Ten and a half years ago...

My little sister, Moreena, linked to Darcy's blog today from her professional blog (under the entry titled, "I Love Me Some Kids"). Before lunch, Darcy had already received 86 click-overs from her aunt's blog. Needless to say, Darcy thought that was pretty cool!

If you want to read a few of Moreena's earliest memories of Darcy, you can read today's entry on the ClubMom site that Reena writes for. In reading through the comments there from today's article, I read that Catherine wanted to see photos of Reena's wedding (May 11, 1996). Moreena responded that she didn't have any of them scanned into digital format so she couldn't post any. Well!.... After SEARCHING through our myriads of photo albums, I finally located photos from that day! I hadn't looked at the photos in that album in years. It was so much fun pouring back over those old photos! For Catherine, I thought I would post some of them here today. (And just for my own amusement, I am posting a few of baby Darcy that were taken that same month!)...

MORENA AND JOERG'S WEDDING REHEARSAL (May 10, 1996):

(When the pastor intoned for Moreena to pass the bouqet to the matron of honor, she passed Darcy's bottle to me!)



PRACTICE KISS!















(A small gathering of friends and relatives back home after the rehearsal supper that night. Grant, myself, Moreena, Joerg, and some of Joerg's friends from Germany all liked Nanci Griffith's music. It looks like Moreena was reading the liner notes of "Other Voices Other Rooms" that evening.)












MAY 11, 1996...THE DAY OF THE WEDDING:

(This first photo is of Grandma and Grandpa with Moreena and Joerg in the doorway of the chapel.)






(Moreena adjusting her shoe as Joerg and I converse. Darcy is dressed in the adorable hat and comfy cotton Baby Gap dress that Uncle Joerg and Aunt Reena picked out for her! I still have that little dress with its matching hat and socks!)



(Joerg looked quite debonair at the reception that followed!)


(Moreena waving good-bye--with two of her and Joerg's friends from Germany--as we drove away for home again.)









LATER THAT SAME MONTH, DARCY WAS A HIT WITH HER GRANDMA'S SECOND GRADE CLASS:

(This was the first in a series of around six "speaking engagements" that Darcy and I accepted that year to inform others about international adoption.)




(Even at the young age of just ten months, Darcy was already falling into her role as a natural leader! Here she is leading the other children in a clapping game!)







ONE OF DARCY'S FIRST BLUEGRASS FESTIVALS:

(It was such a SUNNY day, and I had left Darcy's little hat behind in the hotel room, so her daddy (the bearded one!) fixed her up with a hat that he folded from one of the festival programs!)


















(Ahh...back home again in her own room playing on her little piano!
She still has that little piano...but, I haven't heard her play on it in years and years!)



(Darcy was such a wee, little girl...around 14 pounds at almost a year old. We took her with us to Silver Dollar City that May while her daddy's band was playing there. Back in those days, I always dressed in old-timey clothes to match Grant, so, we dressed Rayna up, too, like a little pioneer girl. We were dumbfounded, though, when several different people approached us as she slept in my arms inquiring where they could buy their own little porcelin doll! Asleep (and dressed in period clothing), some people literally mistook her for a doll!)

(Ahh...now I have half a notion to look up one of the first Silver Dollar City picturs of Darcy so I can post that! A mother's nostalgia knows no limits!)