Dear children,
I know you aren’t born yet and this blog will have been destroyed in the house fire of 2056, but I hope you know I think about you now. I wanted you to hear this story from me first, not the old lady with the faded memory.
Your father and I worked very hard for our wedding. We wanted to have it in our home, because I felt vulnerable and wanted to be in my comfort zone as much as possible. Daddy put in a sprinkler system. He dug the trenches with Grandpa B. and Uncle Jesse by hand. He even designed it and laid the pipe with Grandpa. Then he and mommy laid sod. We paid somebody to do most of it, but they ran out, so we ordered more and finished it ourselves. Me and my friend Jessica Farmer redid a whole garden all by ourselves. We took out 26 big black garbage bags and a lattice. When Grandpa B. and Jessica took it to the landfill, it weighed more than a ton! Then Jessica and I fixed the garden up really nice, she built a fence to keep the dogs out, and I put a stone path and mulch around the boxes. Daddy put a sprinkler system in there too. Jessica and I also made the front yard really nice by planting flowers everywhere. Jessica and Daddy sanded the back deck too. The back yard was so pretty. I got really sunburned doing all that work, and had really bad tan lines for our wedding.
On the inside, we were hard at work too. Grandma B. and I crocheted table runners by hand. I hoped to make table cloths, but was working on my master’s degree and was working too much. So I compromised and made runners. But then it was still too much, and I called in Grandma to help. She didn’t know how to crochet very well, and it was very hard for her. She called me upset almost every day. I ended up doing the last one myself anyway because the one I gave her was too much trouble. But together we worked hard and were able to finish making three beautiful table runners by hand. I hope they weren’t also destroyed in the house fire, because they were truly a work of love. Grandma sewed all the lace on the edges and made them stiff with starch.
The invitations were all handwritten too. And Grandma made a lot of announcements, since we couldn’t invite everyone.
I also took the extra silk from my dress alterations and made handkerchiefs. Silk is very hard to sew and mommy isn’t very good at sewing. I called every friend I knew who sewed and they gave me tips, but honestly, they were awful. I kept the worst one for myself, the two best ones I gave to your grandmothers, and the three others I had your grandpas and daddy put into their suit pockets. Daddy didn’t want boutonnieres, and mommy hated flowers then (I’ll tell you about genitals when you grow up, but they aren’t something mommy thinks needs to be paraded around such serious events). I wanted to sew the extra lace from my alterations onto the grandmas’ handkerchiefs, but I wasn’t very good at it, and I had already messed up the silk from resewing them so many times. Aunt Linette sewed them so prettily, you mom nearly cried seeing how nice they were.
Aunt Linette did so much more! She made us a pretty banner to hang up behind the place we got married. She also painted our aisle runner and made a swag to hang above the door Grandpa and I came through. She sewed a great deal for us.
And let me tell you what Grandma M. did! I loved to wear vintage jewelry when I was young. I used to wear giant awful brooches on my jackets and clip on earrings to go dancing. Well, when Grandma B.’s grandma, Great-Great Grandma Maughn, died, I inherited a couple very ugly brooches nobody wanted. I loved them very much, but never wore them because they were so special. Well, Grandpa B.’s mom, Great Grandma Barbara, wanted to get rid of her “junk jewelry”, and found a very excited granddaughter to take it off her hands. She gave me loads of clip on earrings, screw back earrings, brooches, and necklaces. There were so many and they were so nice that I wore them all the time. Well, for my bridal bouquet, since I don’t like flowers, I wanted these special pieces of jewelry made into a bouquet. I tried very hard, but given my artistic talent, my bouquet was brooches hot glued to a styrofoam ball on a stick. I didn’t care it was ugly because it took so much time, and I did my best. But Grandma M. saw what I had done, took the picture of the bouquet I “modeled” it after, and took the bouquet away from me. She cleaned the glue off and wired each piece to floral wire and made a gorgeous bouquet with all my favorite pieces (I secretly kept the ones I liked to wear best). It was stunning… it looked better than the picture and she spent so much time making sure it was. I hope someday you’ll want that bouquet at your wedding.
Uncle Ryan made these very pretty string balls for us. He blew up balloons, dipped colored string into glue and wrapped the balloon. He let them dry, then popped the balloon and pulled it out, leaving behind a very pretty string sphere. He figured out he could shove a little fake candle into the balloon before blowing it up, and made the spheres into lamps. He made twenty of these! He strung them into the trees with fishing line so they looked like they were floating. They were gorgeous.
I crocheted little “corsages” for our moms and placed them into boxes with the hankies. Same for the dads’ hankies and gave them all cards. Grandma and Grandpa B. were late for the wedding because Grandpa was crying. Later, Grandma M. told me she cried a little too.
Now here’s where I’ll tell you the truth that I probably won’t tell you in 10 years.
