A 50th Anniversary Celebration

May 30, 2009 is my parents' 50th wedding anniversary. We were going to throw them a big party at a restaurant and invite family and friends.

Well, ever since my Dad died a little over a year ago, my Mom has sort of been dreading the day. And I've been unsure what to do to recognize the day and make it nice.

We knew we didn't want my Mom to be alone, so we devised a plan and proposed it to her. We thought it would take some convincing but she jumped at it. We went up to MA, spent a few days doing some fun things, and brought my Mom back with us to PA.

We arranged a day of fun. My Dad would want her to enjoy herself. So we spent the entire day having fun doing various activities with lots of friends.

We planned several things, invited everyone to everything or however much of it they wanted to attend, and people chose what worked for them and came and had fun!

We had 25 people get together in one form or another from 11:30 to 9:30 and my Mom really had a great day. She kept talking about how much she really enjoyed it and appreciated everyone coming out.

And we do, too. We don't have any extended family around here, so we count our friends as our extended family here and that's how it felt that day--like loving family members helping to make it special. I'm really, really grateful.

First we met together at our house. Pat and Judy brought a really beautiful bouquet of flowers. It has really brightened our kitchen these past weeks! Peggy brought a sweet card and a jar of delicious jam.


My Mom felt up to it (I wouldn't have done it otherwise), so we all watched a brief DVD of my Mom and Dad telling stories of the old country that Mark put together years ago. It was really neat and bittersweet to watch.

Then we presented my Mom with her gift. We had a really nice hardback picture book made called "A celebration of 50 Years" with their wedding picture on the cover. The book is full of mostly pictures and some words celebrating their marriage through the years.

My Mom loved it and cried when she saw it. In fact, everyone cried a little bit. The company from which we bought it actually sent us 2 and let us keep them so we all shared looking through them and telling stories.



Then our crew went to our local Japanese Restaurant for a wonderful lunch. YUM!

We all went to our local old-fashioned ice cream shoppe next and a couple more families joined us there for ice cream and more visiting!

Then we met yet more friends for mini golf!

Afterward, as we stood in the parking lot talking, I noticed this sign out front. When we called the place about our group attending, they wanted to know what kind of party it was. We didn't tell them the whole story, we just said "anniversary." I guess they wanted to know for the sign. So we went over and took a picture by it while the kids played (well, Thing 1 took the picture). I'm glad Mark's in this picture because he did most of the picture taking that day (thanks, Sweetie).


After our outings, we all went back to our backyard/patio to hang out, eat snacks, visit, talk, and enjoy one another. If you look closely, you can get some sneak peaks at the book we had made.

Yet more friends showed up with flowers . . .

fun and conversation and even some really cool magic tricks . . .

live music . . .

laughter . . .

and stories . . .

This of course inspired the kids to put on a magic show of their own!

All in all, it was a very enjoyable day. I'm grateful for good friends who would be so sweet to come out and help us celebrate the special day.

And I'm grateful for good, loving parents and a celebration of 50 years.