50!

Man, am I ever whipped.

Yesterday was my in-laws 50th wedding anniversary celebration. Their anniversary was actually on January 21st, but since they were in Florida in January, February and March, we had the party for them yesterday.

It was a super nice day, but SO much work! Almost like a wedding. (That, btw, is why I've been missing the last week or so - I've been busy pulling all the last minute details together.)
Unfortunately, my camera crapped out yesterday soon after the party started and I wasn't able to get any pictures. We took lots of pics on my mother-in-law's camera so I'll see if I can get her SD card from her so we can have some pictures. I'm just kind of disappointed that I don't have anything to show you.

We hosted an Open House for them yesterday afternoon at Golf's Steakhouse. We weren't exactly sure how many people would be coming but we thought it could be as many as 200. I think we got more like 125. We had the Open House in the Golf's Ballroom - a beautiful room! Some friends and family members (about 35 people) stayed for a lovely dinner upstairs in the restaurant proper. After dinner the immediate family came back to our place and my in-laws opened their cards and gifts. It was nice that it was just the immediate family - we all got changed into comfy clothes and plopped ourselves onto couches and put our sore feet up!

The highlight of the day was a multi-media presentation that my dear husband put together for his parents. While they were in Florida, we went over to their house and got their photo albums from over the years to put together a display. We also took the old 8mm film that they had of their wedding day. My husband took the film to a production house and had it converted to a digital format. He scanned the old photos and then put them and the film footage all together into a little "through the years" movie. He found the perfect music to go along with the movie too. Then we took the finished movie with us and showed it throughout the afternoon on a laptop. Everybody - especially my mother and father in law loved it! (After they watched it for the first time they cried.) It was very emotional, seeing all the old memories.

All through the afternoon, my in-laws kept lamenting that they would love to have a copy of the movie, but they don't have a DVD player to play it on. Well, that was our last surprise to them! As a gift, we gave them a DVD player along with the movie Ken made and a DVD collection of "Grand Ole Opry" performances (they are big fans).

All in all, it was a really nice day. But I have to tell you...I am SO ready for a few days off!