Here comes the bride… and there goes the dog.

Seeing as the whole spray tan incident momentarily shot my blood pressure through the roof, and provided a wonderful story that will probably be told for years to come, I thought the wedding that would follow would be just as crazy… Wrong.

It was wonderful.

I arrived in Huntsville at 2:30 for the rehearsal/ rehearsal dinner/ pool party. Yes, I said pool party. The wedding party (including yours truly) was wearing bathing suit cover ups and flip flops during the rehearsal, then it was off to the pool. I only have 2 things to say about the rehearsal dinner.
1. It’s amazing how you can have a group of semi-normal adults, but as soon as you put them in a pool with a 10 foot deep end they become the most rowdy children there.
2. Chicken with white BBQ sauce and ribs… feel free to be jealous.

I know what you’re thinking. “A wedding outside in July? Pass the lady speed stick” but even the weather worked out in our favor. It was hot all day, even during pictures, but as soon as the wedding started so did the breeze. The yellow dress, which I had been stressing/ dreading for the past few weeks looked really good (I know I am surprised as you are that I was able to pull it off), next to our brightly colored bouquets of gerber daisies and roses. Everything about the wedding was relaxed and happy, especially the ring bearer. He was escorted down the isle by Megan’s little sisters (junior bridesmaids, NOT flower girls) and laid down quietly by one of the groomsmen; while enjoying a bone covered with peanut butter… did I mention the ring bearer was an 80 pound 10 month old yellow lab named Boomer?

After the vows were red and the “I Do’s” were said, the new Mr. and Mrs. Made their way back down the isle to start their life of wedded bliss. The junior bridesmaids went to retrieve the dog, but there was a little snag in that plan. Boomer was completely content to continue laying right were he was with his peanut butter bone, and had no intention of moving. The groomsmen holding him had to snatch the bone from the dog and handed him off to the girls (who together probably weigh a combined total of 80 pound) but Boomer was not having any of it. He was still very focused on his bone (now in the hand of a groomsman). Not really sure how to handle this situation, the groomsmen looks at me for some reason, and I (in a joking manner) mouthed the words “throw it” to him. I knew that there was no way that this grown man would actually throw this bone down the isle in the middle of a wedding… I was wrong. Needless to say the dog takes off running all but dragging these poor girls with him. It kind of made the walk back down the isle a little less awkward because everyone, including the wedding party, was still laughing.

I know for a fact there were moments that day that Megan felt really stressed and overwhelmed by the amount to stuff we had to get done, but other than that the wedding and reception went off without a hitch. Megan looked so happy and absolutely beautiful, I’ve never seen anyone “glow” before but somehow she did.

The night ended perfectly with the bride and groom running to their car as the guest held sparklers. This beautiful Kodak moment was followed shortly by them having to turn around because Megan left the bag with her cell phone and all her stuff. Haha Blushing bride or not… it’s still Megan

"I'M AN EIGHT???!!!!"

If my life was a reality show, VH1 would be running clips of my day yesterday on “Best Week Ever” and making fun of me. It all started with a yellow dress…

I’m in a wedding Saturday and the dresses are yellow. (not bright yellow, more like a stick of butter yellow) Some of you may have noticed in the past that I am a tad on the fair side (insert sarcastic comment) so when I put the light yellow dress on I looked pretty washed out. So what did I decide to do about it? The only logical thing… Get Lacy to give me a spray tan, duhhh. So yesterday I found myself at her place of business, standing there in a bathing suit getting apple scented tanning solution sprayed on me. When she was done, I thank her and she leaves so I can get dressed, and that was when I looked in the mirror. I flipped my shiz-nit, for real. I stayed calm while at the tanning place while I was asking Lacy repeatedly “Are you sure I don’t look crazy” She assured my I did not and sent me on my way. Now I’m the type of person who needs like 4 people’s opinions before I buy a pair of pants, so needless to say I did not just go home like she told me too. I need someone’s eyes on me who knows what I normally look like and is honest enough to tell me if it looks crazy…. So I call Aunt Sharon. She is not home but she said that she is sure it looks fine and don’t wash it off “because I want to see you all tanned”. See what I heard when she said that last bit was “don’t wash it off because I want to see you look like a big idiot”. I needed some to assess the situation and honestly tell me what they thought so I decided to go to the Mecca of honesty, Uncle Wayne and Aunt Libba’s house. As I pull up to their lovely home I am on the phone freaking out to my mother, (and I clearly had already lost my mind at this point) so without thinking I ring the doorbell sending Barkley into hysterics. This is followed by Uncle Wayne answering the das “you mean, weirder than normal?”…. Now there is more to the story here but it involves asking over and over if they are sure I don’t need to wash it off immediately and talking like a crazy person (probably too fast for them to even understand me) but I’ve already made myself sound stupid enough. Aunt Libba finally calmed me down and told me it did not look strange and I chose to believe her because I love her and trust her judgment… that and the fact that if I looked really crazy she would not be able to keep a straight face.

