Goin' to a wedding . . Anna Claire's gonna get married . . .

Why do I stay so behind on my blogging?  I think one reason is because we have been studying James in Sunday School and on Tuesday nights . . .without a "book" . . .using just the Bible and about 6 commentaries . . .so I've been spending a lot of time in the scripture . . .which is a good thing . . .but it doesn't leave much time for writing.  Yes, I realize that was one incredibly long sentence with lots of . . . 's. 

So what is the post about anyway?  Anna Claire and Stuart's wedding!!!  The McKaskles moved to Birmingham several years ago and we became fast friends (as you can see from the recent beach post).  They have twin daughters who are a year or so older than our twins.  After spending several years in Alabama, they moved back to Nashville (and we miss them so much!).

We were invited to attend the wedding of Anna Claire (one of their twin daughters) and Stuart Day.  We were excited that Guy and Phella were also invited because we could all travel together.  As an aside . ..it was a really good thing that we were travelling with them.  Mark had a little heart scare that week and so it was wonderful that Phella drove and that our doctor was in the car with us.  Mark is fine - cardiologist said that he has at least 30 more years on this heart!!  Ok - back to the story.

Phella drove the rest of us to Nashville and we checked into our hotel.  We were greeted with goody bags full of snack crackers and bottled water and chocolate and a cute little book with info about the wedding and places to go.  Mark was greeted by a HUGE picture from our recent trip to the beach.  Hayden and Guy buried Mark in an Auburn chair . .with an empty beer can propped on the mound of sand on his chest.  I didn't have my camera because the battery was charging but Jan had her phone on the beach that day.  She had the picture blown up into a 16 X 20 photo and left it at the front desk.  It was quite funny.

After checking into the hotel, we hurried into the hotel and freshened up and left for the wedding.  I think we "cleaned up" quite well.  It was a 7:00 wedding so we were dressed a little more formally than normal.

The wedding was held at Wightman Chapel at the Scarritt Bennett Center in Nashville.  The architecture in this place is amazing.

After the wedding, we drove to the reception . . .and I left my camera in the car.  I wore new high (high for me) heels and I swear . . .I thought my feet were going to fall off before the night was over.  I found this picture of the venue on the internet.  A full orchestra played Big Band music for the reception.  They also had a margarita machine!!  (this picture is not pretty like the reception - the decorations were lovely!!)  There was also an artist sitting in a corner and she painted the reception . . .during the reception.  After the reception, we had to walk a block or so back to the parking deck . . .my feet hurt so much that I walked barefoot on the nasty Nashville downtown street!!

After the reception, we went back to our hotel and crashed.  It had been a long day for all of us.  We had planned to "sleep in" on Saturday morning, but there was construction going on next door and they began at 6:00 a.m.  The "beeping" sounded like an alarm clock.  I thought it was a garbage truck but the noise never stopped!!  We got up and got dressed and went downstairs for breakfast.  Mark loves breakfast and rarely gets to eat a big breakfast.  He once again had an omelet on top of his waffles. 

After breakfast, we drove over to Hayden and Jan's house.  Isn't it cute???

This is a picture of one of the wreaths that was on the door to the chapel.  So pretty.

Grandmother had baked cookies for Ben.  Since we were right there in Nashville and he is a student at Vanderbilt . . and he knows Hayden and Jan . . .he met us at their house for a cookie drop.  I snapped a quick picture of Ben and Uncle Mark.

Lisa Hapgood and Mike and Cammie Quinn were also invited to the wedding and we all went over to Hayden and Jan's house on Saturday morning.  (the wedding was on Friday night)  Jan has a red kitchen table which I love!!

This is just a picture of some of the cool architectural details on their house.

 I realize that this is a random post . . jumping all over the place!!  I guess that is ok since I'm a middle aged mom :-)  I feel so blessed to have been able to spend time with our good friends!!