Pre-Wedding Prep

After a week on Sister Ruth's farm in Michigan, capped off by the August 1 wedding of niece Lesley, I have to catch you up!

First of all, I drove up and back, almost 800 miles each way in 12-hour days, all by myself, and "DID IT!" I drove without fatigue or mishap. I felt protected by the God of the Universe. It was amazing.



Beginning that Monday and for the next 5 days, including Saturday, the day of the wedding, we all worked 8-hour days, almost non-stop. I started out cleaning the above 3 vintage windows...followed by the 18 vintage chairs that had been sitting in the barn for months, all freebies from Free-Cycle. They ended up being placed strategically around the farm in lovely vignettes for the time between the wedding ceremony and the dinner hour.




Then I helped Don build the arbor that was such a romantic gateway to the celebration. It took 4 of us to stabilize it and put it into place. We almost ditched the effort until we got it to work...with celebratory lights to boot!

This is what it looked like the night of the wedding (yes, I'm jumping ahead)!

From that point on, I mainly had a paint brush in hand! I stained the 4 Adirondack chairs Don had made and then Spar-urethaned them...two days' worth of effort.

Sister Nancy then needed me to rip seams from the Mother-of-the-Bride's lovely strapless floor-length dress. Nancy is the real seamstress...taking a size 12 down to a size 6. It was the dress Ruth wanted but the only size available. No problem for Nancy! That's what sisters are for! I was happy I could rip the seams.

Can you imagine sitting out on the front porch to resize a dress?!

Look at that dress! Miss Ele-Gant with the groom, her new son. But I digress again, jumping too far ahead....










Then there were all kinds of odds-n-ends...painting this and that for whatever wherever. All stuff I enjoyed doing. Call me the Painter Queen. It must have been the farmer shorts...putting me in my zone.

Don't tell me I can't handle power tools! Yup. Even the screen door needed to be painted, front and back.


Then the atelier had to be cleaned from head to toe. It was the babysitting room after dinner before the kids went to the farm house to watch their bedtime movie, Wall-E. Can you believe this used to be a chicken coop? Now it's Ruth's studio.

By now, we're finally at the wedding-day stretch, working from 8a till 4p before stopping to get ready for the 6p ceremony. Hundreds of mini-lights still needed to be strung all around the magical tent. Can you imagine what that looked like as it got dark?!

Well, imagine no more because here's Sister Ruth's post for the event. I'll share my own post in a couple of days. But for now, I wanted you to see why I went up early to help get the farm ready. It was such a great memory, to have and hold forever.

For the family (and you who have time), here's my pre-wedding album (you can view it at fast speed in the slideshow). We really did work our tails off...and it was totally worth it!