So Southern--Joshua and Ashley Moreland

They were married under a hundred-year-old oak tree on the outskirts of Houston, with ribbons hanging down like Spanish moss. It was Saturday afternoon, May 29, and 90 degrees outside. No problem. There was ice water for the guests, and a flute quartet played, next to petunias in deep purple, Ashley's color.

Both Michael and I snapped all the pieces of the wedding ceremony,

including:

Vincent and Janice, as parents of the groom...

the mother of the bride...

The bridesmaids and groomsmen, including Charlotte and Tony, Ben and Daniel...

the groom (Joshua) with the "minister"--his bishop...

and, finally, the bride and her father, exchanging last hugs and kisses before she became a married lady.

The bishop read the ceremony....

and Ashley and Joshua each read their own promises and hopes.

Then, the ceremony was all over...

And everyone posed for pictures.

Joshua and Ashley will be sealed in the Salt Lake Temple on December 29, as Vincent and Janice travel here with their family on a skiing vacation. Ashley will then have been a member of the Church for a year.

The night before the wedding, Janice and Vincent hosted a rehearsal dinner in their elegant garden. Nancy, Charlotte, and Janice had spent two days, just cooking.

Charlotte decorated the tables and arranged the flowers.

There were buffet tables for appetizers, dessert, and the entree--herbed shrimp with quinoa/corn cakes and bean salsa,

And finally, after all those preparations, the guests arrived--Dad and Grandma Spendlove, Nancy, Daniel with the girlfriend who will join him at Texas State University in the fall, Joshua and Ashley, and Janice, as well as another 40 relatives.

Vincent was very comfortable as master of ceremonies.

After the wedding, the gang gathered once more at the clubhouse at Belters Landing, an elegant new development, for Ashley and Joshua's wedding reception. I rested from my labors as photographer.

Early on Saturday, Michael and I slipped off to the "Wall of Water". It was just outside the boundaries of Michael's mission, so he heard about it but never got to visit during the two years he lived in Houston. Some missionaries disobeyed the rules and went there, and it was all the more alluring because it was forbidden! There was a truly Texas-sized building next to the Wall of Water.

Crawfish and Mayhaw Jelly

We arrived in Houston on Thursday, May 27, the day before festivities began for Joshua and Ashley's wedding. On a whim, we drove from the Houston airport straight for Louisiana, in search of Cajun cooking.

On the backroads of northeast Texas, we passed a farmers' market advertising shelled pecans and mayhaw jelly. "What's mayhaw jelly?" I asked. "It's made from a swamp berry," the clerk explained. The store also featured ripe melons...

and spicy green tomato pickles.

We found great Cajun cooking at Steamboat Bill's, in Lake Charles, Louisiana. We ordered shrimp etoufee, red beans and rice, boudin sausage, and a platter of fried catfish, fried mussels, and stuffed crabs--and ate it all.

We weren't totally reassured as to the nutritional value of our meal by the sign saying that everything was fried in "100% heart healthy peanut oil."

Next stop was L'Auberge, the elegant hotel and casino on Lake Charles. It reminded us of the Mandalay Bay or Bellagio in Vegas. The flamboyant luxe even included a fire burning in an air-conditioned hall, while it was 90 degrees outside!

Lake Charles is both a casino town and an industrial town (oil and gas refining). There were great views from L'Auberge across the lake--to the refinery!

We hung out at the L'Auberge pool party, with a rock band dressed in Mardi Gras style. The band stirred up the crowd by recalling the New Orleans Saints' recent Superbowl win.

Friday morning, we took a loop road south, through the Louisiana Outback to the Gulf Coast.

There was water everywhere--ponds, marshes, lakes, and the Gulf.

We passed signs advertising live crabs...

and we stopped at a cafe selling everything fried, from chicken to jalapenos to okra...

and offering fresh alligator meat.

The houses in this often-flooded land are perched on stilts.

We passed shrimp boats lying at anchor as the BP oil slick tainted the Gulf.

We saw cranes poised for loading ships...

and we finally arrived at Holly Beach, with its bathers in the surf and ships just beyond.

And we passed a fishing pier, with a host of colorful inhabitants.