The wedding finally gets put to bed…..so to speak… November 16, 2009

The adorable couple, mossy twigs and lots of candles....

This weekend we had an overdue wedding party for our son and the lovely Jennifer here in Baltimore. For those of you who remember( and the even fewer who care)…he was married in NYC late May, in a small, but lovely garden wedding. But with a small wedding, there are lots of people who don’t get to celebrate with you…so for our friends here in Baltimore who have known my son since he was knee-high or so, and quite a few friends with whom he has stayed close since middle school, believe it or not…we all gathered Saturday for one last wedding hurrah.

Sorry I don't have a better picture....

Remember how I dragged a carload of stuff to NYC to decorate for a party Friday night before the wedding, and then had to drag all that stuff home? Candles, vases, flotsam and jetsam….well, a good part of the flotsam went to the restaurant in Federal Hill too.  I wanted a kind of woodsy, rustic look at Taverna Corvino  on south Charles St.

cypress topiary from Lowe's

So I took birch wrapped candles, birch bark containers (got on after xmas sale last year at Pottery Barn)with evergreen trees in them, lots and lots of pine cones that I bought off of Ebay  from Oregon…sugar pine cones that are HUGE! I love them….and one big, silver Mercury glass pine cone from Pottery Barn.( My family again got a big laugh out of my BUYING pine cones off Ebay…whatever.)

See? Big....

In the tall centerpiece above….I had a tall galvanized French flower container….I put florists foam in it and arranged white Mitsumata twigs(from Nettleton Hollow) that are about 3-4 feet tall. Added some hanging votives…and it looked really lovely…or at least the “artiste”(me) who created it thought so.

Good food( who doesn’t like lamb chops with olive tapenade and unbelievable mac and cheese….oh, and the restaurant was kind enough to order in 2 cases of Natty Boh for my son and his friends-they only carry upscale beers…the Natty Boh was all gone at the end of the night. ), old friends, and family….Jennifer’s fam was there too…a lovely fun evening. But I’m glad it’s over…it was on my mind for a while now…you know it needs to happen soon when you wake up in the middle of the night thinking about it. Now, until my next “worry project” comes along…sweet dreams for me.

Keeping up with the details… May 19, 2009

My wedding detail notebook...

Right now, that’s what my life is all about….keeping up with a myriad of details that are all spinning like plates in the air(no, not waiting to come crashing down-that would be negative thinking)….and hopefully weaving them all together into a tapestry of bliss and happiness. This little notebook in the picture is the keeper of the details right now. One of my sisters-in-law gave it to me years ago, ostensibly to journal about my travels…it’s filled with quotes about travel, the first of which is “The world is a book and those who do not travels read only a page.”  I’ve never written a word in this journal until now, when I realized I neede to consolidate my flotsam and jetsam notes scribbled here and there.  Now, it tells me what I need to do today, what I need to do tomorrow, and the next day and the next. The list of things I’m carrying with me to New York is a little staggering. But I’m like that when I travel anyway…so for a wedding party, it’s just that much worse.

Why, you may ask am I carrying things instead of buying them there? Well, why on earth should I buy a couple of big vases, when I already have two, just begging to be used? And why should I pay a premium for wine in the big apple, plus 9% tax, when I can buy it here and take it? Look, my Momma raised a girl who doesn’t like to throw her money away….and I can’t change now. It’s been hard enough, using caterers. I usually do it myself, but I know in this instance I cannot. But it’s hard, giving up that sense of control.

Deb Weiner said to me, “Well, of course you’re taking it all with you…after all you’re going to a third world country!”….and I realize, anything can be had in NYC, but….I’d just rather take it with me. The thought of a turtle carrying its shell on its back comes to mind.  And the lovely Jennifer laughed at my keeping a paper notebook, instead of something computerized. I just like my notebook, though my computer has done most of the work.

A sea of green graduates..or are they?

Here’s a picture from graduation last Friday….my daughter is down there(and this was only the school of Humanities)! The woman sitting by me had thought to bring binoculars, so I got see her up close while she waited her turn across the stage. Wow, that is a big sea of green. And here is the odd, very non-green thing about this graduation….the kids didn’t rent their gowns, they had to buy these polyester sacks..for about 40 bucks. So, what happens to them later? They are no doubt thrown away. Why on earth, don’t they rent and reuse them? Soooooo wasteful….I’m gonna write a letter of complaint to the university right now!!

And here’s quote from the journal that makes me feel more courageous about everything….by Rhiannon Paine. “Other travelers brave rapids, scale mountains, walk on the moon. I drove across London(NYC for me), on the wrong side of the road, on the wrong side of the car, without insurance, in what began as a drizzle and became a downpour. It may have been my finest hour.”