pomegranatesandpaper

Saturday's Moments

We are cautiously optimistic that The Fiance will continue to be stable and progress towards recovery. This morning everyone is scrambling to take care of those little things that life demands: haircuts, showers, laundry, dr. appointments.

I hope to at least drive into the city with Mr Pom and leave The Princess off at the hospital where she will do her overnight rotation with her sweetie.

I am frustrated not to be able to be with her, but the last thing the need is to worry about where I would sit and if I could walk from here to there.

I am doing splendidly with my new knee. Even my physical therapist said that it was remarkable that it was only my third visit and I was so much better than I was on Monday.

I am filling in my days with working on three journals: one is a large scrapbook sort, filled with tear outs of house ideas and wonderful drawing opportunites; the other is a juicy square journal with heavy paper in which I paint more tear out scenes; the last is my usual daily journal, covered in pen and ink sketches, some watercolors, scraps of paper, glued in cards, etc. It's delightful to have time to work on them all. I keep the journals and portfolios full of tear sheets and glue sticks and my watercolors in a big burlap bag from a home boutqiue on the Cape.

I have two major projects that I have planned to work on while I am home. I haven't touched them yet. The first week I was too much in recovery mode. This week, well, it has been a spinning top and I am not capable of more than getting to p/t, napping, and mindlessly glue sticking pretty pictures and silly pencil sketches.

This morning, all is good. And that is all we can do but stay in the present and notice the peonies have budded, the lavender has greened up, and the lily of the valley is blooming all over the garden.

I may not respond to each and every comment your have left, but please know that each and every one has gone straight to my heart with your concern and care. I am a very strong believer in the power of prayer and I will always be happy to be added to your own prayer lists when you need another voice lifted in support.

May your Saturday be blessed with ordinariness.

 

Love,

 

Mrs. Pom

 

Praying and Waiting

The Fiance had an unexpected health crisis and had surgery earlier this week. On the day he was to be discharged, he developed complications and had to have more surgery.

Please remember him, his family, and The Princess in your prayers.

This morning the sun is shining and we are praying that the sun will shine on them all day.

It Takes A Village

Oh.

No.

I don't mean to recover from a  knee replacement.

I mean to recover from a knee replacement with two dogs.

Forget the network of people necessary to get you to physical therapy and doctor appointments, to bring you meds, coffee, buy groceries, and make meals. Forget the daily phone calls, the patience to listen to me whine about pain/meds/exercise/pain/meds/exercise, and making sure I have clean exercise clothes to wear to p/t.

I'm talking about The. Dogs.

As Mr. Pom so wisely put it the other day, "They're here now. They're part of the family. But what were we thinking?"

Our dogs have become daycare dogs.

I never even knew there was such a thing until about a month after we got Cucciolo. We've had several dogs in our lives, starting with a Siberian Husky named Sparky, whom we got before we were married and who lived until age 17. After she ate the vinyl flooring in our apartment (from the middle out, no less), we started daycare with her. Back then, daycare meant leaving her at my parents' house, where she enjoyed the backyard and playing with my sisters. She was THE sweetest dog we ever had and aside from her natural tendencies to shed cotton balls of fur everywhere, jump fences, fall into swimming pools, and despite our sloth at never properly training her to walk on a leash, she was THE best dog we ever had.

You all may remember our last dog, the Samoyed we rescued from a shelter. We wanted an older dog, but didn't know we were getting a 12 year old dog and her short two years with us were filled with turmoil as she became diabetic, incontinent, and acquired dementia. Phew.

But did we learn? Noooo.

So now we have these two adorable, huge dogs, who require massive amounts of exercise, entertainment, food, and supervision. Well, Cucciolo does. Bella Sera would just as soon lie on the bed with me all day and be fed bits of toast whilst I channel surf. Bella is directly descended from my side of the family. Cucciolo, however, is my son in canine form: highly intelligent, curious, and way too energetic for two old people who just want to pet a dog's head at night and then pass out.

