Six Years

Colorful flowers, chocolate milkshakes, a bright red car, lots and lots of dear loved ones, complete joy and contentment, a sleeping ringbearer, sunshine, dancing, and a wonderful new life with my husband.

Tim and I had a beautiful wedding day. Today we are celebrating our sixth anniversary.

Last night we talked about a few things that we remembered.

I remember waking up to the smell of bacon. My mom and dad were staying at my condo with me, and they let me sleep as late as I could, and fixed me a good breakfast of bacon and eggs so I would have "lots of energy" for the day.

It was fun getting my hair and makeup done with my bridesmaids, although I went in telling the hairdresser that she could do whatever she wanted, and then when I saw what she did, I asked her to change it because it kind of reminded me of a girl going to basketball practice. I was happy with the end result. I didn't think I was someone who had to go in for a "trial run" on my hairdo, but maybe I should have after all.

I loved the moment when Tim and I first saw each other before we had our pictures taken. I remember my bridesmaids splitting so he and I could have a moment together.

I liked the feeling that nothing really mattered, anymore, so if anything went wrong, who cared? No need to stress about details at this point, just let everything happen and enjoy the day. I heard later in the day that the organ in the church wasn't working just hours before our ceremony, and honestly, I wouldn't have cared if they had to play the music on the piano or play a CD. In fact, I was just at a wedding last week and they played music off a computer, and it was kind of nice. The musicians in our wedding were good friends of ours, and I loved the music we chose, but afterwards they told us that the processional didn't sound quite right. Honestly, I never even noticed. I was concentrating on walking down the aisle with my dad and not crying uncontrollably.

When I made it down the aisle without crying uncontrollably, I was completely happy and content, and knew the rest of the day would be an utter breeze. Before the ceremony, my bridesmaids and my mom and I had prayed in a circle (after the wedding coordinator ran to get us all chocolate milkshakes from Jack in the Box), and I think my main prayer was that I would be able to hold my emotions in check.

When the ceremony was finished, I was so very happy and wanted to jump down the aisle.

Tim and I got to drive this sweet vintage (my favorite new word) Corvette from the church to our reception barn. Tim was slightly nervous about stalling it out in front of everyone, but the beautiful color and all our friends and family cheering us on and celebrating with us made for great memories and beautiful pictures.

We had so much fun driving around the neighborhood in that car! It was a great feeling. Obviously, we were just married (veil, dress, tuxedo, clinking cans, "just married" sign), and people were honking and waving at us, and I happily waved back and cheered. We drove up on a hill and looked out over the city, and marveled at our first moments of being husband and wife.

I love the people that were there to celebrate with us on our wedding day. I sometimes cannot believe the dozens (hundreds?) of people we invited, some of whom we hardly even knew (although they were probably friends of our parents). And not to mention the bridesmaids and groomsmen, and even people who came all the way up here from Utah to be with us. It was very special and just FUN.

Here are my cute niece and nephew, Gwyneth, now in 5th grade, and Jagger, now in 6th grade. They were so small! We have a picture of Jagger sleeping on the altar steps during the ceremony. No one told me I should think about the poor kid's nap time.

Our reception was fun. We danced a lot and had great food.

Sometimes I laugh at the fact that we even had a cake. We wanted to do the ceremonial cake cutting, but I don't even think anyone had any cake because the caterers at our reception made one mean dutch oven apple and peach cobbler.


The day after we got married, Tim's family had a reunion party in a nearby resort town and for some reason we had to go, even though we just wanted to be newlyweds. But it was fun, and we got to eat some of our leftover cake.

Here is the utter contrast of a car that we drove away from the reception. Not nearly as pretty as that shiny red Corvette.

It was a great feeling to be driving away as husband and wife. Tim is a wonderful husband for me. He is the best at listening and encouraging. He's motivated and a hard worker. He's an awesome dad, and I always marvel at the things he knows to say and do with our kids when I can't think of what to do. And he's pretty handy with his tools and a really good biker. :)

To close this reminiscing session, I leave you with a picture taken by my father-in-law during the ceremony. This was not staged, nor was it in any way intentional. Perhaps it was a subconscious message???? To my father-in-law??? (not really, he's wonderful, and he cried laughing when he developed this picture)

Not sure what was going through my head, but the look on my face is priceless. (And in case you didn't notice, you have to look at the little "sign language" going on as I put the ring on Tim's finger. . . . )