It had been raining all month. I bought a Farmers’ almanac and checked the weather religiously. It wasn’t supposed to rain on the day of our wedding. I called a tent rental service, just in case. They told me to set up a big tent meant I would have to have the utility people mark the buried lines with spray paint, and that the tent had to come with big blue barrels at the corners, to catch the rain. The thought of our little outdoor fete being so marred in the case it didn’t rain made me sad. They told me nobody else was reserving tents and it wasn’t a good idea. When I asked Grandma M. what I should do, she assured me nobody was made of sugar and a little rain would be just fine. Jessica said worse case, we would buy big canopies last minute and set them up. She found some, and assured me we wouldn’t have to use them. But your daddy’s and my cleaning lady didn’t know we had a plan to buy canopies, cleaned out the garage and taped white plastic tablecloths from the dollar store to the walls to hide our tools. She thought if it rained we would have the wedding in the garage. When I came home to that after picking up the cakes I had lovingly taken a week to bake, tort, level, and fondant at Grandma M.’s, I lost my temper. Who in God’s green earth thought I would allow my wedding to be where I parked my car? With plastic taped to the walls? It was beyond ludicrous and I lost my already waning sanity. I yelled at the nice foreign lady. In front of my own mother and best friends who had traveled to express their love for me. It wasn’t going to rain, and if it did, we had canopies. End of story! I was embarrassed the instant my mouth shut. But I was late to a hair appointment, so I didn’t even have time to blush.
Grandma and I got our hair done by my hair stylist, and she did my makeup. I finished stacking the cakes, all the while daddy was cooking delicious food. We wanted everything to be homemade. It was hard, but now we had a house full of people helping us set up. The tables and chairs were set up, the string balls were being hung, the speakers were being set up, the banners were being hung.
We wanted to take our family photos before the wedding, so our guests wouldn’t have to wait so long between ceremony and reception. Aunt Opie came up with that idea. She is a great photographer.
This is when Grandma and Grandpa B. were late. Grandpa didn’t leave the house until late because he was overseeing the set up, then when my card made him cry, they were late. I was waiting for Grandma to help me put on my dress, so I wasn’t ready yet. Which meant Grandma and Grandpa M. were helping Daddy in the kitchen. It worked out, though, and we all went out to take pictures. It was about the time this was wrapping up, when it started to rain.
Jessica ran to buy the canopies.
Jessica and some friends set up the canopies over each table and it was alright. When our officient got there, she told us a huge storm was on its way and she just beat it. She said we needed to have this wedding ASAP. We signed our marriage certificate, went over the rings, who had the bouquet, and what Grandpa B. was supposed to say when Uncle Robin came in and announced the rain had stopped.
Everyone rushed out and took moist seats.
My procession music was a beautiful a capella opera taken from a video game called Portal 2. Time stopped when I saw your father. Grandpa didn’t cry and walked me very nicely. The ceremony was short, and Daddy and I wrote it so it was funny. I made some mistakes because I was scared, but everyone laughed and it was ok. I said “I Jonifer, take thee Jen” and tried to put his ring on the wrong hand. He kept trying to lead sugar pushes because we loved to dance and he was scared too. I cried, and look silly in all the pictures, but I can’t tell you how happy and honored I felt. Daddy kept making faces so I wouldn’t cry, but nobody else saw it, so I looked like I was laughing for no reason. Our recessional was the Star Wars court song (you know Daddy…), and everyone laughed. We hugged everyone coming back inside, and that’s when I really lost it. Seeing everyone with wet eyes hugging and kissing me, everyone I loved and cared about so much, both our families together, sprinkled with friends… I cried so much I messed up my makeup! Acacia took me up to the bedroom and helped me get a grip, which was hard because she was crying too! I fixed my makeup and went back down.
When I say it was raining, that was an understatement. It was pouring buckets and the wind was freezing. There was no way we could expect people to eat outside. There was no way we could fit the tables inside! The fondant of my cake was melting.
Then they said it: “The garage isn’t looking so bad now, is it?” I must have invented a new shade of white for the occasion, because before the sentence was completed, Acacia had organized a feat of Tetris that would shame professionals. Not one, but two tables were suddenly moved into the living room by men in suits. A canopy was moved over the liquor coolers and a third table was moved under it. The kids’ table suddenly became the Middleton clan table, the kids were ushered downstairs with a movie, and the friends and parents and Bettale clan all fit into the two in the living room. Dad was still cooking and I was wearing a dress I could barely breath in, so I changed. It happened like that, and there were suddenly salads being served by pregnant Aunt Opie, with her camera still around her neck. I was too happy to be sad, so I ate salad. The rain was rolling off the canopy into the house, since the second table meant the french doors couldn’t shut. Jessica duct taped one of those dollar store table cloths to the wall to redirect the flow, and we cranked up the heater.
