One Wedding, One reunion, Four cousins

We spent the past two weeks in Georgia and North Carolina for my brother Jimmy's wedding and Carl's 20th (that's right, 20th) high school reunion. I did not, however, take a single picture from either the reunion or wedding. I don't mind posing my baby in different outfits on a lazy Monday morning, but when it comes to actual events, I don't like to bother with a camera; and so dear readers, you'll have to wait for a glimpse of Jimmy's gorgeous bride, Sarah, (not to mention the NC relatives) until I get some pictures from more dedicated photographers. Suffice it to say that Sarah is a very sweet, natural blonde from Athens, Georgia who loves Johnny Cash, Robert Penn Warren, beer in a bottle and couldn't look better in a bathing suit--your basic Southern male fantasy, minus the tacky. Lucky Jimmy.


We did get a shot, however, of Sophie meeting perhaps my favorite person in the entire world: my grandfather, Paul Charles Vancura, champion ping-pong player, dedicated swimmer of laps, singer of ballads from 1944, husband to the late Mary Evelyn Vancura for over fifty years, handyman/craftsman, a man who can basically fix anything with any available materials; in short, an all around good for nothing Bohunk from Prague.

And I can never resist a shot of Sophie with her cousins. Anna Catherine, below, served as flower girl for the wedding despite coming down with a yucky G.I. virus and throwing up all over her Dad at the rehearsal dinner.

Here she is with the other McGraws: James and Lulu. Lulu is one month younger than Sophie but a size bigger, so we came home with a suitcase full of hand-me-down clothes. Lulu's mother is a consummate shopper of both antiques and baby clothes.


We also got to share a meal with some very interesting friends who recently moved to Athens. Wayne Coppins is a young man we've befriended over the years at the annual Vinson New Year's Eve Party. We never saw Wayne outside of this one event, as he was studying at Cambridge and we were living D.C., but I met up with with him and his Norwegian bride, Ingie, last year in London and was able to share the premiere of crooked with them. Wayne is now an assistant professor of religion at the University of Georgia, while Ingie turns her dissertation on Norwegian missionaries in South Africa into a book. Here's to hoping Ingie grows to love Athens as much as I do--I have a feeling it's going to take her Nordic blood a little time to get used to the hot humidity!


And yes, that's Sophie, not a baby Coppins!