I want to document this as accurately as possible, both for you (my readers) and for myself (because I know I won't remember a lot of it later). In order to do that without making you read a novel all at once (and also because our photographer gave us 932 incredible photos), I'm splitting this into a 4-part thing. I swear I'll get back to my regular features and turn this back into a writing blog next week. :P
Let me start with a little back story from wedding week. My parents were supposed to arrive the Sunday before the wedding, but they surprised me and rolled into town Saturday night. I think it goes without saying that I ran and leapt into my brothers arms before squeezing the life out of my parents. :) C was having his bachelor party that night, so my brother left to join him while I chatted my mom's ear off until the wee hours of the morning.
The next day (Sunday), we made a giant breakfast before heading out for my final dress fitting. I don't really remember what else we did that day, but it was wonderful to spend time with my family. I think we might have played a board game, now that I think about it...that's a big part of our family time. :) Monday we spent some time with Bug and Bean, picked up my wedding ring from the jeweler's, and picked up my godmother from the airport. That was quite the reunion, considering it's been 5 years since I'd seen her and 10 years since my mom had (they're best friends, by the way). We then went back to the house and stayed up til 3 in the morning sewing flowers and chatting. :)
Tuesday, my two best friends in the whole entire world arrived within 15 minutes of each other. We picked them up from the airport and then went back home to work on wedding projects (we still had lanterns to finish). Wednesday my baby brother arrived, and we started working on food prep for the wedding. We had a pasta bar with three kinds of noodles, three different sauces, and meatballs, so there was A LOT of cooking to be done. Not to mention the dozens of cupcakes my mom baked for the reception. We also started setting up the yard for the reception.
Thursday we had a luncheon for the bridal party and our families. There was quite a lot of silliness (my husband was involved...of course there was silliness) and lots of great food. After the luncheon, we headed back to the house to continue set-up for the reception. There were lots of lights to be strung and wires to be hidden, so it took us a while. We had our rehearsal at 5, and our photographer was there to capture all the goofiness for us. I'm not posting any of those pictures, because we have better ones from the ceremony, but I can assure you that they're awesome. :P
And then we get to Friday. :) We got up at 7 in the morning to shower and get ready for the craziness of the day. We all had light breakfasts (mostly bagels and yogurts) and then headed over to the house to meet the tables/chairs delivery guy. Once the tables were all set up, we were able to start covering them and putting out centerpieces. We also had noisemakers on every table (for people to use when they wanted us to kiss at the reception), and of course we had to try all of them out.
There are some other shots of me playing with kazoos and party poppers, but this one was my favorite. Once we put all the noisemakers out, my bridesmaids whisked me off to a salon for a mani/pedi. My brother was my man of honor for the wedding (I may have mentioned that before), so he went with, and by the time we left, he'd gotten a pedicure to match his outfit, just like the girls.
Awesome, right? :) The ladies at the salon didn't really know what to do with him, but they went with it. Once we were finished at the salon, we rushed back to the house to start on hair and makeup. We had four bridesmaids and me that needed to be beautified, so we got started early (we ate wraps while we worked...I swear, I became the queen of multi-tasking that day). One of my bridesmaids was in charge of styling us for the day, and she did an absolutely wonderful job.
My hair and makeup got lots of compliments throughout the day, and I especially love this picture of the hair. :) Once I was all dolled up, I got to step into this magnificent creation...
...and get zipped up by my mom (and trust me, she cried once she saw the finished look).
Once I was zipped up, my dad was sent in to see me for the first time. He teared up a little when he saw me, so I offered him a tissue (which he refused). :P In the midst of making silly faces at each other (it's what we do), we also took this shot:
It's a tradition for the women on my mom's side to take this picture on their wedding day. The bride asks Dad for money, and Dad holds out his pockets to show that he's got nothing left. It's silly, but it's one of my favorites from the day. :)
While I was prepping at our house, C was across the street getting ready with all the guys. Here's my favorite of his getting-ready photos:
Once everyone was ready, it was time for the first look. We opted to do it before the ceremony, since we were leaving for our honeymoon that night and didn't want to waste reception time taking pictures. Here's a shot of me trying to get a peek at C outside:
And here's our first look:
On my way out to see him, my train got snagged and one of the loops holding it to my dress broke. After we took our first look pictures, we headed inside so that C's grandma could sew a new loop on the dress (she's a seamstress extraordinaire).
And while the women were doing that inside, this was going on outside:
That's C in the middle with my brothers on either side. The brother in green was my "maid" and the brother in white was our usher/aisle-runner-roller for the day. :) To conclude this installment, here are some detail shots from prep time.
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| Bridesmaid dresses |
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| Bouquets! |
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A close-up of my flowers, and one of my favorite photos
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| Our rings :) |
J
