Morjes!

Welcome to my blog. I write about fitting in, sticking out, and missing the motherland as a serial foreigner.

Flashback Friday: When Bridget & Jeremy got married

Jeremy and I were married on November 20, 2001, which makes today our eighth anniversary. Here are some random, non-sentimental memories for you.

It was the Tuesday before Thanksgiving. We both took a week off of school and work to fly up to Portland and get married here (The Portland Temple of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints):



I remember not being nervous, not at all. Not the night before, not the morning of, and not in the few precious minutes Jeremy and I spent together sitting on a couch in a beautiful room in the temple before walking to the room where the wedding took place.

I was slightly appalled when, a little while after the ceremony, one of the elderly temple workers WHITED OUT my maiden name on my temple recommend card to write in my new married name.



As I was getting ready to walk out of the temple with Jeremy and greet the wedding party, some blessed soul was driving frantically across town to fax a copy of our completed marriage certificate to the people who were doing the paperwork for my diplomatic passport. The Embassy in Moscow wouldn't issue it for me until I was married to Jeremy, and the reason for all the rush was that we were set to depart in just a few weeks. But since getting married does not magically nor automatically change your last name (unbeknownst to temple dude, above), they issued the passport in my maiden name. It was all kind of strange now that I think about it.

We had our wedding luncheon at an Italian restaurant called Ernesto's. There were about 22 people there, if I recall correctly, though I also remember that a small contingent showed up late so maybe there were more.

We had the reception at my house that evening. My mom and sister-in-law did an awesome job of decorating. Unfortunately, during her mad stashing of random clutter into cabinets, my sister-in-law accidentally put away my toiletries bag - you know, chapstick, toothpaste, hairbrushes, etc. So after the reception, Jeremy and I left the house and said goodbye to everyone with great fanfare...and then had to call home 20 minutes later to ask someone to bring us my toiletries bag. Oops.

Also while Jeremy and I were leaving the house, my mom sidled up to me all surreptitiously and passed me an unsolicited fistful of condoms. OH MY GOSH MAY A MORE EMBARRASSING MOMENT NEVER COME TO PASS DURING MY NOR ANYONE ELSE'S LIFETIME.




The honeymoon vehicle was duly "decorated" with shaving cream and pop cans and Oreos on the windows and I know not what else. The reason I don't know what else is because after allowing us and the reception guests to gaze upon it good-naturedly for about two seconds, my dad busted out the Windex and a squeegee and started scrubbing away at his precious car. I guess don't blame him. He was a good sport to allow the vandalism in the first place.

We took our honeymoon on the Oregon Coast in Seaside, and stayed in my sister-in-law's grandpa's beach cabin. It rained the whole three days we were there. We watched Spy Kids. We ate the leftovers from our reception and a lot of Papa Murphy's pizza. We saw the first Harry Potter movie in the theater. We almost ran out of gas on the drive back to Portland (I don't think I ever told my dad that).

By Monday the 26th, we were back at the BYU.





Happy 8th Anniversary to us!

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