. Did not try it on, I was too exhausted from the bras. I met my husband at the entrance of the store, sweaty, glassy-eyed with wild hair, and he thought I had gotten into some kind of a bra brawl. I expect to have to start dressing the day before in order to get it on. Stay tuned for more wedding stories.

Just After the Wetting

The wedding is over. The vows were said, the rose petals were scattered, the sand was poured and the bride was as beautiful as any bride I have ever seen. And the groom, well he could have graced a romance novel cover. Just a few wrinkles occurred.
The rain continued. We opted for Plan B. As Ashlee and Cory arrived at my house to get ready, I tripped over the cat and scraped up both legs, also bruising my ankle severely enough to have to hobble all day. Cory and George went over to Ron and Jeanette's house and Ashlee and I followed later. When we got there we found out that Ron, Cory's Dad, had been taken to the hospital after experiencing severe bleeding from a procedure he had had the week before. So...we were at their house, but they were not there. Cory and Ashlee were in agony. Should they wait? Change their date? It was a lose-lose situation. Finally, a call to Jeanette solved the problem. She told them to get married, everything was ready.
The wedding was beautiful. Their home was a beautiful backdrop for the pictures. Then the wedding party of Cory, Ashlee, George and I headed to the hospital to go to the ER to see her new father in law just out of recovery. Seeing Ashlee striding down the corridor in her gown was a hoot, and she got many a smile and a "Congratulations." My daughter in law has a big heart and she showed it that night.
Phew!