Our solution to Cucciolo v. the long hours we work, is to send both to Doggie Day Camp.  It's vaguely in the direction of where I work, but completely at the opposite end of the earth from where Mr. Pom works, and now that I am laid up, he has begun the Doggie Daycare Commute. The poor  man is getting up before dawn, feeding the dogs, walking the dogs, making me breakfast and lunch, packing a freezer bag with drinks and ice packs, filling a thermos with coffee, delivering it all upstairs to me, then hauling the two dogs to the daycare before they are even opened.

The staff there runs out and grabs the dogs for us and have been so wonderful about our early morn and late eve pickups that I will be baking them a cake (and why shouldn't they be since we are probably the only customers with TWO dogs who attend FIVE days a week). In short, we are Their Best Customers. I could put finally redo our twenty year old kitchen for the amount of money being spent on the two dogs.

 

Why not let them stay home, you ask? Listen to a typical evening after the dogs have been home, even with a dogwalker in the middle of the day:

Us: Cucciolo, stop barking!

Us: What does he want?

Us: OMG, he has all the sofa pillows/shoes/The Princess's dinner/the remote control

Us: What does he want?

Us: Give him a bone/toy/treat/our firstborn

Us: WHY IS HE WHINING?

Us: Take him out/Bring him in/Take him out/Bring him in

Us: Why is he crying??

Us: Leave Bella alone! Now!

Us: Hee Hee, she just clobbered her own son (Bella, not me)

Us: We just want to relax for five minutes!

Mr. Pom: Why am I always responsible for the dogs at night?

Mrs. Pom: Why is Micalangela, their "mother" in college and we are here with the dogs??

The Princess: OMG, I have dog hair on my Manolas! (She doesn't have Manolas but wishes she did)

The Fiance: The. Dog. Ate. My. Iphone.

Mr. Pom: Godammit! I just want 5 minutes peace!

I suppose we could just sent Cucch to DDC and let Bella stay home. She really doesn't need the stimulation like her crazed son does. But I tried that for about a week and as soon as I put on my coat and grabbed Cucc's leash, she would jump onto the couch, curl up in a ball, and refuse to look at me. Heartbreak. I hired a dogwalker who took her to the park each day (so now I'm saving ten bucks a day - woo hoo!) but I was home sick one day when the dogwalker came and as soon as she came into the house, Bella ran into her crate and refused to come out. Nuff said.  Either I had to get a nanny cam or fire the dogwalker. No more dogwalker. And then the staff at DDC, the clever staff, makes sure to tell me each day how Bella and Cucch really love each other, and sleep next to each other, and mainly play with each other...

They even sent me a get well card. From the dogs. With their photograph on it.

Back to hauling two dogs a day.

I am stealthily planting the idea in the head of DDC people that THEY should adopt Cucch as their "mascot". Then I can visit him, play with him, but give up the college tuition we are paying for him to be entertained twelve hours a day.

But then each evening,  Cucch comes home, jumps on the bed, I scream to get him before he lands on The Knee, he stinks of other dogs' unmentionables, and he rolls all over the bed, burying his snout under my arm and then flopping across my stomach with his head up against my face.

Bella jumps up and stares at me until I make room for her, all the while, neither dog is on the nice sheet laid out to protect the new duvet, and soon I am doing the two-handed dog petting routine, making certain not to stop for either or they will start pawing me. Then they hear Mr. Pom open the pantry door where the dog food is kept and both jump off, front legs sailing over me, hind legs hitting my solar plexus, and we begin a new evening.

Us: He's drinking out of the toilet again!!!

 

 

 

 

Easter Monday

I am sitting in my little red and white checked arm chair that we bought about twenty years ago and that has traveled with us from New York to California to Memphis and back. It is tattered and frayed and wobbly and I am always planning to reupholster it, but never find the time.

I remember pouncing it upon it in the store because it reminded  me of the gorgeous red and white checked chairs that Kitty Bartholomew had in her California cottage.

When Mystery Man came home for Easter, he moved it for me from his bedroom to ours. Our master bedroom, small on any day, is now cluttered with a walker, arm chair, ottoman, desk chair serving as side table, extra throws, unpacked hospital bags, a large bag containing journal supplies, yesterday's paper, and the air conditioner that never made it to the attic.