In retrospect, I think I was the only one in a hurry to get to dinner. After so much had been moved around, I was very nervous thinking it was after 8 and everyone was starving. I started eating before Daddy was at the table, and made all my friends and family sit down, even though they seemed happy to be socializing. I think I made it weirder than it needed to be, but the Bettale side was clearly worn out due to the lack of organization, and I tried to take charge, even though it probably wasn’t the correct social flow.
The food was amazing, kids. Jon made an avocado and spinach salad with roast beef and buffalo mozzarella, sou vide short ribs with carrot puree, asparagus wrapped with prosciutto, and a seafood pasta. In the midst of the action, Dad was pulled out of the kitchen to make some decision about the table, and somebody boiled the pasta too long, so Daddy was sad about that, but nobody else seemed to notice. It was really nice, and I loved sharing dinner with everyone. Really, even though I knew half our guests were soaked and tired of the whole thing, Daddy made it so much fun. I was so happy about being married, the whole world couldn’t have brought me down.
Grandma M. kept saying how it was good luck to have rain, and pointed out the window to where the string balls Uncle Ryan made were melting in the water, but still floating eerily in the wind and rain. They looked like something from Salvador Dali… and while there was so much destruction, all I saw was beauty, love, and support. I think everyone had just made up their minds to have a good time, and nobody could stop them… and certainly nobody could stop me from grinning like an idiot. You’ll see that in the photos.
After dinner, Dad apologized to everyone for the cluster, and soon after the champagne and Martinelli’s was passed out… but because Dad had just said our thank yous and sorrys, we didn’t have anything left to say, so everyone just clinked glasses and drank. That was as awkward as my sitting down and eating before everyone else! We used the special glasses Grandma and Grandpa B. used at their wedding.
We cut the cake then. I had wrapped the cake with peach ribbon, and we messed up trying to cut through it. So I took it off and we tried again. I made german chocolate cake with white chocolate buttercream and marshmallow fondant on the outside. Because your cousin William and Grandma B. both have allergies, I made the top tier out of rice crispy treats. It was the first time William had been able to eat wedding cake, and he was very excited, so Uncle John held him. We had two dogs, Jayne and Kaylee, so we had to get a cake for them too. It was made by a dog bakery, and made to look just like ours, with the ribbon. I also put an earring from my collection on each cake, so they matched.
We used the knife Grandma and Grandpa B used at their wedding to cut to the cake. We cut a small piece and I fed it ever so kindly to your dad… Yep, that’s the truth and I won’t have you thinking anything else, or your grounded. Then we cut another piece, but this one was as big as a house, and daddy smooshed it all over mommy in her pretty dress and makeup! She had nuts in her nose! There was nothing else I could have done, it was self defense after all, so I wiped as much from my face as possible and smooshed it back into HIS face! We kissed our messy sticky faces, and everyone laughed.
Grandpa B. cut up the cake and passed it around and everyone really seemed to be having fun at this point. Your dad and I snuck away up stairs to fed the doggy cake to the dogs, and took some time to talk and relax. I hope you guys do the same. It’s important to be balanced, even when it’s good excitement.
Grandma and Grandpa B. and Uncle Ryan left early. I think it was a little too cramped and stressful for them, and while I was sorry for that, I was too happy to do anything hostess-like to make them more comfortable. Plus it was late enough to be tired after such a busy day, and that sort of thing can’t be helped. Also, by this time, tons of friends were pouring in for our after party. Uncle Robin had been our “sacrificial male”, braving the weather for liquor, and by this time, the party had gotten rather casual.
Daddy and I packed a quick overnight bag and headed off to the hotel. Sources say the only drink spilled was by me when I tried to hug Uncle Glen, and the party waned at only 2:30. Tasha and Jessica had all the dishes done when we got home the next morning. And our dogs were dyed pink and purple. There was also a huge banner over our garage saying “MISSION ACCOMPLISHED”.
And so it was that your dad and I were married. Nobody cared about the garden or my tan lines, and certainly there was no need for the sprinklers that day. There was duct tape holding a dollar store plastic table cloth the to wall, and it was freezing. I forgot to put my pretty train down during the ceremony, and there were tons of mess ups and awkward moments. We thought enough get a fire pit and a poorly planned rain strategy, but it never occurred to us it might be so cold in late May. But you know what? Almost everyone cried (even Uncle Kevin), everyone pitched in to show their love, and we really felt loved by our community. We made everything by hand, to show our love, and had no vendors. Aunt Beth took the trash out in heels and her dress. It was a mess, but everyone pulled it together for us and we loved them all for it.
The pictures are deceptive. They show everyone happy and eating and talking… the duct tape was carefully edited out of most shots. And I hope when you are old enough to care about what our wedding was like, I will take out the album and show you all the happy people having a great time, and I will tell you how perfect it was. Because it was.
Your future mom,
Jennifer Middleton