Hanni

On the 4th of July several families from our church get together to eat, play badminton and watch the neighbor's illegal fireworks display. While Silas was still far away in Pittsburgh (sad face) I was still able to hang out with his family on the 4th. Silas has a sister who is a couple years older than Maggie and her name is Hanni. We were playing doubles (badminton) and Hanni was on my team, so we were hanging out, when she began to share her sweet little girlness with me.

Hanni: You know how when, at the wedding, you're supposed to say 'I do'?

Me: Yeah?

Hanni: Well, I was just thinking, instead, you should say 'You're weird!'

*hysterical laughter on the part of both Hanni and myself*

Silas's sister, Elspeth, is my maid of honor and as such she takes pleasure in teasing me at every opportunity that presents itself. (Not that I really mind, I dish it out too...) Anyways, she declared that I looked like a pig. Hanni took offense at this and immediately declared "You do NOT look like a pig. You look like an engaged person!" Ellie and I laughed over this for a minute, but while we were doing this Hanni rethought her position in the matter. "Actually, " she said, after a short pause "You look like a pregnant person."
Thanks, Hanni.
But the crowning moment of all our giggling was when we were discussing her being a flower girl and she stated that she didn't like the word "cute" and hated when people caller her that. She much preferred "pretty". I remarked that I thought Silas was cute. This was, apparently, the most horrific thing I could have said to her. Hanni's face contorted in shock and disgust. "OH. MY. GOODNESS. DO NOT TELL MY MOTHER!" she exclaimed. Ellie tried to explain that "When people get married they always think the other person is cute." while laughing. "Oh," Hanni sighed "That just CRUSHED me."
Oh, life is good and little children are cute. Sorry, Hanni, not cute, pretty.

Muffiness

I invented the coolest muffin recipe ever today. (Ok, so, really, it's not the best EVAR Because that would be pumpkin ginger muffins, which I can't claim to have invented. But you get the picture. So jog on.) Honestly, they were the second best muffins I have ever made. The entire batch was devoured in the space of ten minutes. (I have brothers. Really. What must you think of me!)

Hannah asked me for the recipe and I'm posting it here since they turned out marvelous and because I need a break from posting wedding stuffs. (My dress is pretty close to being finished, though, and I made a test cake, so more wedding posts to follow soon.)

Raspberry Lemon Muffins:
4 cups freshly ground whole wheat flour (If you use white flour use something like 3 1/2 cups instead)
3/4 cup of sugar
3 tsp. baking powder (Be a health freak like me and make sure it's aluminum free.)
3/4 tsp. salt (I know that's a funky measurement - that just happened to be what I used.)
1 1/2 cups milk
2 eggs
1/2 cup oil (I used grape seed, but olive oil works too. And technically I suppose so would any other oil. But for the record I think coconut oil makes things taste gross and should NEVER be used in food.)
1 lemon
2 cups raspberries
1/2 cup butter (Soft and squishy.)
1 tbls honey (We use agave rather than honey in our home. It's made from cactus and it has the texture and sweetness of honey but doesn't taste like bees.)

Okie dokie pokie - First you mix up the flour, sugar, salt and baking powder in bowl #1. Then in bowl #2 you beat the eggs and add the milk and oil. Make a well in bowl #2 and pour in the contents of bowl #2.

Put the lime in the coconut and shake it all up... er... I mean, mix. Don't over stir it, though, you want the batter to be kind of lumpy. Throw in the raspberries. Now, take the lemon and wash it. You should wash all your produce to get rid of yucky chemicals and germs from the sweaty, pimply guys at Winco. But in case you don't - WASH IT. This is important because we are going to actually use the peel.

Now if you have a micro plane grater, here is your chance to use it. Take up your lemon and grate about 3/4 of the peel off and add that to the batter. (I don't have a micro plane grater so I used a cheese grater. It kinda works. I'm registered for one on Amazon, though :P) Sha... mix it all up. Put it into muffin cups and bake at 400 degrees for 18 minutes. Makes 16 muffins.

BUT WAIT! I'm not done yet! While the muffins are in the oven, brew yourself a cup of tea and start work on the lemon butter.
Remember when I said to grate 3/4 of the lemon peel? Ok, so now you are going to grate that last little bit of lemon peel and add it to the softened stick of butter. Cut the lemon in half and squeeze the juice of half of the lemon over the butter and add honey. Mix it all up.

And here's your yummy muffin.
Add lots of butter. Lots.
Then feed to starving children.
OMNOMNOMNOMNOMNOMNOM!
"Sissy, dis is weally good!"
Forget the muffins, starving children are cute.

Maggie and Me

Today, as I sat at the table crafting various things for the wedding, Maggie came up to me and said a phrase she says alot: "I want you, Sissy." Since Silas and I became engaged her 'sissy' has been really busy doing all sorts of things like shopping in Portland, working on her wedding dress, and addressing invitations.

Maggie doesn't like it one little bit when I can't take time to hang out with her. She's missed having me all to herself like she usually does. Who knows how she will survive after I get married and move away.... So I pushed away the papers that were spilling off the table onto the floor, put away the tacky glue, and let Maggie crawl up on my lap.

