Family Photos at the Wedding

The big day has come and gone, and Brooks is now a married man!  

The wedding was at our church in Faunsdale, with the pictures taken on the grounds of the church.

I tried to take a few photos of the kids and get a nice family shot while we were there, but children are not always cooperative, and seven-month-pregnant-moms-in-heels can only do so much.  So while I am anticipating some much nicer shots from the professional photographer (especially because Clara was really hamming it up for him the whole time), here are a few shots of my kiddos in their wedding attire.

With Clara and Paul as the flower girl and ring bearer, I really wanted to make Clara a special dress.  This was by far my most advanced sewing project I've tackled so far, but I had a wonderful time making it!  I actually took a beginner's heirloom sewing course to show me how to do the lace work (which I had never tried before).  I'm happy to report that working with lace is not very challenging!

Paul's suit was purchased.  I wasn't feeling ambitious enough to sew a little man's suit.  All I did was hem the pants.

 

The weather was absolutely perfect despite being early November.  We had planned for Clara to be barefoot walking down the aisle, and she was.  She did such a wonderful job throwing the petals.  Paul decided to pass on being ring bearer that day, but Clara performed like a pro.  Thank goodness!

  

As you can see from Paul's expression, he wasn't so sure about this whole wedding thing, and he wasn't so sure about smiling either.  This is the best shot we got as a family.

We came back to the church a few days later, dressed in our wedding attire, and we tried some photos again.  I didn't get any shots of the kids together (that would be asking too much).  But I did get a few good ones.

 Of course by that time we were all trying to get over stuffy noses, so our coloring and our attitude was still questionable.  But picking berries off the bushes seemed to be perk the kids up.

I love this shot.  It's not actually a great picture of Paul, but it looks like he's modeling menswear for a catalog.  If I hadn't cropped the photo some, you'd see he has one hand in his pocket.  (I did not pose him that way... like I could if I wanted to!)

And let's be honest... a little bribery helps every photo shoot!

Resolution: Garden

Happily, my hopes of having a garden this year are coming true.  When I posted about my plans and resolutions, I thought the garden was going to be a pipe-dream, but thankfully I was wrong.

I'll give you a short but happy little tour...

We planted red-skinned potatoes.  (These were planted chunks of potatoes I bought from the store that started to sprout!)  One afternoon in May Clara helped me harvest them.

Of course she tried eating them right away.

Potatoes are such a low-maintenance, high reward crop.  Highly recommended.

"Look at this one!"

For the first time ever, we planted corn.  Clara LOVES corn.  Pat planted a few varieties.  One was Gram's faithful hybrid: G90.  The others were heirloom varieties.

 

 

The two ears Clara's holding are the "Yellow Dent" heirloom variety.  They were the tallest plants too.

When it was time to harvest, (end of May/early June) the G90 tasted 10x better hands down.  Disappointing to me to say the least, as I was really excited about my heirlooms.  The heirloom varieties will keep you alive, but that's about all.  We will be planting G90 next year for sure.

I started four different kinds of heirloom tomatoes from seed.  Below is a picture of one of the tomatoes.  We have them growing on a vertical metal trellis instead of a cage.  (I read an article in organic gardening mag that recommended doing it this way, so we're giving it a try.) 

All of the heirlooms have their own little problems, although the cherry variety is probably the least problem-prone.  (Clara picking the "tiny ones!" below.)

 

She always tries to be good helper!

 

 

 

I also have a row of Zinnias.  These are fun because there is nothing more luxurious than cut flowers in your home. Since they're not in front of the house, I don't care if I cut them all off and bring them in the house!  I plan on planting more summertime flowers as part of the garden next year too.  I'm more and more interested in flower arranging it seems.

Grocery shopping during the summer is really strange.  I almost completely bypass the veggies.  I don't need to buy any!  People must think my family lives on bread, crackers, and cereal though!  Ha, ha!

There's beans and peppers and eggplant to show you too, but I guess that's a post for another day...