My Brother's Wedding and more fun stuff

Let me just say one thing before I get into my post, I must apologize to the State of Maryland. If you take out the city of Baltimore and Washington D.C. the area it is really beautiful and very woody. I never realize how great a state can be until you can go outside the city limits.

Okay, now onto the wedding. This was my first time ever to serve as best man as well as attending an outdoor wedding. The wedding was held at Crystal's parents backyard which was a perfect setting with the creek on the left hand side of the picture. God created a masterpiece when it came to the weather. The sun was out no humidity, no rain, and very little wind. But he really created a masterpiece when he brought my brother and crystal together as one.

However, there was one little hitch in the wedding. It will be remembered from both the Crippen family and Namie family who attended the wedding.

Crystal's jack russell terrier "Tess" decided to take a little stretch during the wedding cremony we all had a pretty good laugh at this moment. Ray and Brenda Namie (Crystal's parents) were just absoulutely great host to us. They went beyond expectations to cook for us, setting up the wedding and even giving me and my brother Donald Trump ties for the ceremony. To which I say thank you to both of you for your hospitality. This weekend couldn't have been any better and was very special moment in my brother's life. Crystal you married a great guy and you have brought joy into his life. I hope your marriage is as beutiful as this picture I took at the botanical gardens.

I did do some other things besides go to a wedding. I got to meet a lot of Crystal's brothers and sisters and their families. I really got to know Crystal's brother Paul the most. I never realized of just how much we really had in common. He did challenge me to a game of horseshoes in which case I accepted his challenge.

Although, I haven't played a game since I was 9-10 years old. I still had a good time even if I lost every single game. I did have few ringers, but I still need some work on my throwing technique. I told Paul, if you come to K.C. play my game the batting cages and see how many 80 mph baseballs you can hit. He had good laugh when I told him that. We even went to Harper's Ferry, West Virginia. It once was the place where John Brown's famous raid took place in which he was trying to end slavery. Now, it is a National Historic Park where you can visit some the old town buildings as well as tubing down the Potomac River as these people in this picture

It reminded me like Hannibal, Mo, but only with a better scenery. If you come down this area, I would highly recommend it. In a way I almost wanted to grab a tube and join in there with them. Then before the wedding, I rode the metro with my brother before he went to work and stop at the Rossylyn station to go see the Iwo Jima memorial around sunrise. Wow, what an awesome time.

Signed

Tim " I think put more pictures and wrote my longest post ever" Crippen

PS: Okay, here's one more wedding photo