Abby Lee

Our friends, Kelly and Scott, provided us a reason to visit family in Connecticutt and allowed my parents a chance to visit Abby in Massachusetts. Kelly and Scott got married on 09/08/07 near Lee, Massachusetts. Jason and I were given to priviledge to participate in the wedding in many different ways. I assisted Kelly by making the cheesecakes for her wedding receptions. She had a tiered wedding cake which you can see turned out quite beautiful. She also wanted individual cheesecakes for her guests. So for the three weeks prior to the wedding, I made 75 individual cheesecakes. She had Turtle flavored and Plain with caramel or chocolate toppings. They turned out really well. So the cheesecakes were made in advance but had to be decorated on the Friday before the wedding. This meant that Jason, Abby, and I flew into Hartford, CT on Thursday afternoon. The flights went OK, Abby got really tired on the second flight and just ended up crying for the last 20 minutes of the flight and then the entire walk through the airport to get our baggage, and then the entire ride over to the rental place, and then the entire time we stood in line. It actually ended up helping us out though. There was a huge line at the rental place and Abby's crying allowed us to be pushed to the front of the line, skipping about 15 people who were really angry. We spent that evening with my brother Jeff, his wife Becka, and their four month old baby, Allyson. She is adorable. I think Abby enjoyed playing with Ally's toys more than actually playing with her but i expect that Ally will hold her own in a very short time period.



Friday morning was spent decorating cheesecakes and putting them on plates and then we headed to where the rehersal was because Jason was going to be playing the guitar for the wedding. I got to babysit Abby & Dakota. Dakota is Kelly & Scott's son. He and Abby are good friends. We walked up and around in the woods. By the way Kelly & Scott were having an outdoor wedding at a state park. It was a beautiful area. After the rehersal, Jason and I went by the hotel we were staying at and checked in. Then we headed out to the rehersal dinner. We were about 20 minutes into the drive before we realized we were exhausted and really just wanted to relax since we had been on the go since 7 in the morning. So we turned around, called Kelly and Scott to let them know what was going on, and headed back to the hotel. Within 20 minutes, my parents had arrived, so got to hang out with them and they got to see Abby. It was a good evening filled with laughter, pizza, and talking about all the people we knew.

The next morning started out with Breakfast at Joe's Diner. If you can call to mind the Norman Rockwell picture of a cop sitting on a diner stool next to a boy...This picture is based on Joe's Diner. I will try and post a picture...we'll see how it goes.

I think I did it right. Anyway, after breakfast we ran over to the outlet stores...Abby got a bunch of new clothes for really cheep. It was a bunch of really cute clothing. Thanks to Grammie & Poppy! At this point we headed back to the hotel so that we could relax a little bit before the wedding. Also Jason could practice, and so that Abby would be nice and settled for the afternoon. My parents had actually come down so that they could watch Abby during the wedding, so Jason and I would be baby free. A nice change of pace. We got everyone settled, got dressed and left a cell phone just in case. My parents had definitely come prepared and Abby had a great time.


When we arrived at the wedding location, we stumbled across the wedding party getting their photos done. Oops. Jason and I headed down to the clearing where the wedding was and hung out. There was a little tension because some people were late but the sound guy finally showed up and Jason got his guitar hooked up. The set up of the wedding meant that I would be sitting by myself but that was OK. I got to take pictures and then cry like mad when Kelly and her dad walked down to Scott. It was really beautiful. Jason was singing in the background. Who wouldn't cry?



The wedding was beautiful. Towards the end of the wedding, I heard a crying that I recognized...Dakota's. He was being watched by Kelly's Aunt, who lives in Iowa, so I thought I would go check and see if I could help because I do spend a lot of time with him. He ended up hanging out with me and not crying for the rest of the wedding. After the wedding, Dakota got in a couple of pictures with his mom and dad, before the rain came. As the thunder started rolling, Jason, Dakota, and I headed to the car. I let Kelly know that we would take Dakota to the reception so that way she and Scott woudn't have to worry about him. This worked out well. We had a car seat, with no baby in it, and our responsibilities were complete!

So off we went to the reception. The reception was a bunch of fun, with good food, good music and a lot of laughter. Kelly has a pen pal from the 4th grade that she still keeps in touch with. Brenda is from Pennsylvania. I had met Brenda when Kelly and I had gone on a road trip a couple of years ago. So Brenda and I hit it off well and enjoyed hanging out that night. We stayed dancing and enjoying ourselves well into the night.


We left pretty early the next morning and headed back to CT to spend the afternoon with Jeff, Becka, and Allyson...and all of Jeff's friends who were over for the Opening Day of Football Party. This meant super good food and Jason got to watch some of the games before we flew home.






As you can tell. It was an eventful weekend but also exhausting. Thanks to everyone for a great time.