wedding blues

This weekend, our dear Michael and Amie got married! For those unfamiliar with these two wonderful people whom we dearly love and majorly adore, Michael is Bryan's youngest brother. Amie has been a friend of our family for years but in the last couple of years, has become one of my closest friends and, before she moved down to Atlanta to be with her now husband, was a weekly babysitter of our kids. Needless to say, she was already family to us, before she and Mike even decided to date. So, we've been counting down the days till their wedding, first and foremost just so we could SEE them again (Atlanta feels so far away sometimes!) but also because it's a really exciting occasion to celebrate their marriage!

Ella is somewhat of a romantic at her ripe age of six and a half. So she LOOOOVES weddings. And Bryan had taken Simon shopping this week to pick out some fancy clothes to wear. He was so excited about his new dress pants, shirt, vest and tie and had been asking me all week if he could wear it. I kept saying, "Wait till the wedding on Saturday! Then you can wear it!!"

Wednesday, the coughing began. Thursday, the runny nose took off. Overnight on Thursday, raging fever ensued. And Friday, I began to get a little panicky that the kids and I were going to have to sit this one out and miss the wedding we've so anticipated.

Friday night was the rehearsal and Bryan and I tag teamed it so he could do the officiating and I could see family and friends for a bit. But Saturday was still up in the air. I monitored the kids closely all day Saturday and the virus seemed to progress. Ella barely got off the couch all day which you KNOW is a bad sign. It was a guarantee that the kids wouldn't be well enough to attend, and with most of our friends and all of our St. Louis family attending the wedding, all hope seemed lost that I would be able to attend as well.

But then, HOPE! I have a wonderful friend named Sarah who I met at the kids' preschool (I'm sure there will be posts to come about their family as our kids love playing together and we so enjoy Sarah and her husband Kyle) whose kids had the same virus the week before. I texted her questions wondering how high and how long their fevers persisted. In the midst of our texting, she offered to come stay with the kids so I could go to the wedding.

Elation! But major GUILT in having to leave the kids behind. Ella was teary and bleary eyed and didn't seem to understand WHY she couldn't just go for a little bit. She had her heart set on seeing them and especially dancing with them. And in all the rush to get ready, Simon didn't seem to get all the information that he wasn't going to be able to go either. (His fever was equally as high as Ella's but he was still bouncing off the wall all day.) As I got my heels on to walk out the door I heard him calling out from upstairs, "MOOOOMMM! MOM!!! I need  you!" Which is usually code for, "I'm on the toilet and could you please come wipe me." But this time, I reached the second floor to find him in his room trying to put on his new clothes. He said, "Mom, I need you to help me with my tie!" My heart shattered. Totally destroyed. "Oh Simo. You're sick buddy and you're not going to be able to go." Oh the horror. The guilt. The tears.

After the ceremony, which was so lovely, moving, beautiful, joyous, etc, I came right home. There was a reception a few hours later which Sarah offered to come back to watch the kids for. But after visiting with the kids, especially Ella, I didn't think I could bear the guilt of leaving them behind. Ella asked me lots of questions about Michael and Amie's plans and if she'd get to see them soon. I told her they'd be going on their honeymoon really early the next morning and they would fly home to Atlanta after that. She began to tear up again and said, "I don't want them to go on their honeymoon, Mom. I miss them so much!" 

But again, HOPE! Bryan made a few phone calls and was able to reach Michael and, joy of joys, Michael and Amie were able to drop by our house on their way to the reception in order to give Simon and Ella a little squeeze. I can't express how special this short 20 minute stop off was to us all, especially Ella. It seemed to take the sting out.

Uncle Michael

Beautiful Aunt Amie and poor sickly Ella.

This made everything right in the world.

 

So now, it's the day after the wedding and the kids are beginning to mend. Fevers are down to low grade and the coughing has let up a bit. And so I'll close this post with some comic relief. Do you notice the severe chapping of Ella's nose in the middle photo? That poor girl chaps like nobody's business when she gets a cold. Her hands go crazy dry and cracked in the wintertime too. For this reason, there is a huge tub of Eucerin in her room. Since she's been sick, she often globs a big mustache of Eucerin on her upper lip but it hasn't seemed to help all that much. So we switched to Aquafor which has soothed and healed a bit more effectively. After we read books and got tucked in bed, I set her up with a fresh box of tissues and her Aquafor within reach for nighttime use. She slathered her nose with it and said quite seriously, "Aquarfor rules. Eucerine drools." And then we both laughed for a solid three minutes. Ahhh....we needed that.