From where I am sitting, however, I have a view of the beautiful yellow tulip plants that Mr. Pom brought me for Easter, a stack of novels waiting to be read, and the TV which is plaing West Side Story.

Micalangela stayed at school as she had no days off for the holiday and only two weeks left before the semester ends (!) I didn't go to my sister's for brunch because my leg hurts, I haven't had a shower, and couldn't get up the energy to take a shower and go out.

This morning, Mr. Pom packed me a breakfast and a lunch, several ice packs, and even went down to the corner to get me a coffee (he doesn't know how to work The Princess's coffee machine). He was so sweet and delivered it all in an insulated bag I have dubbed the "rehab bag".  He will come back in time to bring me to my first outpatient physical therapy session. Here's hoping it is 1) more spacious; 2) has more equipment; and 3) is cleaner than the "exclusive rehab" center I was in last week.

Which brings me to my new career: developing and marketing rehab centers for Baby Boomers. Let's face it: we're all getting older and needing joint replacements and someone should be creating rehab centers just for Boomers. The needs of the elderly are quite different and there are no centers in the metropolitan area for skilled nursing care that are not 99% elderly facilities.

When I check into a rehab center, I do not want the following:

 

• to be weighed on a swinging portable chair within minutes of checking in
• to be checking in and have the LPN in charge not smile and say hello and have the transport driver more concerned with where my room was and if I was comfortable than the admission folks.
• to have powdered scrambled eggs and/or a "hash" or potatoes and refried beans constitute breakfast.
• a menu laden with fried food and creamed vegetables at every meal.
•  dinner choices of (1)hot dog with sauerkraut "side dish" or, 2)lamb stew. (I don't ever want to see those as my dinner choices.)
• no fresh fruit or salad EVER ( I didn't find out until the last day that I could ask for plain chicken or a salad - though depending on the cafeteria, I may not get it.)
•  an environment where every lounge has a flat screen TV blaring and there is absolutely no quiet place to be.
•  to be asked if for my "activity interests", I like to be "around animals", i.e. two birds in a cage. (Dude, if I wanted to be around animals, I could be at home with 2 large ones).
• showers offered only on Monday and Thursday (tough luck for me for checking in on Tuesday, despite the iodine all over my right side, the sticky tape residue, and the hair, oh, the hair!)
• visiting hours over at 8:00 (have you met my husband, the CPA? Have you ever tried to get a CPA to break a rule??)
• LPNs who are allowed to wear excessive after shave, causing the Percoset handed to you at 2:00 a.m. to taste of said after shave
• to see my elderly roommate fall out of her wheelchair when she tried to get back into bed because she saw me get from the wheelchair and back into bed (cause if it happens again, I'll be there long term for the stroke I almost had as I struggled to run out of the room with a walker to find a nurse)

And please, can you at least try to match roommates that has some semblance of age connection? The little lady I shared my room with was over 85 and used a bedpan. In the middle of the night. For everything.

I knew I was in trouble when there was only one other person under 70 there beside myself and that poor guy had fallen and severely broken his leg far from home. He ended up where I was by picking a name at random off the list. We bonded immediately and had clandestine meetings under the din of the TV where we would compare notes about the cleanliness of the rehab room, the knowledge of the physical therapists, and the food.I saw nurses coming by and muttering about us and I think I got out just in time before they transferred one of us to the gulag known as "the other side of the hall".

I really really knew I was in trouble when my questions about how long my rehab would take and other specific questions about knee replacements were met with vague answers. My physical therapist was a lovely young woman, but I sensed her frustration at the crowded conditions and lack of equipment. She admitted later on that they only had a few knee replacments and were mainly all hip and stroke patients.  The rehab room was often a Monty Python or SNL skit come alive, with patients asleep in their wheelchairs, patients who were deaf, and a lot of cantakerous old folk who just wanted to be left alone and especially did not want to march in place behind their walkers.

