Oh My,

I am homesick.

Convention Weekend -- the first one in ten years I haven't been to. Heck, I remember when we didn't even have them every year! I missed that, a lot. Thanks, ALB, for filling me in. It was the next best thing to being there.

I need sparklers for the weddin'.K. wanted pyrotechnics and we compromised on sparklers. Well, duh... You can't ship firecrackers. Don't know why I didn't think about that. So, I called my aunties and asked them to bring the contraband into Pinellas County next week. I must really be homesick if firecrackers are making me weepy.

By the way, if you ever decide to get married and you think to yourself, Hmmm, I think I'll just make my own veil. Don't. Unless you're directly related to Martha or that chick on DIY with far too much confidence in her bedazzle skills, just don't.

Making memories.

Do you ever imagine things? I sort of think it as an active daydream that I direct. Positive thinking with a movie screen.
I did it when I imagined myself winning the officer of goober at Girls State or when I imagined myself opening the rejection letter sent my USC Law.

I've been doing it. I'm trying - hard - to keep focused on things at hand. Normal daily things, work things, life things. The dog does not care that I am getting married but he does want his morning kibble.

I've been picturing myself walking down the aisle.I've been picturing myself dancing my first dance with my husband. Or cutting the cake or putting the ring on his hand or signing my name for the last time on the marriage certificate.

I am so excited.

Kleenex

(I am so on a roll today! Thanks RFT!)

I have loved the Big Couch Kleenex commercials since the beginning. The one with the Katrina Survivor? The one where she says something like, tears do not compromise my strength -- it makes me tear up. I love it. I adopted it as one of my personal mantras.

Okay, well - now there are commercials -- still with the big couch -- with folks talking about their moms. Ugh. "My mom is my best friend." "My mom is my inspiration." "My mom is the most amazing woman I know."

Dude, where's the person on the couch with the three thousand dollar therapy bill that says, "I am finally over my mother." Or maybe, "I no longer blame my mother." Let's have some reality. Not all mothers deserve a hallmark card on Mother's Day. Some deserve a restraining order.

I have not had good experiences with Mother's Days in general. I never could find the right card - even if I bought one or three. Don't even get me started on a present. There were many, in a row no less, where we weren't even speaking on the second weekend of May.

I would like, just once perhaps, for some truth in advertising. I personally like the one about no longer blaming the mom. I am almost, almost there. Almost.

The Yellow Bowl

My mom has a large yellow bowl. As a kid, we used it to make cookies or mac'n'cheese or some other recipe. It seems so simple - that innocent memory of a kitchen item.

I received a yellow bowl from a dear friend. And this past weekend I used that big yellow bowl to make dinner and it brought back so many dear, sweet memories. Dude, it's a bowl. Weddings make you emotional.

Shamed into Writing

Okay, okay... I felt like all I was writing were boring wedding details. Do you really care if I tell you about my family frame project or perhaps the moss pomanders I've created? No. No, you don't. Honestly, at this point - I barely do.

It's twenty days. Wait, nineteen. Ask K., he keeps a better count than I do. And I know that those days will go by in a snap. And then... Then I will be MARRIED.

I'm humbled by all of it -- folks coming together, making plans and traveling. It's a huge celebration and I'm amazed that it's coming together. It floors me.

How many dresses?

I've been taking inventory of my closet recently. There's so much stuff in there -- the gorgeous aqua silk dress with tiny light blue embroidered palm trees? Yup, I love it. But will I ever really fit into a size 8 again? And, more importantly - do I even want to?

I pulled out stuff that I haven't worn in a year... You know, the clothes you keep because there's that one day when you haven't done laundry in sooooo long and there must be something that fits that you can squeeze into and pair with a cardigan or jacket so it's somewhat presentable. (And yes, that was a long sentence. I hope you could follow it).

Goodwill will soon be receiving a large, random assortment of party dresses and jeans. My personal collection of clothing from the last three years --- gorgeous things with labels and then my favorites from Target.

Meanwhile, I realize I need to procure additional summer dresses. A) Summer has already started in Tally. B) This wedding stuff? It requires a bunch of cute dresses: showers, luncheon, rehearsal dinner - hello! Honeymoon. C) I am fat.

So, I've been looking. I thought I had time. Where did the time go? I have no time! I thought the white dress was the one I needed to worry about the most. Yeah, perhaps the most -- but not the only.

Another Wedding-Related Post.

While the Greenville News has disappointed me once again -- can't you spell people? It's K. with a "p." Get a new copy editor - whatever it takes. It's spelled correctly in the announcement (the part that I wrote). But in the photo caption -- they got it alllllll wrong.

We made it into the St. Pete Times. While K. can't stand the St. Petersburg Times, it might just be my favorite Florida news source. It's not owned by a big conglomerate and yet, it still manages to be the tenth largest paper in the country.

Anyway, the thing about being down south in the other south -- newspapers don't take the whole wedding announcement page that seriously. How many engagements were in the Greenville News? At least twenty. SPT -- probably three.

Six weeks from today I'll be a married woman.
wow.