Wedding Pix

I better get started with these wedding pictures or it will be too late:

The wedding was at Bartram's Garden in Philadelphia, the oldest surviving botanic garden in the US, which predates the revolutionary war.

First came the huppah carriers: Ethan, Peenesh, Nick and Owen,



Elyse, the grooms' sister,



Blue and flower girl Katy



Alex and Dorothy



the groom and his parents, Gail and Marc



and the bride and her parents (us).



Ellie's old friends and co-co-cos from YRUU, Jessica and Kristin lit a candle and gave stirring readings about the meaning of the ceremony.



Elyse read a beautiful poem. I need to ask her permission to reprint it here.



Ellie and Jacob welcomed everyone, and made their vows to one another - and let me tell you, they were terrific vows. Afterwards, many long married couples were saying, "yeah, they really know what they are signing up for!"



They exchanged rings,



Jacob's father, Marc, talked about the significance of breaking the glass in Judaism and his wishes for the new couple, and Jacob broke the glass, and then Marc told jacob to kiss the bride.





Ellie's oldest friend Ann presented the wedding contract that she had illuminated



Ellie and Jacob each signed it



and finally everyone there signed it, as witnesses and community, sealing the marriage.

It was a Quaker service so there was no Minister or Rabbi. Just a community of people who love Ellie and Jacob, and as it turned out at the reception, really dig each other as well.

As you can tell, there were no color themes - everyone wore what they wanted to. Young and I ended up matching when he changed his shirt at the last minute - and Marc's tie matched my jacket - who could have known?

Photos by Demian Harvill and Zena Harvill. Many more to follow.

My Prius is no more...

Last thursday, Matthew and I were driving on 101 in Redwood City (I was driving) and some joker suddenly remembered he'd missed his exit or something, and wham!



Some people behind us stopped and called 911. An off duty cop stopped and directed traffic. Matt took care of rest - called Young, who arrived within minutes, called the high school and told them to send Jacob to Tammy's studio. He found my driver's license and insurance info and gave them to the cops, and told them what happened.

The paramedics took me to the hospital immobilized on a back board as a precaution, because my right arm was numb, so I never actually saw the car until Matt showed me the picture on his phone. I'm fine except for some aches, and my thumb is still numb.

After the countless times I've been in the emergency room with my kids, this was the first time I ever been there as a patient, and it made me much more sympathetic to Jacob. After a flurry of activity when I was first wheeled in, they realized I was okay, but the rules said they couldn't unbind me until my c-spine had been cleared by an attending. So I was parked in the hallway for 3 hours, while all kinds of interesting things went on around me that I could hear but not turn my head to see. I couldn't even play tetris on my cell phone, but Young was there and he was good company.

Matt went and picked up Jacob and brought him back to Stanford, and we all went to the Peninsula Creamery, where Jacob had a banana split to celebrate the last day of school.

The Honeymoon

There are tons more wedding pictures, and many other happenings, but it the mean time - here's an update from the newlyweds in peru sent June 9:
hi guys,

we are in cusco, leaving tomorrow on our hike up to macchu pichu.
it´s been amazing so far.

on saturday morning, we had an hour to wander around lima´s miraflores
neighborhood. we walked without a direction and ended up at the
pacific ocean. we found ourselves standing at the top of a clif
watching surfers--the waves were beautiful. it´s funny, it really felt
like the pacific even though we were so far away from the pacific i´m
used to.

we´ve been in cusco for the past few days. the city of cusco is
amazingly dense, with beautiful tiny plazas. but when you walk just a
little ways out of the main city, there are so many inkan ruins that
many are unmarked and don´t appear in the guidebook. the main ruins,
which i can neither pronounce nor spell, were awe inspiring. a wall
built out of carefully cut bolders far taller than either jacob or i.

the citizens seem to treat the lesser known historical sites as parks.
teenagers make out in the ruins. families picnic. there´s one site
that has evidently been treated as a natural slide since the incan
empire. we kept walking and found families roasting dinner in earth
covered pits, sheep roaming.

we have lovely photos, but i forgot my cable and can´t send you copies.
we have completed our itinerary for the trip, having booked a five day
tour of the amazon. we figure that this is our honeymoon and we´re
too reasonable (chicken) to go without a tour. we´re going to the
explorers inn http://www.explorersinn.com/.

much love.