Now, do not take my issues as a criticism of the motivation, compassion, or intent of those that work there. This facility  encompasses a  a nursing home, assisted living, etc. It is considered the creme de la creme of nursing facilities in our area and I was told repeatedly in the hospital that it was very hard to get into and I needed several back up choices. The problem is that it was for the elderly, period. I never saw any cruelty, mistreatment, or lack of concern on the part of the staff toward their patients. The therapists did the best they could with what they had. I was very touched to see the excitement it caused whenever a patient took their first steps on their own and how hard the therapists worked, with  one hand on the walker, one hand on the waistband of the patients, and another hand (?) on the wheelchair they trail right behind. I really don't know how they managed it!

The only facility around here that I wanted to go to was for "sub-acute and acute" nursing care and the insurance companies won't pay for a unilateral knee replacment to go to a facility above "skilled nursing care".  The occupational therapist told me that the trend now is for Boomers to go home after joint replacement and have therapy at home until they are able to go as outpatient. I honestly could not see myself doing that as I was still pretty weak and feeling sickly until Thursday and it would have meant someone staying home from work to take care of me.

In summary, stay healthy. Seriously. I saw what waits. We can't control all disease or illness, but we can make a really good stab at eating right, exercising, and taking the vitamins and meds that we are told to.

So just do it!

 

 

The Return

I am feeling rather resurrected myself today, as I sit in my cozy living room, hearth ablaze, a quilt on my legs, laptop on my lap, and walker by my side.

Yes, that last part is rather jarring, but it's the truth. Mr. Pom rescued me from rehab today, sparing me from another night in that strange netherworld I fell into, and brought me home with a cup of (decaf) cap and my first bagel in 10 weeks.

And it is so good to be here!

I am too tired to upload pics and write a long, chatty post, but there's many tales to tell. First off, the knee surgery was picture perfect. My surgeon in a genuis whose wound and staples are admired by every health care professional who has occasion to view it. The anesthesiology  department at my hospital are brilliant, and I was indeed semi-awake with a spinal epidural,though I remember nothing but waking to the noise of the joint being pounded into my leg, but don't worry, I couldn't feel a thing.  Next thing I knew, the adorable physician's assistant, Courtney, was bending my numb leg completely in half to show me how well it went, a very surreal experience as I kept wondering where'd she gotten a naked leg to show me as it quite obviously was not attached to my body....

Then the medicine department met me in recovery and inserted an epidural block of the sciatic and femoral nerve, a procedure that took about a half hour, employed futuristic sci-fi type equipment, made my leg muscles jerk up and down from thigh to toes, but resulted in the leg being as numb as a block of wood for over 30 hours, sparing me that much more pain. My family was astonished to find me sitting up reading the NY Times on Sunday and refusing all pain meds...

Until it wore off. And I'll stop there.

Except to say that it was the best hospital stay I've had, and I have had them in many parts of the country. My doctor is the chief of orthopedics and they built him a private suite for his patients. Private rooms, wifi, beautiful recliners, and hand-picked nursing staff that were as polite, compassionate, and personal as anywhere I've been.

And then I went to rehab. Oh, no, no, no.

But I'll save that for tomorrow.

Today, I'm hopefully convincing everyone that pizza is our traditional Good Friday supper, so the shrimp and veggies they thought I'd want can be made tomorrow. I've already watched the episode of Parenthood that I missed and now I'm working on the Thursday NBC comedies. This is my first day back online and I have many blogs to catch up with. And naps. And hugs from my family and kisses to give the best husband in the world.

 

 

Popping In

 

 

Mr. Pom brought the laptop over to the hospital so I could pop in and say, "I'm here, I survived"

 

Going on a computer break until Monday or Tuesday. Actually read the entire NY Times today. Reading, journaling, sleeping, waiting for the nerve block to wear off and the physical therapy to begin in earnest.

 

Thank you again for all the well wishes!!

The Sweet Spot

While I have a little tweaking done to my leg, i.e. they'll split my knee open down the middle, cut the bones in half and cram in a titanium ball and socket, I want to leave you with a little sweetness.

