they said 'i do'....30 years ago

location, location, location.

Next stop:  North Alabama.  Leaving my own, Queen-sized bed at the hotel, we headed for the Grandparents' homestead for several anniversary parties and photo shoots.

This past Tuesday was my parents' 30th wedding anniversary!!!  They have never been back to the church that they got married in since their wedding day.  For their anniversary my mom wanted us to all go to the church and have a photo shoot with my brother, sister & I standing in as attendants.  It turned out really well!

the colors/flowers.

For the first time in history, Mom, Emily & I all already own dresses that we felt like would go together well for the occasion.  The guys were the only ones who had to go out and buy something!  [Another history making moment!]  Then we moved to flowers...

Color palette in action

Mom wanted a wildflower-like bouquet to hold for the pictures and something small for us to hold.  You would think we would have learned after our first trip to Hobby Lobby at 7:51 p.m. that we needed to go earlier in the day if we wanted to hammer and haw over all of the choices.  [Those of you who frequent Hobby Lobby know what I'm talking about-that place SHUTS DOWN precisely at 8:02 p.m. and they will take prisoners.  On our third trip at this time of night we actually got called out on the intercom.  Ha!]  After 3 trips like that, we had every size and shape of any and all yellow, white, purple and blue flowers the store had to offer.  To this day there is a huge bucket sitting in our kitchen of unused stems to be returned.

Emily, Dad, & I spent hours rolling our hair; can't you tell?!

Mom used yellow and white daisies in their wedding so it was important to her that she have some of those in our bouquets.  Hers ended up being white daisy, yellow gerber daisy, a yellow spiky flower, white hibiscus, and an electric blue-ish flower.  It took very little time to make after we decided what it should look like.  With ribbon the ribbon that was used on Mom's bouquet, I made Emily & I pomanders, or 'kissing balls' to hold.  I personally think they came out cute!  Although for a minute there I didn't think they were going to actually get made as they were the last on the weekend's long list of the things to create, design, and assemble.

A Maid's duties: airing out & cooling off the bride.  It gets HOT in that dress!!!

how they met.

Mom and Dad met on a blind date!  My mom worked at the same place as one of my dad's first cousins.  [Note that I said they worked at the same place and not that they worked together;  I don't know that they even knew each others' name.  Ha!]  While eating lunch one day, Joyce approached Mom, laid a piece of paper on the table and said 'I have a cousin I want you to meet.  Here is his name and number.  He will be calling you soon.'  I can imagine the look on my mom's face!

Dad called her and asked her out on a date.

They went to Pizza Hut and a movie.

She thought they had a good time.

But she waited for his call...

...and waited.......

...and wait-ted................ 

....my Grandmother told her to stop waiting and move on; he was NOT going to call....

....but 5 WEEKS later....

....he called!!!  Haha!

I'm not sure what the moral of that story is; don't listen to everything your mom says?!  Ha!  Wait, be patient; one day he is bound to set his thinking straight?!  Or perhaps, listen to your heart?!  Like I said, I don't know but I do know these things: thankfully he did call her; blind dates can work; they have made it through 30 years of marriage, 3 awesomely, ahem, challenging kids, several moves, and more rough times than you could count and still love each other.  Praise the Lord!

these are my favorite two pictures of the entire event:

the kiss.

that was then and this is now.

Mom may not be too happy with me when she sees these last 2 pictures but I had to share.  I have always loved a certain picture of my mom on her wedding day.  It was obviously taken just hours before the wedding as there is much wedding prep and hair rollers going on.  I just learned recently that my dad is the one who actually took the picture.  [Yes, that is correct, they saw each other the morning of the wedding.  No superstitions here!  Maybe that's the secret!]  Anyways...on Tuesday morning [the morning of our photo shoot and their actual anniversary] I found her in the kitchen complete with her hair in rollers and complaining of an upset stomach [pre-wedding jitters I presume].  I couldn't resist this opportunity!

May 24, 1981

May 24, 2011