Virtual Coffee {25}

Hello dear friends and welcome to coffee. We’ll be enjoying a nice Coconut Cake with Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting today with our coffee, as yesterday was my birthday and I finally had an excuse to make this cake I’d been wanting to try for awhile now. It came out really well, if I do say so myself (recipe scheduled for Thursday).

If we were really having coffee today, I’d tell you I’m still recuperating after my Mom’s wedding weekend in Rome. It was very emotional and beautiful and exciting to be there, but the trip is L O N G! I’ve got a wedding recap post in the making, but I just wanted to start sharing a few pictures with you:

This is my mother, ain't she purdy?!

Her veil was a literal work of art.

The Happy Couple
(please excuse poor quality of picture, not their fault!)

I’d tell you I was amazed at the kiddos, cause they were exceedingly well behaved and patient. They sat relatively calmly through a 12 hour car trip, normally we would make the drive in about 6 hours, but what with the new, more stringent speed limits and the fact that you can’t keep kids strapped in their carseats for that long without a break, it turned into an odyssey. They were wonderful at both the wedding and the dinner the next night, they were friendly and well-behaved and great entertainment both during and after the service, they even managed to walk down the aisle (with me).

It’s funny to see how oblivious children are in what we consider formal situations. During the wedding mass the girl kept calling “Nana” and wondering why her Nana wasn’t going to play with her (her other grandma eventually took her outside for a much needed break), the boy kept asking me in a stage whisper when Nana was going to dance, cause somehow he put together the fact that there was music during the service and the fact that we’d talked about the wedding and I had mentioned dancing so he concluded there should be dancing in church (and there probably should have been, I mean, it would certainly have made the catholic mass less tedious!)

Look at that happy face!

I’d tell you I met my new stepsisters and they were both wonderful women, I wish we had had more time together. It’s amazing how families can get reconstructed from one day to the next, what wonderful opportunities we have to connect with people in the modern world if only we’re willing to take them!

If we were really having coffee today, I’d tell you I’m having a hard time getting back into a routine, getting our activities started for winter and such. Fall is coming, and with it a kind of longing or anticipation for my Houston trip this winter. I’m finally going home, after three years (if all goes well) and seeing many friends from Houston this weekend has only made me more impatient. I’d like to manage to live in the present, to enjoy each moment as it comes, instead I’m both excited about and impatient for a trip that’s not exactly right around the corner. There’s this constant yearning for time to go by faster, for the snow to get here already cause it would mean it’s almost time to leave… But I’m not too happy about these feelings, this is one of my favorite times of the year, the chilly weather, all the festivities, the town fairs that start now, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas concerts and shopping and decorating.

I usually love Fall and the beginning of Winter cause it’s a time of such promise… and now all I want is for it to be over already so I can bask in the Houston heat (compared to here, of course!). I swear, it’s like I’m never happy!

Anyway, I’ll try and concentrate more on the present and less on the future cause the future will come eventually and the present is gone in an instant.

And with that, I’d offer you more cake, and send you off to visit our hostess Amy as usual. Toodles.

Amazingly I didn't manage to take one focused picture of the bride and groom!
(Hopefully the husband did a better job, and I can post some of his pics!)