You know it is coming up on Easter. Which means... chocolate Easter bunnies, chcolate eggs, coconut eggs, jelly beans, marshmallow peeps, cannolli, ricotta cheesecake, and cassata.

Oh, did I mention the resurrection of our Lord.

But I have no pictures of that.

(Waiting for lightening bolt)

OK, we're good.

Right now, I am sitting in my bed sucking on sugar free root beer barrels. When I am done with those, I have sugar free Jolly Ranchers, and for a big treat, sugar free Werther's butterscotch. And let me tell you, if I didn't tell you it was sugar free, you'd never know. Fooled Mr. Pom for quite awhile.

Can't help this sugar fixation. I am Italian. It is was what we do on the holidays. So sure as the day gets longer, my sugar cravings start to rise and I begin daydreaming about anginetti (coookies with lemon icing) and ricotta flavored with vanilla, almond, and confectionary sugar, then crammed into deep fried shells. 

Thus, CVS sugar free candy is saving my ass (from getting bigger).

That doesn't mean, though, that a girl can't look. And drool.

 

 

Right out of Grand Central on Saturday, we ran into the mini cupcake store. These are incredibly charming and look scrumptious. Very innovative! And possibly diet-friendly since they are a size of a quarter and cost a buck each. A buck each. Can't afford this, move on!

 

 

Ah, this is better. And who cares how much they cost! They are a little girl's dreams. And plenty of big girls, too.

Welcome to La Maison du Macaron.  Please, ma'am, can I rent a room?

 

And for my addictive personality, it  is a really good thing that I have been on this healthy eating plan for two months. Cause otherwise I'd be broke.

 

So pretty. How many people think Mr. Pom should have this waiting for me when I come out of recovery? Raise your hands!

 

Any Easter table (or hospital tray) would be enhanced by these chocolate mice.

 

Or a shiny silver salver of sweets. And they have berries - fruit is good.

 

Micalangela informed me last week that surgery or no surgery, she'd better get an Easter basket. I could take offense, but I understand. For kids, Easter is the basket. There's no tree, no gifts, no decorations to speak of. There's just a long church service. And chocolate bunnies.

What I don't understand, is that my children don't like "Easter candy". They want "regular candy". I explain that regular candy is for Halloween and movies theaters. If they don't want foil-wrapped, hollow, cheap chocolate then they aren't Christians.  My sister A and I agreed tonight that you just can't pretty up an Easter basket that is full of Junior Mints and Hershey kisses. You got to have Easter Pez, pastel foil kisses,  peanut butter eggs, tiny boxes of pastel malt balls, really cheap jelly beans, and a gumby Easter Bunny.

And that's the law.

 

Waiting

First off, thank you all for your wonderful, funny, and warm comments of wishes of good luck and speedy recovery. It is splendid to log on and have so many people greet me. Makes me feel warm all over and I truly feel your love and support.

The week has flown by as I knew it would. I opted to take last Friday off rather than tomorrow and I made a good choice. I was generally nervous and out of sorts of Friday with too much time to think and too long a list of things to do. I felt much better this week as work was its usual insane routine and I hardly had time to think about the surgery.

Plus, we  managed to cross off so many items from the to-do list. Mr. Pom took up the slack on Saturday, running my errands all over town, whilst I spent the day in the city with my sweet art girls.  Though a few of us had to leave early and one drop out (she traded lunch with us for a ticket to the Caroline Herrera bridal show! Can you imagine? No, not me! It was dear Elizabeth, who now works in the bridal industry. Hey - Elizabeth - you promised me pics!) (Missed you, Ellen!).

First stop was City Quilter, which has doubled its space and  has more fabric and books and even a gallery space. I found some gorgeous woven fabric from Japan and bought a length to make a tote bag. I was drooling over a slubby brown woven Japanese import that another woman was buying. When she heard me exclaim over it as the employee unrolled it to measure her yard,  she quickly told the shop employee to give her what was left on the bolt. And she never even turned around to say, "sorry"! I had to laugh at we fabric lovers' acquisitiveness.

