At least 9 wonderful people

First off, I seem to be in love with the word "wonderful" of late.  I have over-used it in the last few posts.  I can't quite explain this affection for the word, but I can either embrace it and continue to over-use it to the point of causing you, the reader, to vomit in your mouth every time your eyes skip over it or I can change and commit to not using it at all for the next 5 posts.  Yes, that's what I'll do.

Wonderful.  That's decided. 

I mentioned a few days ago about some people that allowed me to spend a few special moments with my daughter, the bride, right before the wedding - being just that, her mother, but in a good way.  Helping her with her dress and her accessories and taking pictures of her.  I'd like to tell you about these people. 

These wonderful people.

I'll begin with family members who helped make this gift possible.  Both of my sons strung white Christmas lights on the railings at the Transportation museum that line the platforms.  My oldest son's girlfriend, A, also helped with this task (and I'm including her here because we already think of her as family!)  This may not sound like much, but we're talking 4 railings, each about 50 feet long, plus we asked for black tulle to lay over the lights.  The net effect (ooo, did you catch the pun?  tulle...net...get it?!) was to draw the upper portions of the platform where the bar and the cakes were to the lower portions of the platform where the buffet was set up and the wedding took place.  I wish I had a picture of how this looked, but alas, I forgot to do that.  I was just plain too busy smiling at the lights every time I walked by. 

Then came my sister, J, and her husband, G.  J&G live in Indiana and drove over for the wedding.  And I had the audacity to put them both to work just about immediately!  And they did it!  Joyfully even!  Setting up the table for the programs, settings up the altar, fighting against the wind with the foamboard picture of S&K where the escort cards were attached using glue dots, eventually having to attach it with zip ties pursuant to the genius idea of another person that I'll get to later. 

Now I'll move to the friends.  My friend, C, a different C than helped with the cakes, came over and sat at the house, letting P and C in to pick things up and drive them to the wedding site.  C will tell you that she has to plan her spontaneity, and I didn't give her much notice when I asked her to do this, but she did it anyway.  She even found a couple of things I forgot to set out for P to pick up plus called me with updates since she knew I'd be wondering about what was happening back at the house! 

I've talked about C with the cakes before, but I can't say enough how much she did to make these cakes a success.  Have you ever driven a cake across town?  Much less 4 cakes?  Have you ever driven a cake that is about 2 feet long across town?  It can be a nerve-racking experience, but C did it.  Successfully.  When I get upset with drivers who are "too slow" or "too cautious", I try to remind myself that they might be driving a cake somewhere...

Now I'll talk about P.  She has an SUV who a) cleaned it out so there would be room to take all of our stuff to the wedding; b) found every one of the things that I had on our list; c) picked up every one of those things and drove them across town; d) unloaded those things and set them up; e) came up with the genius idea to zip tie the foamboard pic to the easel AND magically poofed a glue gun out of thin air to glue said zip ties; f) cleaned herself up for the wedding; g) helped tear everything down; and h) drove it all back to our house on Sunday! 

Since I don't really have many pics for this post, I'll include a pic of P here, so you can see an example of the decorations, which leads to my next wonderful person.  (P is the 2nd one from the left.  Doesn't she clean up good?!  PS - she is single, too!)

I don't have any pics of the decorations, but this is a pretty good example.  See the table name sitting in the white box table name holder?  See the centerpiece?  See the placecards?  See the little favor box?  See the jewels hanging from the centerpiece?  See the white roses at the base of the centerpiece?  All of those are there because of our friend, J, and her team.  Pretty wonderful, right?

So that is 9 people.  9 people who made it possible for me to spend a few precious moments with my baby on her wedding day - a day like no other that will never be repeated again.  And this list of people is by no means exhaustive.  I could tell you about more who helped make this weekend work for us.  Like the lady in the pic above who is sitting to the left of P.  She came over and ran my kitchen for the post-wedding brunch on Sunday morning for the wedding party.  Or B, the maid of honor, who helped put together S's something old (my baby spoon that was hidden in S's bouquet)...

...and her something borrowed (an ankle bracelet given to her on her wedding day) and the real something blue (a turquoise ribbon from her wedding) plus S's fun something blue shown in the pic below.  I have told S for years that she should decorate her "Christmas tree" tattoo for the holidays every year, but for some reason she never does...Hmmm...I wonder why...

I've thought about making a list of the 10 top things I've learned as the MOTB, and while I haven't thought of all 10 of those things, I'm pretty certain that the # 1 thing I've learned as the MOTB is that I need friends.  And family.  And help. 

And I'm grateful that there are wonderful people who step up and give me the gifts of their time and talents and joy and help.  I am blessed. 
J'Deb