i am getting married!

on May 24.

I just got the email from Dad showing confirmation of our reservation of the park. It's pretty exciting. And all of a sudden I am full of inspiration again, like I was when we first got engaged. There was awhile in there, waiting for Jamie's job situation to get worked out and all, that I felt like I had figured things out as far as I could. For the wedding, I mean, not the marriage. The one that we shall be will be a work in progress for all of life as much as the one I now am is, I should think. But that's the beauty of it! Jamie and I were just reading about how we don't know all the working that God does, just as we don't know how he created the universe. It's in Ecclesiastes 11, I think. And we said, "that's the beauty of it! Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today, and forever. He is always working." And He is always working in us. As the Newsboys would say (in our father-daughter dance song!) "To have found You, and still be looking for You, is the soul's paradox of love; You fill my cup, I lift it up for more."

Anyway. I had the bridesmaids' dresses picked out, I had my gown, I had my bouquet and all planned, I knew where we were going to have it,I knew the music, I felt done. But in an incomplete way. Like there was more I should know and I was just uninspired. Not as in I lost interest in the wedding, as in there were no ideas pouring out of me like before. And then there was the shoe fiasco...but let's not go there.

But then. We set a date. We went to the park, Dad booked it. And now I have ideas again! I hired a florist in my friend Jess because I want to have a lot of control but I also want to have a professional's eye on it, and now all of a sudden more flower ideas are coming to me. There's a little bridge next to our ceremony that just begs to be all wrapped in flowers. And for the church, for the reception- I think I want two big tall arrangements at the front and probably very little else. With apple branches. Jess will have to help me with that. And all these possibilities started occurring to me about the cake. So I have to talk to Megan about that. Big doves? Little doves? Fountain? Pearls? Stencil? Piping? Sugarpaste? Color? Originally I had thought the cake would be fairly simple, but then Megan said, "It's a work of art! I need you to give me some inspiration here!" and I started looking through magazines and seeing pictures and getting ideas, and now I can imagine it elaborately elegant. And I finally figured out how to do the centerpieces!

It just feels like it's all finally coming together. I just need an after-party site, some hoodlums to man cameras, a photographer...and some preparations for actual marriage, not the wedding. But it's going to be amazing. There isn't a bit of this relationship or the wedding that isn't dripping with meaning. Truly, my cup runs over.

So what can I say? I'm excited!