Girlymama

Well, Saturday my husband’s brother got married to one of my favorite people in the world. The wedding was beautiful. (I only cried three times!) My father-in-law performed the ceremony, which is just so special (he married us too!)  It was so thrilling to see L &  get married, say their vows and have that first kiss. (Which was a whopper – uh, save it for the honeymoon, guys!) The reception was not only beautiful, but was a great time as well. It was here. And we all danced the night away. Here are a few pics to tide you over and I’ll try to get more up soon. Since all four of us were actually in the wedding, it was hard to get pictures, but the photographer promised me some good ones!!

 Me and the flower girls (Little Sis and Big Sister). They are so excited because I just told them that the reception would have cake.

 First dance! How adorable… Doesn’t her dress rock?

 Bride and the flower girls before the ceremony

 Oh, Mama, this is sooooo good!

 Big Sister dancing with the bride — that was all she wanted to do since she heard there was going to be a wedding!

was last night. Super fun. Good food. Fun drinks (pink champagne, frozen yumminess, something called a ‘tipsy turtle’). Lots of laughs. But I will not be thinking clearly until I have had at least 3 more cups of coffee, so I will post some great photos and some fantastically funny quotes later, I promise.

Just a taste:
L: “Hey, I’m the um.. um… Bride! Yeah – the bride.”

UPDATE: Here are some pics:

 Some of the bridesmaids

 Everything just got sillier!! (those darn tipsy turtles!)

  Sloshed Bride

Once again there is water all over the mudroom/family room/utility room/crawl space area. Only this time, Husband pulled off the molding and part of the wall in the mudroom to discover a few lovely surprises:
1) water damage.
2) mold.
3) our trim is not actually made of wood, but some sort of shavings-packed-together-Ikea-like thing and then painted to look like wood.
4) a crack in the cinderblock foundation.

and then we pulled up the carpet. More mold! Hooray!

SUPER!! Wedding is this Saturday! Basement full of water!! Breathe in that fresh moldy air! House for sale!

It feels a bit like I have dropped off the planet, but I am actually here. Things are totally and completely crazy. Why? Two words: Wedding Crap.

My brother-in-law is getting married on Saturday, so our whole family is having an insane week. Oh, wait. Actually, its just me. I’m really busy with wedding stuff. My mother-in-law & sister-in-law are busy enjoying several ‘shopping’ trips and backing out of babysitting for me. grrrrrrrrrrrrr 

I agreed to plan the rehearsal dinner. Well, agreed because the wedding was three weeks away and nothing had been done besides setting a date (the night before the wedding) and some talk about what to eat (should we order deli trays or pizza?). I love my brother-in-law and sister-in-law too much to allow that nonsense. (seriously, deli trays?!?) I tried to delegate. I really did. But when I delegated two months ago — nothing got done and here we are. So I’m planning the rehearsal dinner.  And I’m also hosting an open house for my husband’s extended family on Sunday afternoon.  Between that and our whole family being in the wedding, my to-do list is two pages long.

Here’s the rub. I don’t want my mother-in-law’s help. She’s lovely – really – but we do not work well together. I am ever-so-slightly OCD while she is ever-so-slightly… not. I am extremely organized (lists upon schedules upon lists), she is not (“I’ll just go to Sam’s and pick up some things for the rehearsal dinner!” No! What ‘things?’ I need specific things. Not just whatever “things” tickle your fancy that day!!!). 

BUT what I do want is help with my kids, who spent most of yesterday either plopped in front of a video or being dragged along to stores. (Actually last night, they did both! Husband and I needed to run errands, so we set up the dvd player in the car and took turns running into stores while the kids sat in the car watching Winnie the Pooh. Highly Effective Parenting, that is.) And today, I’m off to 3 or 4 different stores in the morning, followed by a trip to DE to meet with the facilities manager of the church for rehearsal dinner set-up. I had a really full day tomorrow too. 

Then last night my sister-in-law called to say that she couldn’t baby sit because my mother-in-law wanted her to go shopping with her. (I apologize, but the only words that went through my mind upon hearing this were) WTF?!? You have to go shopping right when I needed a sitter? You both have your dress (which I took the time to go shopping with both of you to get) and your shoes (which I took sister-in-law to seven stores to find.) What is so freaking important to go shopping for right now? Is there really no possible other time you could go shopping? Tomorrow afternoon was my time to get my stuff done.

I had stuff I wanted to do to get ready for the wedding. Admittedly, it is somewhat shallow stuff like tanning away my #$%&! tan lines since my dress is strapless and getting my nails done and my brows waxed.  And I’m really annoyed that my stuff is what’s being cut out. I know its not as ‘necessary’ as rehearsal dinner stuff, so if something has to be cut, its the unnecessary stuff. And I know I should be dying to self, serving others, blah blah blah. But my mother-in-law has had time to get her hair done and my sister-in-law has had time to get her brows done. Is it really that bad to want the same? Is it really that bad to be a little selfish sometimes?

Sorry. Just needed to vent a bit here. Time to get to work.

Happy Birthday to you,
Happy Birthday to you!
Happy Birthday, dear Little Sister,
Happy Birthday to you!!

Blow out the candle!

  LICK!!!

