she said 'i do'....60 years ago

location, location, location.

For the wedding and anniversary caboose we will remain in North Alabama and settle in at my Grandparents’ carport.  My Grandparents’ celebrated their 60th anniversary on May 26 and that, my friend, deserves a celebration!!!  So celebrate we did.

And what better place to have a party than your own backyard?!  Since they have lived in their country house for more than 50 of their 60 years together it seemed right that we set up there, in and around the house and land that has itself housed countless memories, family, and passers-by.  In less than 24 hours we turned their carport and yard into an informal banquet hall ready for its guests.

the way it happened.

My Grandmother was 16 when she married my Granddaddy [he who was the ripe old age of 22 himself!].  Because she was underage, she had to have a ‘permission slip’ before the judge would officiate.  Since her parents had just moved to Illinois, her Granddaddy had to sign a note permitting her to get married:

The note reads:
'Hildred has my permission to marry.  
There will be no objections by anyone.'
-Joe M. Gray

 Notice that it doesn’t even say to whom she could marry!?  Can you imagine your Grandfather handing you a note and saying: ‘Here you are, little granddaughter; this note is good for marrying the guy of your 16-year-old heart’s choosing.’  I wonder if these come with expiration dates?!  Or if they sell them in coupon books?!  Lol.  They did not have possession of this note until about 7-8 years ago when the courthouse was cleaning out.  I guess they figured that no permission slip was needed after 50 years!

the preparations.

Considering that we all rolled in on Sunday afternoon/evening there was much to be done for the party on Monday evening.  Everyone had jobs to do:

Mom & Dad went to Florence-a 45 minute drive-to pick up a Honey Baked Ham, a Chick-Fil-A fruit tray, miscellaneous items at Wal-Mart, and last minute-needed items at Hobby Lobby.

Aunt Carolyn & Tom headed to town to pick up coleslaw, potato salad, and a few other miscellaneous items available there.

I think the following lyrics by Brooks and Dunn were written with my Mom & Aunt in mind in particular:

You can take the girl out of the honky tonk

But you can’t take the honky tonk, take the honky tonk

Out of the girl.

Or not, lol.  If you know either one of them you know that yes, they did grow up fully immersed in the country but as soon as they both met the city, there was no putting the honky-tonk back in.

Granddaddy, Tom, & Andrew were in charge of collecting tables and chairs and outdoor cleanup:

Grandmother kept things running smoothly in the kitchen:

I glued, wrapped, arranged, and assembled

[and made it through with only a few hot glue gun burns!]:

And I guess Emily thought that since she was the evening's Master Camera Woman she didn't have to do anything to help in the prep:

I'm only kidding; she did help after she was done reading the comics.  And I could not have done it without her!

the colors/decorations.

Emily and I hunkered down in the trailer, ahem, guest house, for the majority of the day to work on the set-up and decorations for the night.  The majority of our time was spent ‘fluffing’ our pre-folded tissue paper flowers for the yard-sized ‘60’.

I cut out the large '6' & '0' and tissue paper flowers before leaving home.  After 'fluffing' about 120 flowers we realized that we were short about 20 flowers!  Thankfully I had packed any and all supplies that we could possibly need in our handy-dandy Rubbermaid bins and were able to make a few more.  I found these DIY flowers online at The Art of Doing Stuff; they were extremely easy to make and turned out super cute!!!

Adhering the final roses to the '6':

                                            They turned out great!

Daddy and Tom took over from here and added campaign-sign stakes to them to stand them up in the yard for a photo backdrop:

 

We also finished up the visual timeline that represented my Grandparents’ life together.  I was very pleased with how it turned out!  Starting with their wedding date in 1951, every 10 years after was represented with a picture taken on or around their anniversary.

 

This picture was taken at my parent’s wedding.  G & G's 30th anniversary was 2 days after their wedding.

We had a video made for their 50th anniversary, commemorating each decade with a song from that era.  Emily spliced the original video with the past 10 years, adding about 60 more pictures that flipped through while David Phelps sang ‘Unchained Melody’.  [The video played throughout the evening on her computer seen here.]   It was perfect!

G & G can and preserve all types of fruits and vegetables in mason jars.  I put a large, pink hydrangea and a smaller, white hydrangea in some of their Mason Jars for the centerpieces:

I couldn’t believe how beautiful the cake came out.  The cake lady matched the paper ware perfectly!

the guest list.

There were about 40 people in all.  Here we are, circled up for introductions and blessing:

GDaddy, GMother, & Aunt C

Jona, David, Aunt Shirley, Olivia, Jill, Brett, Kevin, & Madison

Pam, Uncle Fay, Randy, & Rebecca

Greg, Lottie, Norman, Jennifer & Jeremy

Big Brothers & Baby Sisters

Grandmother T was the oldest of 3 sisters; Aunt Shirley lives about 40 minutes away from G & G T.  We usually get to see her when we are in Alabama; she has the largest collection of McCoy pottery I have ever seen!  Granddaddy T was the youngest of 3 brothers; Uncle Fay lives about 5 minutes from their house, down the road and just past the church!

Immediate family:

EVERYONE!   I LOVE Grandmother's expression in this picture!!!

the venue.

G & G T have worked hard to make their back ‘yard’ beautiful over the last 15 years or so.  Every year there seems to be a new stone structure added to their garden.  All of the stone came from his land.

We gave them this statue a while back because it's 2 little girls and 1 little boy.  Just like us!

 

Dinner in the woods:

The food was DELICIOUS!!!
 

It was a long but very fun day.  We ate a lot, talked a lot, laughed a lot, and enjoyed a lot.  Some of us made it to the end; Granddaddy went straight to bed.  [Seriously, that is his bed when we are there!  Bless his heart.]

I suppose it was too much of this:

Unfortunately the week was cut short for some of us as work and school called us back home.  Aunt C and Tom dropped Emily and I off at the Birmingham airport on their journey home the next day.  I LOVE to fly and was super excited about this part of the trip.  Ha!  We got out of there in the nick of time, too: Mom ended up being sick the rest of the week. :(

 
So long, Alabama The Beautiful.  See 'ya next time!

Congratulations, Hildred & Luther Ray! I love you and hope to make it to my own '60' some day!  [Although, seeing that I didn't start at the age of 16 or 22, I'm not sure I'll make it!  But I'm gonna try!]