 

 

Isn't this a wonderful felt pad? I was very tempted to buy the kit. I could just see myself sitting in my hospital bed making this.

 

I am going to try to make these adorable eggs, though. Not in the hospital, but maybe in the rehab. '

 

Then we sauntered down the street in the first warm Spring Saturday sunshine. Everyone was out enjoying the weather and we snagged the last outdoor table on 7th Av! And look who we found!

 

 

 We had lunch with BZ and a friend of hers visiting from Texas.

 

Sal had these darling tuna tartare tacos.

 

This is my new favorite meal - so French! A beautiful spring salad with poached eggs. So fresh! So healthful! So sunny!

 

 

The french fries and some amuse bouche donuts were served in these little trolley wagons. Very cute.

 

After lunch, we strolled to a secret location and on the way, found an amazing vintage clothing store. It had stunning items, and lots and lots of inventory: jewelry, straw clutches,  dresses, table cloths, shoes, and more. A customer was at the counter talking to the very tall, very glamorous salesgirl, who was wearing a colorful 1950's sheath and a huge necklace made of fruit around her neck. BZ asked her where she got her beautiful necklace, and the customer, who had a long ponytail, a large baseball jersey, and gold lame leggings, told her it belong to him. Yes, him. I do love the city.

 

As I sniffed around some bamboo purses, which I was sure once belonged to my grandmother, I saw a woman was trying on elegant vintage dresses - frocks, really - for some event she was attending. I wish I had had the time to try some on, but she was tall and willowy and looked ravishing and I think I would have looked like my great aunt Gussie in her 1950's ensemble.

I love vintage clothing on other people, but in general, I can't pull it off. And the prices are absolutely ridiculous. ($90 for a teacloth. Puleeze. I have a trunkful from various relatives who actually gave teas.)

 

 

These, for example. I think they're darling but I would never have a place to wear them and would probably sprain my ankle or at least take a pratfall     down a flight of stairs.They'd look adorable on my dresser, though/

It was a lovely lunch and at one point we all get misty-eyed over the fact that 5 years ago none of us knew each other and but for these two amazing gals, we would never have met and now we all our traipsing around the countryside going to art retreats, spending the weekend learning to show shoe, and just enjoying having friends who will drop everything for an afternoon in the city with friends.

After our unexpected secret detour, which I will show you tomorrow, Sal and I hopped in a cab and went to the Village. We dropped into The Ink Pad, then just wandered down around. After a ten minute wait in line to use the Starbucks bathroom, we strolled down Christopher Street and found a little bakery where we had coffee and talked about Australia and I did my best to let Sal know that if they moved back there, I'd have to shanghai here and she was, in a word, nonplussed. So now I have 18 months to get all sad about them moving back. What will happen to the art girls? Will Art Is continue? Will we ever have last-minute lunches in the city and Thursday night art studios?

Only the future knows. But I do know that my little art life just expanded in a geometric explosion in the last five years and I couldn't be happier!

Tune in tomorrow for more sweetness.

Big Ol' Giant Case of Wup Ass Stress - Sign Up Here!

The older I get, the more junk I haul around.

You would think that as I get older, my needs would diminish. I was hoping that age would bring me a more streamlined lifestyle. Seems I will never be a minimalist, but I am trying to avoid becoming a hoarder.

So yesterday, I sent Mr. Pom to the public library with two laundry baskets full of books. Couldn't stand the sight of the bedroom bookcase one more minute, and in order to transform the double-stacked books and tumbling off the shelves magazines, I had to prune my library.

Now, this is a major project because none of it is in one room. I have a bookcase in the bedroom, three in the upstairs hall, one in the studio, several shelves in the sewing room, and two more bookcases downstairs. My dream is to one day have a library with built in bookcases and all my books in one place.

Mr. Pom reports that he was greeted with much applause at the library because they were in the middle of a booksale. Which, naturally, made me consider - briefly - running over to the library and browsing the sale. I knew if I did, however, that I might be served with divorce papers upon my return.

