My sister-in-law Dani was visiting her parents in Salt Lake City that same weekend, so my sister Em and I arranged to stay with her at their house. Dani picked me up at the airport. We got Chick-fil-a and stayed up late watching holiday chick flicks and talking about babies. Sisters are the best. On Friday morning, Dani dropped Em and I off at the nearby Murray Central train station so we could catch a train to Provo to attend Annie's sealing. Dani has never met Annie so she did not go with us. It was a blustery windy day and our hair was flying while we hunted for a ticket machine. When we started pushing buttons on the machine, it said that we could not purchase a ticket at that time. So we walked into a nearby building with official looking people in it and asked what to do. The lady told us that the machines were down and if we were asked to show a ticket on the train, we only had to give the officer the code word "bravo." So we dashed back out into the cold wind and waited for the train, joking about the code.
Em was out of her element. She is a virtual stranger to public transit, always preferring to drive herself around. Small town girl though I be, my interest in visiting big cities mixed with my distaste for driving in them has lead me to ride my share of trains and trams in my life. Em kept worrying and I kept assuring her that we would get on the right train. Em spoke words she has never in her life said to me: "you are in charge!" She relinquished her role as dominating older sister for 20 entire minutes on the train platform and I was as free as a bird, bossing her around, making decisions, and figuring things out. Haha! It was exhilarating! Maybe it was just the cold wind making me breathless and giddy, or it could've been the lack of small children to keep track of, but I think at least part of the carefree feeling was due to our sister role reversal. Em fretted whilst I reassured her, and at last our train arrived, we boarded (the correct one headed the correct direction, I might add), and settled in for the 51 minute ride to Provo.
My parents picked us up at the train station in Provo and drove us the mile or so to the new Provo City Center temple, where we met up with many beloved family members whom we haven't seen in years. Hugs all around! I love how the temple brings us all together. The temple was breathtakingly beautiful inside, with a Gothic arch in every doorway. I sat there admiring the craftsmanship and wondering the entire time what those "pointy arches" were called. The answer was just out of reach in some dusty corner of my brain. A little research later informed me that they are called Gothic arches. Of course! Well, Gothic arches make ordinary doorways into elegant portals, if you ask me. Back to the wedding: Annie was grinning from ear to ear and simply glowing, and her husband was too. Happy happy happy. My heart expanded with love and memories.
After the sealing, we took a few pictures outside. The sky darkened foreboding-ly and out of nowhere it started HAILING! We into a nearby restaurant for a delicious long lunch and good old fashioned family conversation. Then we power-walked a few more doors down to the reception venue to help set up and--of course--talk some more. The reception was lovely with a rustic classy charm. In honor of Annie's new husband (who's from Belgium), the reception was catered by a Belgian food cart with authentic machine gun sausage sandwiches and AMAZING Belgian waffles. My dad drove Em and me back to the train station to catch the 7:20pm train back to Salt Lake City. We had to RUN for it to catch the train! Dani picked us up and we went back to her house for another late girls night.
On Saturday, Dani and I froze ourselves on a brief 3 mile run, then went out for some Kneaders French toast with Em. We had a pleasant day hanging out and caught planes home after church on Sunday. I'm so glad I was able to slip away for the weekend, see my cousin get married, and spend quality sister/family time! I have a few phone-pictures of the weekend.
WINDY! Waiting at the train station. Em did a double-chin pose for fun, and her hair blew onto her neck to make it into six chins! We were laughing our heads off! Em doesn't read this blog so she'll never know that her chins are posted on the world wide web. Muahaha.
A mom and 2/3 of her girls. Crazy to think that the next wedding we all attend will probably be our sister Mel's (she returns from her mission in Cambodia in March!)
Machine gun sandwich and a Belgian waffle with cream on top. MMMM.
I would've taken at least a couple more grainy cell phone pictures, but my phone was having battery issues that day and it actually died while I was at the reception. I mooched most of these pictures off of Em.
Brooke (Annie's older sister), Hadrien, Annie, Em, and me. Cousins! I don't have that many cousins, so this is a bigger deal than it may seem. On my mom's side (the side with Brooke and Annie) I have five cousins, and on my dad's side, I have eight cousins. [not counting cousins' spouses]
Meanwhile, back at the ranch...one week before I left for the wedding, Amber suddenly started using the potty. Like, she stripped out of her pants and diaper repeatedly and actually peed and pooped in the potty. So I put some of Jay's old training undies on her and watched the story unfold. I had been letting her sit on the potty once a week at most for the past two months or so, but she hadn't really cared too much or done much on it. Then she learned how to open doors at the beginning of December, and I could no longer lock her out of the bathroom. I had to hide the toothpaste and the toilet paper. Then she started removing her pants and diaper and climbing up onto the potty (she can even climb up without a stool, little MONKEY). This girl can get into ANYTHING she sets her mind on. Nothing is safe. So many messes. So much destruction. Way more than her siblings at this age.
Amber had ZERO accidents for the first two days she was in underwear. What? Yeah, I was in shock. Then the potty was no longer quite so much of a novelty and she started missing occasionally. Now, three weeks later, we are to the point where if Amber has not pooped yet in the day, we keep her in a diaper in self defense against disgusting underwear messes. But she is still doing an amazing job for a self-taught barely two-year-old. I have learned enough from two vastly different previous potty trainings to roll with it and let Amber lead the way. When I was gone at the wedding for three days, however, Jeff was thrown into the deep end of early potty training without a life vest. I am familiar with Amber's elimination rhythms so if I pay attention I can usually make sure she's on the potty at the right times each day. Jeff was not up to speed on such matters and therefore suffered through numerous nasty messes in my absence.
A certain text from Jeff early in my weekend away made me feel...validated? vindicated? Mostly amused:
Early on in the potty game--note the excited wonder on her face.
Getting used to it.
The queen on her throne--"this is old news to me now," she says.
She likes to climb up and stand on the potty before sitting down / the first car ride wearing undies. "Dude!" Amber said.
Hand-me-down training pants from her big brother.
Breakfast at Kneaders. It was my first time eating there and I thought it was pretty good. It seemed that the main draw is more the "bottomless" part of the French toast rather than the French toast itself. Or, the fact that a bottomless food actually tastes good rather than toxic. It was good. I shared my strawberries with Derek (cute lil nevvy that he his)
Toldja he was cute. Derek is my brother Brad and his wife Dani's son. Somehow Brad and Dani escaped all 3 of the pictures I took, sneaky folks.
