Now, I knew I was not alone in my love and adoration of Marni, a dear friend of 10 years and the closest thing I have to family in NYC; but it was amazing to be part of the outpouring of affection and support for the bride and her deserving groom, Matt. In addition to the zillions of things Marni does for her friends and family on a regular basis, she has been in about 27 weddings and has traveled all over the place to countless others, giving heartfelt toasts, pitching in for all the attendant events, and bringing a level of enthusiasm to all of it that is simply unmatched.
I am so happy to report that, for the past 3 days, nearly 200 people responded in kind. The wedding was beautiful, the bride stunning, and the party a blast.
How did Clio do, you ask? Well, she thought the decorative pillows on our hotel-room bed were pretty cool (until she face-planted and couldn't figure out that she was not stuck, and tears ensued).
She thought her dress (a Christmas gift from Great Grandpa Peterson) was very pretty, and repeatedly said so while rubbing her hands down the front. (My bridesmaid dress was very pretty, too.)
During the ceremony, Dave happened to sit right in front of my place up on the not-altar (I don't know what you call it at a Jewish wedding in a restaurant?), and as soon as I walked down the aisle, Clio started exclaiming "Mommy!" and eventually came up and stood with me for a while. (After Dave took her out, calls of "Mommy" could still be heard in the ceremony for a little while... at one point Marni looked over at me, I think wondering where Clio was and how her voice could possibly penetrate this whole, big room.)
After the ceremony, Clio and I were the first to have the honor of congratulating the new Mr. and Mrs. (I'm the only one who knew how to bustle Marni's dress- and it was NOT self explanatory).
In the cocktail room, Clio did a lot of dancing by herself.
We don't have great pictures, but the videographers and photographers were all over her, so maybe we'll see more in the wedding video?
She also found the heat system (a giant corrugated tube blowing hot air into the space at ground level) to be quite fascinating. She stood in the windstream and let her dress blow around her. She walked up to it and declared the tube to be hot.
See? Weddings are fun when you're 18 months old.
But not as much as when you're a grown up and a competent babysitter is watching your 18 month old at the hotel.
At midnight, we counted in the New Year with sparklers on the deck and fireworks over Manhattan.
Turns out I'm afraid of sparklers in semi-enclosed spaces (who new? must have been all those warnings about the dangers of fireworks as a kid); in putting them out, Dave burned trenches into the rubber soles of his rented tux shoes. (As an aside, doesn't Dave look hot in a tux?)
At 1:30, we made it back to the hotel and collapsed. As any of you pregnant or once-pregnant know, the belly expands at night, and as it was, a feat of undergarment engineering was needed to get me into the dress in the first place; I was unzipped on the bus ride back, and have never been so happy in my life to close the door and take off my clothes.
The law of baby sleeping dictates that going to bed late means getting up earlier than usual, and this was no exception for Clio: despite a week of 8am wake up calls, today she woke at 7; the Daddy gallantly got up and took her to breakfast. I think he knew he had no choice: this is what I looked like:
Okay, so I guess when you're a toddler's parent and pregant, there IS such a thing as too much fun. But not for our beautiful bride (who, when I last spotted her, had taken down her hair and was dancing to Bon Jovi in the middle of an admiring circle on the dance floor), or our handsome groom.
Congrats again, and much love and happiness to you.
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