The Royal Wedding

It was Wednesday, July 29, 1981 when I got up at 3 AM to watch the coverage of the wedding of Charles & Diana. I was enthralled by the pageantry, history and beauty of it all. I was so happy for them!

Next Friday, I will again be up by 3 AM to watch the coverage of another royal wedding: that of William and Kate. I'll watch as much as I can, hopefully seeing most of it before I have to leave for work.

My husband Terry and I visited London exactly five years ago. We spent six days there and absolutely loved it. One day, we hope to return. Since I know the streets and have seen the city first hand, I'll be able to get my bearings as the procession heads through the streets of London and Kate enters Westminster Abbey.

I thought this would be a great time to share some photos of our London trip. Some of these locales will indeed be on the wedding route! Others... not so much.

Here is the fascade of Westminster Abbey. I regret we did not go inside, but next time for sure!

Big Ben is right across the street from Westminster Abbey.

Here are some shots of Buckingham Palace and the Changing of the Guard ceremony.

When the Queen's Guards aren't rotating in and out of duty, they're doing this...

... and this. People try to crack them up, but they must remain stoic. A few times, we saw the guards begin to march in place and switch their guns to the other side in hopes that would scare the tourists who were getting a bit too close!

A charming carriage just outside the gates of Buckingham Palace.

Just across the street from Buckingham Palace is St. James's Park. It was SO beautiful, with gorgeous flowers, ponds and birds. A true paradise!

The wedding route will not pass the Tower of London...

... nor Tower Bridge. We decided not to take the tour inside the Tower of London. Jails and jewels just didn't fit into our schedule. Maybe next time. I really would have loved to see the ravens that live on the grounds, but they weren't there when we were in London.

I was surprised to see this statue of Abraham Lincoln in the middle of Parliament Square! Especially since it is a replica of the one we have in Lincoln Park here in Chicago!

We Illinoians are mighty proud of old Abe!

Terry is a huge Beatles and British Invasion fan, so we just had to walk up Abbey Road to Abbey Road Studios.

It was almost impossible recreating that famous shot with all the traffic! The locals must think us tourists are crazy!

Here's a typical pub in London. Such quaint buildings, and many have been in operation for hundreds of years!

There's no better way to get a bird's eye view of London than from atop the London Eye!

Well, that concludes our brief tour of London! If you're interested in the Royal Wedding, check out the links below.

For the official Royal Wedding website, click here.

For a helpful interactive map of the royal procession click here.

Here's a fun 3D imagery of the parade route by Google Earth Maps:

And finally, if you're not watching the festivities on TV, you can watch a live stream on the official Royal Household YouTube channel beginning at 5:00 am ET by clicking here!

Our 14th Wedding Anniversary & Apple Festival

Today, Terry and I will celebrate our 14th wedding anniversary!

This past weekend, we went to historic Long Grove, Illinois for their annual Apple Festival. The day of our wedding, we also went to Apple Festival with our photographer to take some photos at the gazebo there. Sometimes, around our anniversary, we like to go back and photograph ourselves at the same gazebo.

Apple Festival is a great outdoor fall-themed event.

There's rides for the kids...

and ducks to feed...

There's music for everyone to enjoy...

and wine tasting for the adults!

Don't these wines look like fun?

A great gift basket idea!

Pumpkins and hay bales and haystacks were everywhere.

The candy stores were ready for Halloween!

These antique vehicles were used for calliope music...

fresh popcorn...

and the star of the fest... apples!

We stopped for a hot chocolate to take the chill off!

And we both fell in love with this figurine!

We purchased it to commemorate another year together.

All in all, it was a fun day in Long Grove, and a fun 14 years!

Remembering Our Victorian Wedding

June is the favorite month for weddings, so I thought I'd post some pictures of our Victorian wedding!

We got married in October, almost 14 years ago. I wanted our wedding to be as Victorian as possible, without breaking our budget. None of our friends or relatives are Victorian, so we didn't want to impose our tastes too much on anyone.

We decided to add as many touches as we could that would have a Victorian flair. And when I say "Victorian," I use the term loosely, as my theme was based on the 1906 era. That is my favorite year for women's fashions!

We designed programs that were handed out at the church and reception, describing our themes, listing the music and readings, the dinner menu, the reception musical selections, and some fun facts about us.

After the ceremony, we had some pictures taken outdoors at a nearby gazebo. I loved the idea of a gazebo so much, that a few years ago we had one built for our own garden!

The reception hall was very beautiful and accommodating to our wishes. We set oil lamps wrapped in silk greenery on all the round tables. When the overhead lights were dimmed, the glow from the oil lamps was very Victorian!

Our cake was lovely and very delicious! We chose doves as our decoration for the top, because we both love nature and birdwatching.

We had set up an easel with old-fashioned cards describing the different parts of our reception, such as would have been used between the acts of a Victorian play. Some of the other cards were "Dancing," "Cutting The Cake," etc.

I decided to design and sew my own wedding dress. I scoured old photos and pictures of Victorian fashions until I finally settled on the look I wanted. I also designed and sewed our niece Emily's maid-of-honor dress. Our two youngest nieces, Allison and Elisa, wore cute little dresses I made from a pattern. My dress was white, the girls' were ecru, and our accent color was antique peach. The whole look turned out just as I planned!

Terry wore a black tux with tails, a white shirt, white vest and white bow tie. The groomsmen, nephews Joe and Rob, wore black tuxes with white shirts and black bow ties. Very handsome and dashing men!

Did I mention that we had all our nieces and nephews as our wedding party? Since we were older, we felt most of our friends and relatives wouldn't want to go through the whole wedding party thing, and everyone loved the idea of the kids being involved. Since that day, we've added one more niece and two more nephews to our family!

It was an elegant day, full of wonderful memories we will cherish forever!