They're married!!! P and I just returned from freezing (no joke! We're talking actual frost!) Florida. My baby brother wed his beautiful bride last Saturday and it was Fabulous. The wedding (I'm not allowed to call it a ceremony tho, the little man explained that there are too many types of ceremonies, most importantly the kind where people get buried (which are not to be discussed) ;) was so lovely, truly beautiful. I wasn't entirely sure how P would handle the intimate setting, the period of silence, since his last wedding (for Uncle Seth and Aunt Alicia) had found him squirming in the back row and eventually wandering away.... But its over a year and a half later (!) and the five year old sat still, in the front row, quietly watching.
Well, quietly watching... until the intimate gathering began reciting the Lord's Prayer. As people rounded the bend towards the end, the apparently agitated Little Man finally exploded with an "All I can hear is Hissing and Growling!" Oh boy. I quickly shushed and then hid my grin. Because, honestly, he had a point, though, having grown up knowing the words, I had never considered the mumbling quite that way before. This being the Little man's first ever group prayer recital, it was entirely foreign to him. And apparently unnerving :)
He was then watchful for the remainder of the sweet ceremony, only to explode, again, when everyone stood to greet the married couple with applause. "Why is everyone clapping?!" he shouted over the din. Slowly, ever so slowly, he is learning the ways of this world ;)
I had also wondered how the reception would work for the Little Man. Alas, appetizers, mingling and tall glasses of white wine as a prelude to a sit down dinner isn't the typical procession for this five year old's evenings. But he adores his Aunt (the wedding was a technicality to him, she had him at bling two years ago) and Uncle and was thrilled to be there. ( In fact, he had been prepping himself for months. Last fall, after watching his father purchase a sport coat for wedding related matters, the Little Man had requested a similar shopping experience. He picked out the pants, shirt, coat and tie he had envisioned without a moment's hesitation. When the sale's lady suggested a different shirt, he shook his head, adamant in his preferences. Then, sometime between November and January, he outgrew his khakis, leaving only this wedding outfit for Friday's rehearsal dinner. He was bereft. This was not to be worn for Friday, he explained to me (and then Maria.) It was his special wedding attire, and he was prepared to wear it for the wedding and the wedding only. Maria, soul sister to P, adorably validated him. She too had planned a different dress, only to be foiled by a frosty Florida. She vowed to love him in any garb and the little man instantly took to prying his dress shirt off his skinny shoulders. The rest of the rehearsal was an unequivocal success for the Little Man. He bonded with his college age cousin, played with her shoes and stared at the sunset off the boat's bow.)
P (using his "wedding smile" the photographer taught him ;) and his lovin' cousins, Josh and Meg
The reception proved to be the same. He followed both of his college age cousins like a puppy dog, glowing from their attention. Laughingly mentioning his collector's streak, they gave him their candy filled goody bags, suggesting he get Grams' and Gramps' bags, and maybe Uncle Greg's too. And thus went the night. The collector was off, and every one of my brother's friends showered him with attention, and their goody bags. I tried to keep an eye on his comings and goings, knowing that regardless of his perfectly gentlemanlike behavior that he was still only five and not entirely beyond an occasional late night melt-down :) And then, he was gone. I had watched him walk through the crowd with a groomsmen and his wife, only to see the wife return, sans P. I adore my brother's groomsmen, have known them since they were in pre-school, but this doesn't mean I see them as babysitter material (perhaps because I've known them since preschool ;) So I swung around the room, looking to no avail. E joined the search. I checked the bathrooms, under the tables, scanning the too tall crowd for a short blur. Then E shouted my name over the band, smiling, and crooked his finger. I followed him, to the hotel bar. "What?" I asked, maybe a little too wild eyed, as my progeny was still nowhere to be seen. Like I hadn't seen Cash's best buddies huddled at a bar before? This wasn't what I was looking for. Then, the best buddies shifted, and sitting in the middle, smiling, was P. I grinned my way across the room as one of the boys proudly said, "Hey! We taught him how to order a vodka." (See babysitter comment above ;)
While he did briefly dance with his mother after this, he was typically found wandering the crowd, making friends, collecting goody bags. (His grandfather even got in on it, scoring him a large white paper sack for his collection.) He was especially smitten with one of Maria's Aunts and fed her chocolate after chocolate. This planted the seed and he took to handing out goodies to anyone even slightly chatty. As the night grew late, we suggested a departure. "No thanks, I'm busy." And so we were the last to leave the Ritz that evening, the Little Man falling so soundly asleep in his car seat that I was able to not only transfer him to our bed, but to also remove his wedding suit and pony tail, all without him stirring.
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