Your sleep schedule is a bit off here, and you’re not sleeping very well either, probably on account of being in a strange place and also as a result of your stuffy nose. You’re waking frequently in the night, and also waking around 6 am. We’ve been snuggling with you and playing with you in bed, and you fall back asleep around 7 and sleep until 9. This is nice for us, but sure has caused us to sleep away the mornings of this vacation. That’s ok though, I suppose that is what vacations are for – relaxing and catching up on sleep. Anyway, we all went out for breakfast then came home and took another nap. Neither you nor I are feeling very well, and so we thought we’d get in a quick rest before the wedding. Unfortunately we awoke with about 30 minutes until we needed to go, so we had a mad dash of getting ourselves ready and then you ready really quickly.

But we made it to the church on time and had such a fun time watching Kim and Brandon get married. Emmett was the ring bearer and was so serious and focused. Then came Alex and, after a morning of primping with the big girls, she looked like a little princess. She dropped all of the flower petals in about the first third of the walk down the aisle, then stopped, and looked around at a loss of what to do since she was out of flowers. She paused for what seemed like ten seconds, than her focus returned back to the front of the church. I’m not sure if someone there prompted her to continue walking, but all of a sudden she sprinted the rest of the way down the aisle. It was adorable.

Before the ceremony started you were a bit fussy and you were very vocal, so both your grandma and your Aunt Gretchen nicely pointed out that there was a mother’s room in the back of the church where we could take you. Your dad took you there and Uncle Matt and Jackson were already there. It was perfect for you two; you were able to play and make all the noise you wanted. I didn’t get to see your interactions, but your dad said you two did great together. He was worried that Jackson would be too big to play well with you, or that the age difference would be too much and he’d be bored quickly. But he had what seemed like a virtually endless supply of patience with you, putting up with you pounding on him and poking at him, and at one point even tackling him. He just watched you and observed, never once getting upset. I guess one learns a lot of patience from having to constantly deal with two older siblings.


Next was the cocktail hour, and you continued to amaze me with your lack of trepidation in noisy, chaotic social settings. Numerous people stopped me because they wanted to meet you and visit with you, and you just took it all in. The party soon moved into the ballroom for the reception, and it was set up beautifully. I was so happy that they’d decided to do the cake cutting and speeches first; I knew I’d have to leave shortly to put you to bed and I was glad we didn’t miss these moments. My favorite speeches were Cousin Ali’s and Uncle Denny’s. They were funny and personal, and of course they both made me cry. Denny talked about when Kim was a little girl, and she liked to pretend that she was a princess. She’d pretend that her dad was her prince, and they lived in this blissful fairytale land. He talked about how now Brandon is Kim’s prince, and his words made me think forward to a day when someday your daddy will be giving a similar speech after giving your hand away in marriage. And of course this thought brought tears to my eyes.