Thursday, July 11, 2013

14,610

That's how many days my parents had been married when I took these pictures on their 40th Anniversary on Sunday.
 
This is my math: 40 years x 365 days + 10 leap days.
 
My parents had a small party for themselves on their actual anniversary.  This was right before it started.

My parents "hired" Ian to tend to the bar.  He also bartended at our wedding reception.  Ian seems to help with all of my family's alcohol needs. 
 
Elliott is 362 days older than Max, but they kind of look like twins.
 
Very angry twins.
My mom didn't want to mess around with all of the food, so she had the party catered.  It was yum-yum-yummy.
My mom asked if I would take pictures so before I ate I went around the house and got at least 1 picture of everyone.
 
Steve (my dad's friend since he was 11 and one of his groomsmen) and Kathy.
 
Lois and Jerry 
 
My dad and mom
 
Michael and my Uncle Terry
 
Ed and my Aunt Karen (who is married to Terry)
 
Ian (tending bar) and Elisa.
 
Steve and Kathy's grandson Justin
Richard and Audrey.  Richard is a photographer (he took our wedding pictures) and I just booked him for Thanksgiving weekend to do family pictures.  Eeek.
 
Rosemary and Sheila
 
Pete and Julie 
 
My mom's sisters Kathy and Janis
 
Ginger and my Uncle Gary 
 
Buddy, Eleanor and Max (Buddy and Eleanor are Elisa's parents, Elisa is Ian's wife and Max's mommy.  Is it all starting to click in your mind now?)
 
Spencer, my father-in law Raymond, Elliott and my mother-in-law Jeanne.
After dinner my mom wanted everyone to tell a story of how they knew my parents, or when they met or something about their wedding.  My mom always makes people work for their dinner.

Pete painted this garbage can and gave it to my parents for their wedding.  He painted and gave one to us for our wedding too. 

 
Ginger was not really amused by the stories.
 
My dad gave my mom ruby and diamond earrings and a necklace despite their no gift agreement.
 
The caterer and my mom.  He did all of the dishes too.  It was awesome.
 
Dessert

Remember when I said in the jello post that Michael ate all of New England except Rhode Island?  Well, that's because Ed was there the night we ate it and he jokingly asked for us to save Rhode Island for him.  I said I would.  He was joking.  I wasn't.
 
This is Ed eating Rhode Island.
 
Elliott was getting tired so he needed some Gramme time.
 
And some Grandma time.
 
My brothers called during the party and facetimed on the iPad.
 
Eleanor, my mom and Audrey. 
Richard, Buddy and my dad.  Notice how the ladies are all cozy and the men maintain a constant three foot perimeter?
My mom and dad making a toast using the glasses that one of their bridesmaids made for them that they used for the toast at their wedding.

 
Then Spencer started dictating who should be in pictures with each other.



 
Ed was the last person to leave.  He's a hard partier.  It was about 10:30 pm.
Spencer got ahold of the camera and provided the last two pictures of the night.
 
This is a common look for his self-portraits.

The original plan was that the whole family was going to celebrate the 40th anniversary by taking a big trip together over Christmas.  That has now been postponed for a wide variety of reasons.  We're going to do it next summer.  So we'll celebrate 40 years for their 41st anniversary.  Makes total sense.

Tuesday, July 9, 2013

There's always room for Jello

I had lunch with a friend from high school on Friday.  I had not seen him, probably, since the day we graduated from high school in May 1997.  I didn't take any pictures during lunch because that would have been a little awkward........"Hey!  How are you?  What have you been doing the last 16 years?  Can I photograph you and blog about you?"
 
We had a really nice lunch though. It lasted 2 hours, so obviously the conversation was easy and enjoyable.
 
Elliott napped, Spencer played on my mom's iPad and Michael watched TV while I was gone.  A big monsoon storm blew through Tucson on Friday afternoon as I was driving home and dropped the temperature almost 30 degrees in less than an hour.  It was about 82 degrees when we first went outside to play.  It was actually 79 (!!!!) degrees when we came back in.
It's been so long since we were able to play outside they weren't quite sure what to do.
 
Spencer was pretending to ride Ginger again.  This time he was saying, "let's ride the range, Ginger, let's ride the range."

My mom and Spencer made a triple layered, red-white-and blue map of the United States jello for dessert on Friday night.
 
Spencer ate Arizona and Texas.
Elliott ate Florida, but I forgot the take a picture before I chopped that poor state into little bits.  Michael ate New England (minus Rhode Island, which is a story for another day) and I had New Mexico and California.

 
This was Elliott's first jello experience.

 
He was pretty pleased.
 
On Saturday Michael and I decided that although we love our children we needed an extended break from them.  So we went to a movie, then went to lunch, then went to another movie.  It was delightful. 

 
We were in the second movie when I realized we had not taken Spencer's monthly picture yet.  So we did a little photo shoot when we got home.  This kid is barreling down on age 6.   







 Is it too early to start buying stuff for his party?  It's in 2 months.  I'm pretty excited about it.