Now that I actually know what is on my shelves, I am reassured that I have several yards of books to read during my recuperation from the knee replacement. (Though I just watched several You Tube videos by patients who have had knee replacements, and all recommend bringing an Ipod and not books to the hospital, because you will be too drugged up to read.)

I then watched an actual knee replacement surgery video which made me nauseous and reinforced lest I forget the reason why I am a lawyer and not a doctor. Shaving femurs with precisions jigs - euww!!  Now that I am done with grossing myself out and freaking myself out, I am resigned to the passive motion machine that moves my legs after surgery, the morphine drip,  the oxycotin prescriptions, the grueling physical therapy, and the very attractive gym shorts I bought at Target today.

This is all leading to a giant attack of I Need Chocolate, which I haven't eaten since Feb 12th, so I am resisting mightily. Meanwhile, it is slowly dawning on me that I will never finish all the work I should have done before I go on leave. In fact, it is slowly dawning on me that for the 4 days I will work this week, I will be in a daze and pretty much cannot be held responsible for the reports, depositions, emails, file reviews, and tasks that are expected of me.

I have, however, started reading Ahab's Wife (surprise find on my shelves!) and it is very engrossing. We also watched Love  & Drugs on Friday night and all the sex and Jake Gyllenhall's naked body parts made me forget the tizzy I've been in. So perhaps Mr. Pom can rent some soft porn for tonight so I won't wake up at 3:00 a.m.? (Euwww - gross - don't worry kids - we only did it three times and had our eyes shut and were fully clothed.)

Come back tomorrow when I am sure I will be gibbering some more random nonsense at you as I gear up for Friday.

In almost one year, The Princess and The Fiance will be betrothed on Cape Cod. They only had one requirement: the wedding must be held by the water.  So it was a fairly easy task to find a place on the Cape. Especially when The Princess and our family had eaten many meals here, driven past it innumerable times while weddings were in progress, and watched many bridal parties having their pictures taken against a backdrop of vivid blue hydrangeas and a sparkling sea.

I know the picture is a little dark, but it was a cloudy day when we were there last and the entrance hall has high ceilings. The hotel has the understated elegance of a large (very large!) private home and my only desire really, is to see her walk down those stairs in her wedding gown on the arm of Mr. Pom

 

 

 

 

What we love about this place is that the rooms really are decorated like the English country home that we all dream about. The cocktail hour will be held in this room, with its hanging lanterns, fireplace, and embroidered drapery. I can't imagine we'll need more than candles and a string quartet to set the mood.

 

 

 

While you sip your Cape Codder (cranberry and vodka), you can wander out to the wraparound front porch and gaze at the harbor.

 

 

Or take a peek through the telescope.at the fishing camps on the outer beach.

 

 

The Princess and I were visiting the hotel a few weeks for a Wedding Weekend. This is an event new to me (old married of 30 years), a fair where vendors are invited to show their wares.  It was a bit circus-like, but we got some good ideas.

 

 

 

I love this room, although it is too big for our small wedding, but I adore the vaulted, ship-beamed ceilings.

 

 

 

The Princess wants the flowers to be as casual as possible. I think she would prefer it if I could just pick them from our garden and bring them with us from New York.

 

 

 

Personally, I'm considering sneaking out in the dead of night down the street from the hotel where the huge mansions line the ocean drive, the ones whose walks are banked with hydrangeas. Cuttings anyone??

 

 

 

I just love this color combination with the turqoise peeking through.

 

 

 

And oh, my! There were so many freebies to sample and take away! And we both were so good and only had a nibble. Sigh. Better to fit into our dresses!

 

 

 

I'm pretty sure some form of cupcakes will make an appearance and become the new tradition, usurping the role of the Italian cookie trays from my generation.

 

 

 

And there's talk of a candy bar, which will result in the Mother of The Bride being told to wipe the Hershey kisses off her lips for the photographs.

But the thing I am looking forward to the most, is the apres-wedding. Many of the vendors were spas offering their services. While I think it is a lovely (those quite expensive treat!) to have spa facilities for the wedding party to relax in and get ready, I for one am saving my pennies for the apre-wedding visit I will be making to this lovely lady:

 

 

Need I say more??