My MOH Speech

This weekend my very best friend (who happens to be my cousin) married a terrific guy and I was honored to be asked to be their matron of honor. I'm a major planner, so of course I'd been working on my speech for a few weeks. Perhaps I'd even practiced it, practically memorized it, and timed it out. Of course some ad-libbing was done in the moment, but the heart of the speech stayed the same. Here's how I had it written. I hope that Emily and Jason felt my love when I gave it :)

Good evening! I’m going to assume, since we’re all gathered here tonight, that the second April Fool’s Proposal was not a joke?

For those of you who don’t know me, I am Emily’s cousin and best friend. Emily is a year and a half younger than I am and I really don’t remember life without her. From the very beginning Emily and I have been as close as sisters. At any family gathering, you could find Emily and I together laughing and giggling and generally being goofy—not a whole lot has changed in that respect J. Over the years we’ve gotten into our share of trouble (I know Emily remembers hiding out in my closet all night because we invited her over before asking our Dad, who then said no  AND I’m sure Aunt Marge and Uncle Craig don’t have any stories from the summer I babysat for Emily and Erin).  But wherever Emily and I are together, you can pretty much guarantee that we’re having a good time—whether it was out on the lake lot on those hot summer days, our shopping trips to the New & Used Store, or our Girls’ Vacation to Florida---Emily makes even a boring errand seem a little more fun.  Emily is a great friend and a wonderful “auntie” to my daughter Heidi.

As I’m sure most of you already know, Emily and Jason met while they were both working as CNA’s at St. Clare’s, where they still work.  I first met Jason when he came with Emily to one of our “game nights” with some friends. The thing that struck me first…well, the thing that struck me first was obviously that he’s like 6 and half feet tall and Emily is like 5 feet tall. But the thing that struck me second, was that, he fit right in. Not only did Jason fit right in, but Emily was able to be herself when he was around, which was something I had never seen before. Emily wasn’t worried about acting silly because Jason was acting silly right along side her. When you spend time with Jason and Emily, you can tell that not only do they love each other, but they genuinely like each other, which, I think,  is kind of important. Whether they are singing karaoke or showing off their dance moves on the XBox, riding their bikes around Baraboo, or using whatever their word of the day is, Emily and Jason together just make life better.

I wanted to end my speech with a quote of some kind or a song lyric perhaps that would remind me of Emily and Jason, unfortunately, most of the songs that remind me of Emily and Jason, are ones that we’ve sang perhaps with a cold beverage or two, along to the XBox, and they just didn’t seem fitting. First there was….

·      “We can dance if we want to, we can leave your friends behind, cause your friends don’t dance and if they don’t dance well they’re no friend of mine.”

·      Or there was. “When a problem comes along, you must whip it, before the cream sits out too long, you must whip it…”.

·      And Emily and my favorite to sing together…”I like big butts and I cannot lie, you other brothers can’t deny…” You know the rest.

So, since I couldn’t find the perfect song, so I thought maybe a quote would be better and I found this one that I

·      “Happy marriages begin when we marry the ones we love, and they blossom when we love the ones we marry.”–Tom Mullen

Everyone please join me in raising our glasses to Emily and Jason. May your marriage blossom for many , many years to come. Cheers.