For Carole...(and everyone else who has faithfully waited...)

Sorry, folks, that it has been so long!

Those last 10 days before the wedding were a little hectic, especially once my family arrived and I felt like I needed to host them on top of accomplishing all the myriad of things that needed doing before the wedding day. But it all got done, in large part thanks to my family´s help and that of the few friends who made it down. Except that our mattress never arrived (it should have arrived a solid week before the wedding), and so the day of the wedding we had to make other plans for where to sleep that night. ;)

The wedding day...hmmm...I think it must be a little bit like when a woman gives birth and the hormones cause her to forget the worst of labor...
I know it was crazy that day, and I felt completely depleted. And I did have one true complete breakdown when I thought for about 2 and half minutes that we didn´t have my wedding jewelry. But when I think about that day, I only remember from about 4pm onwards. My sisters-in-law and good friend did a fabulous job on my hair so that it looked salon quality, and just what I wanted. Everything came together just as it should, found jewelry included, and when it came down to it, although it felt slightly unreal, I was very calm and very ready.

If any of you ever get a chance, you should really experience a Mexican wedding sometime. Although there are many parallels to what Americans are used to, it is definetly a different experience. For example, our invites said the wedding was at 5pm. I think we started a little after 6 - and felt good that we started that early! They have a few additions to the ceremony itself that are really very beautiful - like the gift of kneeling cushions to symbolize the part that prayer will pray in your marriage. And how many of you have played musical chairs a wedding ceremony?! Or any other games that involve the distinct possibility of someone getting hurt, but make you laugh like crazy?

Really, though, it was so beautiful and wonderful. And I didn´t even cry during my own wedding ceremony, if you can belive that! I wouldn´t change a thing about it. A Pastor and good friend from Rochester gave a beautiful word, his wife (who I miss like crazy!) very graciously translated the majority of the service, and our Pastor here did the vows and what-not.

I´m really looking foward to seeing pictures (I think tomorrow!), because I know there were details I couldn´t take in, and because I think the photographer did a great job.

Oh, to backtrack a second, I got really nervous just before my family came that they wouldn´t like or wouldn´t understand Saltillo - it is a whole different world from Rochester. And I so love it here, I wasn´t sure how I´d handle that. And I was nervous about our families being able to connect with knowing so little of each other´s languages. But I worried for naught. If anyone didn´t like it here, they hid it very well :) And somehow our families really connected - a couple of them even want to stay in touch.

Beyond the wedding day, the honeymoon was awesome. We absolutely enjoyed every minute of it, with only a couple of exceptions: we missed our flight and had to leave the next day instead (FB´s brother was using FB´s car to take his sister to the hospital, which had one of my bags and FB´s ID in it); and we ended up having to call in the hotel Dr for some type of infection or something that required 3 different types of treatment and occassionaly make him feel like he was in a hospital or something. But neither of those things slowed us down much, and all in all it was a beautiful week that I wish would have lasted longer.

FYI, the birth control we had planned on doesn´t work for us after all....so we´ve just kind of decided to see what happens. So no one should be too shocked if I end up pregnant sooner than I´d originally thougt.

I know this is getting way long, but its been ages since I´ve written, and I don´t know what I´ll get another chance. SO, if you´ll all bear with me, I just want to give you a taste of what my married life looks like here.

Monday: I cried a little when FB left for work the first time, then cleaned like crazy cuz I don´t think our place ever had been. And started organizing our things. After FB came home for the midday break, I went with him the rest of the day. That night, we discovered our mattress and stove finally arrived at his family´s house, but we couldn´t transport them back to us yet.

Tuesday: Our suitaces arrived from the honeymoon finally, our sofa set arrived (I was so excited - they are so pretty!), I walked our neighborhood a bit looking for a cyber cafe, and instead finding 3 near-by neighborhood stores (kind of like tiny groceries where you can get many of the basics).

Wednesday: I walked 20ish minutes to the supermarket to do our first real grocery shopping, and returned by taxi. Managed to make a meal without a stove still. In the afternoon I walked again to the supermarket to get what I needed to do laundry by hand since we can´t hook up our machine still. Stove and mattress arrived that night, but I´m still waiting for the stove to get hooked up.

Oops, gotta go, but the rest of the week included more laundry and walking 2oish minutes to visit with a friend for a couple hours.

So, alls well. ANd hopefully I´ll settle into a routine soon where I can write more.