Hilarious.  We had a great birthday weekend here in our house.  Saturday we went to the zoo for a picnic lunch (our girls favorite Saturday activity!) then out to Lancaster to purchase Little Sister’s birthday present — a tire swing! (updates from the emergency room to follow 😉

Today Big Sis and I woke Little Sister up singing happy birthday (which she loved) and made her her favorite breakfast (chocolate chip pancakes). After church and nap, we had a birthday party with family in the area. Grace was thrilled to get so many Cinderella things. She loved the party and she l-o-v-e-d that cake!! (It was this one from Cold Stone Creamery. Even the adults were seriously considering licking their pieces as well. Yum-o!)

So that’s it. My baby is two. Hard to believe!! She is such a sweetheart — we adore her, love her to pieces and I am so, so thankful that she is in our family and truly blessed to be her mama.

Happy Birthday, Baby!

I just caught Big Sister taking post-it notes (with things written on them) off the desk and throwing them in the trash. When I asked her what she was doing she said, “Cleaning up! I’m a biiiiig helper!”

Well, that explains a lot. Maybe I’m not losing my mind after all……….

day around here today. Cleaned the house, planned more of brother’s rehearsal dinner, got my hair colored, refilled some prescriptions. Wait. Back up. Colored your hair?!? Yup. That’s right. I am now blonde.

(just kidding. I threw that in to mess with the bride who’s wedding I am in next Saturday. Love ya, L!)

My hair is actually a bit darker and ‘warmer’ according to Joy, my personal stylist/colorist. Now the chocolate brown bridesmaids dress will not make me look like death, um poop I mean washed out, but will instead highlight my tan and bring out the color of my eyes and compliment my warm brown hair. My next big wedding-day production? Getting my brows waxed on Wednesday. (so if you see me between now and then, please excuse my bushy eyebrows.) Then on to the mani/pedi. Then to the stylist for my updo, then to get my make-up done.

Now here’s what I am finding funny about all of this:

This is more beauty-related prep than I did for my own wedding. Seriously. There was no brow waxing. No waxing anywhere, in fact. (read this for a good laugh. ahem) I did get my nails, hair and make-up done. But nothing else. No tanning or waxing various body parts or bleaching teeth or hair coloring or whatnot. I was a pretty non-prepped bride. (I believe I did shave my legs, which can get rare. Poor Husband.) Of course I had just graduated school, was unemployed with student loans and was moving to another state, so I probably just didn’t have the cash. (not that I do now, really) 

I’m finding all this beauty stuff fun, but I am incredibly glad that I am not this high-maintenance all the time. Who has the time and energy for that?

I’m running around (like usual) trying to get dinner on the table, Big Sister is coloring at the table, Little Sister is dancing in the living room in her princess dress. I’m mentally making out my grocery list for when I run out later tonight, thinking of everything I didn’t get done today. When I feel something grab my legs.

Little Sis: (looking up) “I love you, Mama. Kisses?”

She’s never said that without my saying it first. That was the first time. I dropped everything, gave her a huge hug and kiss and took her into the living room to dance with her for awhile.

Yup. Its all worth it.

Frugal Fashionista

This is an amazing blog — tells you how to copy fashionable outfits (usually on some celebrity) for super cheap. Includes links to show you exactly where to purchase everything.

This site is so, so fun.

Not that I watch it now. My kids will not tolerate me watching Oprah when there are Princess movies to watch instead. But yesterday, I snuck in 10 minutes while Big Sister was playing and Little Sis was sleeping in.

And I felt nauseous.

The show was called: Ultimate Betrayal: when your husband cheats with your best friend. Yes – a little Jerry Springer, I know, but I was hooked instantly. This was a ‘Christian’ couple struggling with a husband’s affair with his wife’s best friend who was his best friend’s wife.  Yuck-o. We will now refer to him as Slimeball. He was coming off like a real selfish jerk, while his poor wife sat there trying not to cry. I was completely disgusted. Oprah was looking at him like he was something that crawled out of her trash can. Nice. Then comes “Dr. Robin” the psychologist.

She told Slimeball that “All of us get wounded in childhood. You did not create this kind of self-destruction in your life, in your wife’s life, in the lives of your children without a wound starting in childhood.  Who pulled the rug from underneath you? That’s what you’ve done to your family, and we learn that behavior somewhere. … Someone teaches us how to be mean.”
“I love my father, but my father…he doesn’t listen to my mom,” Slimeball says. “He doesn’t respect her. He doesn’t listen to anybody.”
Dr. Robin says Slimeball’s childhood pain is the real ‘cancer’ in his life. That’s what caused him to cheat on his wife. All that childhood pain drove him to have an affair.

Ummm…. WHAT?!?! His stinking ‘difficult’ childhood justifies his cheating on his wife with her best friend while they were all in the same house? He did all of this because of a rough childhood? (which was not that rough, frankly) I don’t think so, Slimeball. Let’s try: “What you did was wrong. You need to take responsibility and get over yourself.”  What Slimeball did was not okay.  He admitted he was selfish and what he did was wrong and he hated himself for it. And here’s ‘Dr. Robin’ letting him off the hook, telling him its not his fault, to blame someone else? Ridiculous. The culture of victimhood strikes again. My love for Oprah just went down several notches.