Home Stretch

I have a week to go before we leave for NY – then a week after that.. the wedding! I’m sure my blogging will get back to normal (whatever normal is) after I return from the honeymoon – – I’m thinking, breathing, eating, sleeping wedding plans these days.. I’m sure I sound like a broken record!

Just got off the phone with my future mother-in-law. My dress is done. Done! Done! Done! I can’t wait to see it. She says it’s beautiful – which I’m absolutely sure that it is. It’s waiting for my final fitting which will be done on the Monday before the wedding. She informs me that Monday is the absolute “NO GAINING OR LOSING WEIGHT FROM THIS POINT ON” moment.

The losing part I can deal with. The gaining part I’m fretting over. The closer I get to this wedding, the more and more I’m having the ‘nervous munchies’. Ah well, that’s what corsets are for, right?

My daughter and I have joint hair/nail/pedicure appointments set for the day before we leave. That should be fun. Then we have shoe shopping to do – – both for her, and for me.

Final meetings with the photographer, caterer and florist the weekend we get into NY (a week before the wedding) – – then it will just be a week of getting Jane’s garden in shape, decorating – – details, details, details – so that in the end – – we can get married, eat some stuff, drink a lot of stuff, go on our honeymoon – then get on with the business of life as a married couple.

We’re arriving in NY on the 16th. Leanne is set to arrive on the 21st – I have to pick her up at the airport in Albany, as IF I know how to get there, but I’ll figure it out! My folks are arriving in NY on the 22nd – they’re driving out from Wisconsin.

On the day of the wedding, we hired a ‘limobusine’ – which is just a glorified bus – to transport all of our guests from the hotel in Fishkill to the location in Putnam Valley – and then back again at the end of the evening.

It seems that everything is set, unbelievably so. The wine was delivered yesterday. All of the various folks providing services have been paid up. The weather is forcasting an 80 degree day and sunny.

Today – as I type, Chris is at the Office of Homeland Security getting his Green Card renewed. When we were on our cruise last Sept. – coming back through customs from St. Maarten – the customs officer took a look at his green card and informed him that it was expired. Chris was one of the ones grandfathered in (pre-911) because he’s held a green card in this country since he was 6 years old. By ‘grandfathered in’ – that means his green card never had an expiry date – – it was valid forever. However, a few years after 9-11, that changed and green card holders, like Chris, now needed to renew their green card on a regular basis, like everyone else.

Somehow, when that changed, Chris missed the memo and luckily the customs officer in St. Maarten wasn’t overly concerned about the fact that his green card was expired and let him back in the country anyways. Now that we are headed to South America for our honeymoon – we decided it might be a good idea for him to get the thing renewed. I’m not entirely sure what… of if… his new marital status means for his eligibility to live, legally, in this country with an expired green card – – but we figured we’d be on the safe side and get the thing renewed either way.

As soon as life settles down around here, he’s going to go for his American citizenship. Though, I know the prosepct of giving up his British citizenship causes him great angst – poor guy. Or can he hold dual citizenship? We really have to look into the whole thing.

After the wedding, though – – one thing at a time!