My Wedding Day: Chapter Three

Ah yes, we were to the actual ceremony part of the wedding weren't we!

I got to the front of the aisle turned around to face the guests and the wind immediately whipped the hem of my dress neatly onto the upward curve of the stabilizing foot on the (previously pictured) beautiful brass archway. Luckily we had tucked my veil into the ginormous bow on the back of my dress, so that never became an issue during the ceremony.

My mother, seated on the front row took notice of this right away. In fact I don't think she heard or saw another thing the entire wedding, she was so fixated on the fact that my dress was caught. I seem to remember her making strange gestures toward the wedding party, but figured it was just her way of coping with her middle child and only flesh and blood daughter getting hitched.

So, there I was caught and unaware.

The ceremony could have gone without a hitch, but, it didn't. While mild in comparison to previous and upcoming debacles, a hitch it was. The main problem (other than the wind and no one hearing a single word we said) was the ring portion of the program.

For some odd reason, that I cannot justify even to this day, we gave the job of ring bearer to my husbands youngest sister, an adorable little rough and tumble tomboy age 5. ( The flower girl job went to her equally adorable girly girl sister age 7.)
It all made sense at the time!
You know, adorable cuteness on each side of the wedding party to create visual balance.
They both seemed to have reservations about being in the wedding.
The younger because she would actually have to wear a dress and brush her hair, and the older because the dress was green and not purple. I left the job of dealing with that whole mess to their Mom. ( Still don't know what she bribed them with to make it all happen!)
Both of them ended up fighting their own battles with my children in each of their weddings so I guess we are even.

I have to throw in a photo here.

As you can see, the wind is blowing...a recurring theme. And there, my readers is my little sister in law.
Oh, I have so much I could tell you about her as a child, but am choosing to keep it to myself because she likes me right now and I wanna keep it that way. Especially since she is coming over this afternoon to help me with my children, who by the way are so similar to her in soooo many ways. Sigh, good memories!

She seemed to take her job pretty seriously and worked hard despite her inane nature for destruction and dirt to keep the rings safely on the pillow until they were needed.
Little did I know, she probably could have ridden on the back of a tractor with that little pillow tied to a rope dangling off of the back and they would have still been attached.
Whoever had the job of tying the rings on must have known her all too well and tied them on tight!!
I am fairly certain that the ceremony doubled its time just in ring removal.
Ok, maybe it wasn't that bad, but instead of a gentle tug, it took the maid of honor and the preacher to remove one ring, and in turn the best man and the preacher to remove the other.

Of course the ring did not go smoothly onto my dear husbands finger, but stopped at the first knuckle, drawing a chuckle from any guest who was close enough to see that. I think he encouraged it all the way onto his finger, but I don't recall when that was.

Meanwhile, still on the ranch. My mother is about to go into apoplexy with her attempts to draw someones attention to the fact that my dress was caught. I know she had slow motion visions of me stepping away and carrying the arch along with me, or dumping it over onto my head, or knocking out the preacher, or taking out my maid of honor. Who knows the number of scenarios she had cooked up by that time.

Somehow though, she must have made it clear to the preacher because during our "you may kiss the bride" kiss, he leaned over and tugged my dress free.
I was still clueless!

We made it through, sealed it with a kiss, were pronounced man and wife and headed down the aisle hand in hand to the absolutely perfect music I had chosen for this moment in time.

Well, that was what was supposed to have happened anyway...

...to be continued!

Elusive fish

I am fairly certain that most of you won't care a hoot about my fish.
But, seeing as how it "pond life in my backyard" is right there under the title I decided I better throw a bit of that in while you are waiting for chapter three of the wedding saga.
I promise I am working on it!!

I must admit that I have a love/ hate relationship with my fish.

Here is the deal, for some strange reason I have an unreasonable fear of fish.
(I am assuming it was because I was viciously attacked by fish in my youth, but I am not willing to pay for an in-depth psychological analysis to find out for certain.)
Looking at them scares me a bit.
I know this is a personal oddity.
It must have been a really vicious attack!

On the other hand they are so fantastic to look at!
This may strike you as a bit of a conundrum...so be it!
Going to an aquarium is practically a life threatening adventure for me because I find myself equally horrified and fascinated with the glorious variety of fish and all of their colorful variance.

In an effort to feel less anxiety with fish, I try to be friendly with mine in the backyard.
Are you laughing at me?
I think I hear you sniggering!
That is okay, I have a strong constitution and can handle it.
Yes, I go out and feed them and try not to look them in the eye, because that really creeps me out...when they look at me...in the eye...shudder!

I am highly dissatisfied with my current camera and find myself taking shot after shot of my fish that look like this...
nice huh???

They are just so fast. That, combined with the delay on the digital camera make for frustrating picture taking situations.

This is a fairly new batch of fish which we got at the end of this last summer, as the other ones all got eaten or died. That is a whole 'nother post all its own!
These fish didn't seem to have the knack of coming to the surface when I approached to feed them, but have acquired it mysteriously just this week. It must be something deep within them, like salmon returning to spawn or something. Yeah, something like that.

So, I got the bright idea (duh) to shoot a little video and thereby escape the frustration of yet another missing fish photo!
I walked out, they came over to see me...nice fishey fishey, don't look at me as I get really close to video you in your natural habitat.

We currently have 10 fish.
Eight of these are from a chain store and cost .23c apiece with an average length of one and a half inches upon purchase. Most of these have no readily distinguishable features, but upon inspection a few have a couple of visual treasures to discover. I can't help but love the little white one with his orange helmet. He is usually one of the last to rise to the surface and I find myself waiting to see him before I leave to get on with my day.

Two of these fish came from a specialty store and cost more than I am willing to mention in a post about someone who fears fish. I chose to pay more for these as they were larger than an inch and a half and I was still in mourning of the good sized, recently deceased fish I had cultivated a liking for!!
One is a large greedy gray and white beauty which has a few orange spots, so that he is color coordinated with the other members of his family.
Another is a large orange one with a white underside and a beautiful swishy tail.

Here is their internet debut. It is kind of boring...but if this year is anything like last year, you will be hearing quite a bit about my fish and will need to have a ready reference!!



Did you hear that splash near the middle?
It was the large grey one trying his best to scare me.

He did.

I will have to work up the courage to go out there again!
Kidding,

I am kidding...



kind of.