The Smolder.

Yes.  Hello.  We have returned from the wedding festivities.

On Saturday, we departed at 6:30am.  We made excellent time and arrived at the hotel around 2pm.  The kids were fantastic, I kid you not.  However, when the rehearsal started that night, the boys decided to become not-so-fantastic.

Convenient.

It turns out they don’t like to “conform” or “do things that strangers are telling them to do.”  They weren’t awful.  But they could have been a little more participatory.

I would love to show you all some pictures.  However.  My favorite camera is broken, my cell phone cannot take a decent picture if someone moves, and the camera I had is too advanced for me to figure out how to use it.

Such a shame.

Do y’all remember that Handsome Dude broke his glasses on the eve of our trip?  Well, my handsome Lumberjack was able to repair them!  So, he did have his glasses on.

But then, he broke them again at the rehearsal.

And Uncle Alex was able to repair them.

It’s not Dude’s fault this time.  The new lenses he got are about four times as thick as his previous ones and I don’t think they fit right in the frame.  Anyways, the poor guy just keeps having the lens pop out.  He’s a good little lad about it and promptly brings me all of the pieces.

The wedding was on Sunday at 3 and we needed to arrive by 12 for pictures.  As you can all imagine, this is when things became stressful.

You see, dear readers, it wasn’t easy to be me on this trip. 

No. 

 No, it wasn’t. 

I had the privilege of getting two boys looking like ring bearers, two girls looking like flower girls, and one, extremely uncooperative husband to look like a groomsman.

Unfortunately for him, he was not able to wear his dressy Carhartts for this occasion.

Tough luck, Lumberjack.

Anyways.  When I woke up on Sunday morning, I knew I had a hard day of trying to de-Ruralville-ify my kin ahead of me.

David decided to take the kids down the hall to breakfast while I took a shower.  I got out of the shower and adorned myself with the world’s tiniest, hotel towel.  Promptly after the towel adornment, I received a knock at the door.

It was my mother.  She had found Little Dude wandering the halls and was delivering him to me.

Dang.  David is on top of things, isn’t he?

So, I discreetly pull Little Dude into the room.  He informs me that he wants me to take him to the pool.  I tell him no. 

This displeases him and he begins to throw a fit.  This is not uncommon for Little Dude these days.  I decide to go look for some clothes when I hear the door close.

Yes.  Little Dude opened the door and left.

So me and my tiny towel got to run down the hallway to get him.  And by “get him,” I mean grab his shirt and yank him back to the room before the tiny towel fell off of me.

Don’t judge me, reader.  You would do the same.

Now Little Dude is livid.  Oh, yes.  Livid.  Yet, during his fit, he decides he needs to potty post haste.  However, he is too furious at me still to allow me to assist him.  And he has an accident.

So.  There I am.  Standing in a hotel bathroom, draped in a tiny towel, trying to shush my naughty son, all whilst standing in a puddle of his urine.

It was a moment that belongs in the parenting hall of fame.

Needless to say, I was a bit miffed, oh yes, miffed at David when he returned.

LJ (short for Lumberjack who is also known as David.  Keep up, people!):  What’s wrong?

Me:  Well.  You lost track of Little Dude.

LJ (aghast):  I did not!  I told him to go back to the room!

Me:  HE IS TWO.  You cannot send a two year old to find a hotel room.

LJ:  But look!  He’s here!  See?  It’s all good.

*sigh*

I chose to procreate with this man.  I have only myself to blame.

In the interest of being fair, David did tell me that he was looking for Little Dude and saw that my mother had him. 

Now the beautification process has begun.

I begin to iron, iron, iron while David feeds the children scores of peanut M&Ms.  Daisy Mae becomes ill and throws up while I am curling her hair.  And Sweet Pea cannot find her glasses anywhere.

She hates wearing glasses, so she is on cloud nine.

We made it to the wedding.  Barely.

During the pictures, Daisy Mae asks if she can take pictures with my way-too-advanced-for-simpletons-like-us camera.

I hand it to her and inform her that she is allowed to take 10 pictures.

She thinks 10=900.

So, the pictures I am about to show you are not good. 

No. 

But they are the only ones I have.  None are in focus and most of them are taken by children or David.

You have been warned.

Now, my Dudes did pretty good on wedding day.

I did have to do many, many, “hand checks” with Handsome Dude, though.

Classy.

Nice.

Fantastic.

Precious.

Jason and Alex.

Poor Little Dude.  He had suspender issues.

The wedding was beautiful.  You cannot tell from my pictures, of course, but everything was gorgeous.  They got married in this barn and the decorations were so beautiful.  And I LOVED her dress.  She looked very pretty.

My precious boys did a good job.  They walked down the aisle and “stood” up there the entire time.  They didn’t even need me to perform any hand checks.

Holla, boys.

Holla.

Daisy Mae loves her Uncle Jason.  And Jason and Amy are always kind to her.  And they were kind to her when she stood at the receiving line right in betwen them and helped them welcome their guests.

She even tried to join them at the head table.

Don’t worry.  I promptly nipped that in the bud.

Here is a random picture of me, doing what I do best:

removing unruly boys.

I thought this was a fun shot of Hansome Dude:

He likes to move it, move it.

There were hundreds up on hundreds of awkward, terrible photos on my memory card, courtesy of Daisy Mae and company. 

I think Alex was getting a bit annoyed at her, but was kind to humor her for a bit.

“How YOU doin?”

“I call this one, ‘The Smolder'”

(Name that movie)

Alright.  So, hopefully Jason and Amy will share some beautiful pictures with me.  As you can see, mine are not-so-great.

The wedding was gorgeous and I am very thankful that we were able to be a part of it.

Happy Tuesday!