-ellie


And one from June 14:

just got back from machu picchu. heading to the jungle tomorrow.

much love!

The Wedding!

We are immensely pleased to announce that Jacob Samuel Fenton and Eleanor Lorraine Harvill were married saturday at Bartram's Garden in Philadelphia. If there were ever a happier or lovelier wedding, I wasn't there.

Many more pictures soon.

Hooray!

The California Supreme Court struck down the state's ban on same-sex marriage yesterday.



Leanne's caption says "The last time we had our picture taken here was Feb 14, 2004 when we got married the 1st time. The CA Supreme Court invalidated that marriage so we went to Canada in 2007 and got married a 2nd time. Today the CA Supreme Court says gay marriage is legal! Joy! Wedding #3?? "

Congratulations to everyone -As a mother-of-the-bride I especially send my love to all those parents who can finally see their children married!

Happier

On a happier note, yesterday was Young's birthday and we had a pirate themed (?) birthday party at Greens in San Francisco.





Ellie and Jacob Fenton's wedding is next week and I have been putting together a photo history of the two of them for the rehearsal dinner. Here is a sample:

Ellie:

and Jacob Fenton


Blue got the pins taken out of his finger today, and his big clunky dressing replaced by a more managable one. Here is the X-Ray from the surgery when they put the things in. It's kind of cool looking:



We got some fruit trees planted - a barlett pear and a gala apple - and some beautiful bamboo against the fence to block the new McMansion that's going up next door. We worried about the bamboo spreading out of hand, but its a "relatively benign" one according to the tree guy, and anyway, it went in where the blackberries were, so it wasn't like they were under control. The fruit trees were a dream we've had ever since we moved in. The garden is going nuts; everything is bolting, but it's going to have to wait until after the wedding. A lot of things are going to have to wait until after the wedding at this point.



And there is a wonderful video of Lucy spinning here.

Children in peril - not happy thoughts

May 25th, the third anniversary of Jacob's stem cell transplant, will also be the second anniversary of our housemate and dear little friend from Ronald McDonald House, Nicholas' death.

April 16th marked four years since the original diagnosis of Jacob's brain tumor and the third anniversary of another friend from Packard, Michael's, funeral. April should have also seen our friends Ben's tenth and Courtney's twenty seventh birthday.

So I have been thinking a lot about children in peril, not just the children themselves, but about what it does to their parents, their families, everyone who is caught up in it.

And I have been thinking about the war in Iraq, and the terrible toll it is taking on children. I feel an awful kinship with the mothers and fathers whose children are there. Iraqi or American, it doesn't matter.

Today there was a horrifying, heartbreaking article in the New York Times by ALISSA J. RUBIN that starts out:

Missiles Strike Sadr City, Damaging Hospital

BAGHDAD — The ugly daily fight for ground in the poor Shiite neighborhood of Sadr City unfolded Saturday at a small mosque next door to a hospital, damaging the hospital and a number of its ambulances, and near a group of children who were wounded as they gathered tin cans to sell for salvage.

The missiles that hit close to the Sadr General Hospital were American. After a night of clashes in the neighborhood, the Americans fired at least three “precision-guided munitions” at the small building next door to the hospital. Neighbors said the building was used as a place of prayer for pilgrims, hospital employees and neighborhood residents, but the military identified it as a command center for the Shiite militias that it is battling.

Last week we saw American Joe, a wrenching and beautiful original play by Liza Raynal, about her brother's coming deployment to Iraq.



Afterward all I could do was hold onto Liza's mother and cry. We have got to do something to stop this. WE HAVE TO STOP THIS.

Meanwhile, our country is not taking care of the soldiers we are sending to war. One small act we can do is support those who are suffering from the aftereffects of war, just as Jacob is suffering the after effects of cancer treatment.

Click the link below to sign a petition to support IAVA and Drowning Pool’s “This is For the Soldiers” campaign to make sure the mental health needs of our troops are a top priority.