Two dear friends are getting married again in November. I met them two years ago; they had dinner with Hubby and me a week before they were married in a hastily arranged and brief wedding. She wanted to be a bride, to have her dream reception. There wasn't time: not too long after their wedding, they were deployed -- she to Afghanistan, he to Iraq. In the subsequent two years of marriage, they spent a grand total of three months with each other -- not always consecutively. They're both back now and her thoughts have turned once again to the wedding of her dreams.
My wedding day was the happiest day of my life. I owed my happiness to Hubby; but the perfection of the wedding day itself was due to the collective grace under pressure of Sondra, Julie, Mom, Ellen, Anna and Marni. Sondra and I had spent months discussing aspects of the wedding, refining each detail every time we talked. So two days before the wedding, I turned all operational aspects of the wedding to Sondra. In a memorable moment recounted later over (lots of) alcohol, Sondra confessed to informing the reception site and catering staff that any problems were to be brought to her: "If the kitchen burns down and we have to go pick berries for dinner, come to me and we will take care of it! She doesn't need to know anything from this point forward!" The kitchen didn't burn down and we didn't need to pick berries. But I knew that if anything was to go wrong, Sondra was going to fix it. So unlike a lot of brides I've talked to, I actually enjoyed my wedding.
I think every bride should enjoy her wedding day, so I offered to host our friends' reception because I want her to have the party of her dreams. It's karmic payback for the fête Sondra and the girls gave me.
I love throwing parties, so the reception is taking place in our backyard. I'm also insane: I'm cooking for the event.
3 months, 18 days until the event.
I have a first draft of the menu, a few design sketches, a draft schedule, a logistics plan for the backyard, and 17 recipes for Red Velvet Cake (the wedding cake) to test.
It's rocking to me to sleep every night.
Comments