Readying
Most of my days and evenings for many many weeks have been preparing in some way or another for the wedding. My aim was to have my main list items done by the time my family arrived to help the week before. I thought I could impress them with my organization and planning acumen and then have time left over to show them a good time. I am apt to make things slightly (cough cough) more detailed and time consuming than they really need to be. There are certain details I planned that had to be let go for the sake of my family's sanity and also my own. For example, did I really need to make hanging mobiles of 'I DOs' two days before the wedding to adorn the bathrooms? No.
We were all focused and hard at work the day of install, which was the day of the wedding! I tried to maintain a positive air of frivolity and it worked for the most part. It all came together stupendously considering we only had that morning and early afternoon to do everything since there was a wedding at the Center the night before (X&Y’s eerily enough). Every hour Dad - lightening the mood but also intensifying it - would proclaim how much time we had left: “3 hours left people! only 2 hours left now everyone!” Kate Mayfield, Gordon Bowen, Joe Williams, Bolyn, Mom, Dad, and Tif were focused intently on trying to make it all work helping wherever needed. We even snagged some of the artists to help when they came to drop things off: Skip Arnold, Terri Phillips, Karen Lofgren - all saints. Bolyn had a huge job to get the photos blown up that she’d taken and affixed to the large rolling walls. They all were over-worked and there's no true way for them to fathom the depth of my appreciation for their help - an A-team.
At some point you just have to let things go, because the wedding was going to happen, and some details will be unfinished or relinquished.