I am kind of sad because I don’t feel like this story transfers to text very well. It’s things like this that make me want to carry a video camera every where I go. Also I feel it’s necessary to confess that there is more to this story (including me going to see Brittney) but I was trying to save a much face as possible so some chapters have been omitted.


Any who, I am happy to report that every thing is fine now. When you get a spray tan, it is kind of dark but lightens up when you get in the shower and today everything looks fine.

Things to Do

I'm in a wedding next Saturday and I need to get ready... where has the time gone?

1.Learn how to put on makeup so I look semi presentable (and not completely washed out) in the pictures
2. Get hair cut and learn how to do it so I look semi presentable
3. Paint toenails
4. Buy makeup seeing as I am out of some stuff of mine
5. get something to wear for the rehearsal dinner
6. Pick up dress at the alterations place

I wonder if I'm leaving something out

Meredith Clark's Summer Reading List

1. The Bible
2. Beowulf
3. Ramona Forever
4. All books with the words Boxcar Children, Babysitters club, and/or Sweet Valley High in the title
5. The Crucible
6. Six by Seuss (which is a collection of short stories if you recall)
7. The back the cereal box
8. Beth’s blog
9. The news paper
10. Everybody poops
12. My horoscope
11. Are you there God? It’s me, Margaret (to help you get through that tough transition from child to teenager)


If you can’t find something on this list to that you want to read….well then I can’t help you

And now

I'm tired

Are you there fun? It's me, Betsy

Fear is a pretty useless emotion if you think about it. Sure, sometimes a little fear does keep me out of trouble or from getting hurt, but does it also keep me from living? I realized last night that I say “no” to a lot of things just because I am scared of what could happen. I mean seriously, I am only 20 years old and already there are things I look back on not doing with regret.

Some of my friends and I were talking last night about things we were scared of and I figured out that one of my biggest fears is getting old and looking back on my life and being disappointed. Like I said there are already things that worry made me miss out on, so I have decided to make more of an effort to relax, take chances, and do stupid spontaneous stuff while I have the chance. I really want to start trying to live life to the fullest and not worry so much about the rules, all the little things that could happen. I am about to start my junior year in college, isn’t now the time to have fun and do crazy, fun things. I can feel my “time to be a carefree (ish) young adult” starting to wind down and I refuse to let my college years slip by without having a little irresponsible fun along the way.

*So last night I was invited to go do something that I would usually say “no” to. When my friend asked me if I wanted to go all my usual paranoid questions popped into my head. “What if someone gets hurt?”, “What if I get hurt?” “What if we get in trouble”. Then I realized the chances of someone getting hurt were slim and we probably were not going to get into trouble so I decided to go (even though I was scared) and I loved every minute. Now I have a very memorable night with a group of friends that I love, and even if we did get into a little bit of trouble, there is no one I would rather be with… what a great story.

Even though I did not do anything really crazy or life changing last night, it’s a start. So who ever is reading this I am asking you help me to not be so fearful of things. If I start to back out of something for stupid reasons, point it out to me and encourage me to live the life out of every day.

* If you want to know the whole story of last night just ask me.