"I love you, Sissy." she said. "I love you too , Maggie." "I love you 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 13." she said. "What?" I asked. "I said, I love you 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 12, 14! That's how much I love you." She was counting how much she loved me as far as she could count. I may or may not have got all misty eyed.

"Sissy, can we take some pictures?" Maggie loves the Photo Booth program on my macbook. "Sure." As if I would or even could say no after a display of affection like that. Mom says her personality is just like mine. I think it kind of really shows.






I love this little girl.

The Invitations

I'm excited at the prospect of having the invitations out in the mail by Monday. That is, if I can finish addressing them all and the wedding website is up.

I chose the King and Queen of hearts stamps to adorn our invitations. I think they're lovely.

Details of the stamps.

The invitation, picture and reception card. We're so cute.

Wrapped in ribbon. I designed the invitations and reception cards myself.

All ready to be stuffed in envelopes and mailed to our friends and family.

I'm hand addressing the envelopes. Sadly, I had to smudge out the address, as this is the Internet and such. But you get the idea.

Another pretty inner envelope.

One hundred addressed, stamped, and ready to go. Only one hundred and fifty left to go!

Ach! We're so cute!

Looking back on Fake Crocs and the like.

This post is a part of 20SB’s Looking Back Blog Carnival. What's more, Ben & Jerry’s is awarding free ice cream to lucky bloggers and readers!

The point of this blog carnival is to show your readers how you have or haven't changed since you first began blogging. So here is a post of mine from the first month that I started blogging at this blog. It is entitled "Fake Crocs".

I remember the first person I ever saw wearing crocs when they came into vogue a couple of years ago. She was this very cool lady with freaky glasses who did story time at our library. Her crocs were bright yellow, and they were the real thing because they weren't popular enough yet at that point for people to make knock-offs. I commented to my Mother that I liked them and she said they were the ugliest shoes she'd ever seen. (A statement she has since made many times about my shoe collection...)

I wanted a pair. The thing was - most of my friends were of the cynical variety and immediately condemned crocs as the dumbest invention known to mankind. So for the past year or so I had been fighting with myself about whether or not to buy a pair. I don't have any other shoes like them, so it wouldn't be totally frivolous. Sam is always telling me how stupid flip-flops are, so this would be an acceptable alternative. And besides - I really, really wanted them.

On Sunday I broke down and bought my cheap wal-mart crocs knock-offs. I love them. Take that peer pressure. Nah!

And here is a picture of me rockin' my fake crocs on our yearly camping trip to the Rouge River:

Really, I don't think I've changed that much since then. Except I've gotten kind of long winded. But what the heck. When I talk to people in person I have to be nice and let other people talk. On my blog I shall pontificate at my pleasure.

The Dress

Yesterday, upon hearing that I was going to post pictures of my dress on my blog, my very dear friend Ms. Kari warned me against doing so because then Silas would see them and that is bad luck - which I say Luck Schmuck. In the event that any of you share her fears, let me put them at ease, or not, by letting you all know that I have already shown these to Silas. As if I wouldn't! Pft!

And so, my friends, I present to you, in all its glory, my dress.

I love the way this bodice fits for so many reasons. But I must say that my favorite thing about it is the mismatched buttons. If you look closely you will see that they are different shades of grey, blue, tan, and green, and that they are also different sizes. I'm spending every moment I'm not addressing invitations making lace for the trim. More pictures will be posted upon completion of said project.

The back of the dress, sans bustle. Also missing the three beautimus pewter buttons that go over the pleats that you saw in the above pictures. Again, pictures to be posted upon completion.
Here it is. And I don't really have anything to say about it because, well, what does one say about a picture like this? I said it all in my last post.

The Fitting

Last night I stood there, looking at my reflection in the window as Margaret pinned my my dress on. It was mostly assembled, only one part of the skirt left to make. I was wearing my wicked wedding shoes and my awesome hat. It suddenly dawned on me that I actually looked like a bride. And I started to cry.

Margaret was smiling and jabbering about how awesome/amazing/perfect the dress was. I remarked that I looked something like Mary Poppins to which she replied "Mary Poppins wished she looked this good." I started talking about things we still needed to do to the dress. There was really very little left to do on the dress, but I had to talk about something so that I didn't totally lose my composure.

The dress had gone together beautifully. It needed no alterations - it just fit. I still needed to crochet and attach the cap sleeves and the lace trim for the bodice, sew on the ribbon, add a few decorative buttons and a few pearls. I also had yet to embroider Silas and I's names and the date of our wedding on the inside of the dress. All hand work, for the most part. Something for me to do while I pout about Silas being so far away.

I don't know why, but I wasn't expecting to suddenly be choked up. I have (of course) been reading wedding blogs etc... and I've read about the brides that are like "The first time I tried on my dress I cried because I knew it was the one!" But it wasn't like that. I didn't go "Oh, I look so beautiful." or "The dress is perfect" or "This wedding is going to be so awesome."

It was more like "Wow. This is Silas's bride. I get to be Silas's bride." It's not about the dress, even though it's the bomb. Or the wedding, although the wedding is going to be one rockin' party with dancing and cake and amazing friends. I get to be Silas's bride.

Pictures to follow before too much longer.