The Wedding

Finally Some Pictures!

The day didn't go perfectly, but it went as well as could have been expected.

The one thing I noticed was how calm and cool I was. I expected to be a nervous wreck, with no appetite, stressing about how the day would go. With the way I was acting, it could have been any normal day.

My hair and makeup lady, Kacee, arrived with an assistant at around 10:45 to start working on me, my two moms, and 4 bridesmaids. Not only did they finish an hour early, everyone looked fantastic.

Being done an hour early only made me more anxious to get to the venue and start getting ready. We ended up going there early so that my Mom could get the flowers from the florist for my cake.

Getting there early was probably the best thing I could have done. I ended up spending way too much time running around, directing people, trying to find things, helping OTHER people out. By the time I actually got in my dress, it was too late to go and take photos of me around the property and me with the girls, because our guests, and most importantly Josh, had arrived. Bummer!

It wasn't too much longer until our coordinator came in and told me it was time! The nervousness still hadn't set in, which I was surprised about. My Dad came walking up, and he just started clapping. It was really sweet.

Finally it was my turn to walk down the aisle. It is a fairly long walkway, and as soon as I began walking down, the back strap of my shoe slipped down my foot, and my veil was threatening to fly away at any moment. My dad and I concocted a plan to tuck the side of the veil in between our arms. It worked!

When I was finally able to see Josh, I could see the tears swelling up in his eyes. I was afraid of this, because once I get going, theres no stopping - and man, am I not pretty when I cry. Luckily, we were both able to compose ourselves.

Apparently there was some commotion going on with the kids in the bridal party as Josh and I were saying our "I do's". I was completely oblivious to this - and pretty much everything around us. My Dad gave a wonderful speech during the ceremony talking about Josh and I as kids, and together as adults. Of course he didn't forget to tell little embarrassing stories of our childhoods. It was a nice touch to the ceremony.

After the ceremony we rushed to take pictures. I don't think I realized until then how large our party actually was, and spent a good chunk of time doing pictures of family and the wedding party. When Josh and I were about to begin the pictures of just us, we were already 5 minutes late doing our grand entrance. Oh well. We spent about 20 minutes taking some pictures of just us, that I think turned out really well. But if I were able to go back and do it over, I'd probably do less wedding party and more of us.

Then off to the reception - we did our first dance right away, and then sat down. My two maids of honors, and Josh's two best men both gave their toasts, and then Josh's granny gave the blessing before dinner. Now these were the real tear jerkers. At least the pictures were over.

Don't expect to enjoy dinner too much - we had people coming up to us left and right to talk to us, which was great, but man did that food look good. We were able to get in some rounds at the tables before it was time to start the rest of the festivities.

First was the Father/Daughter dance. At some point during the dance I looked over at my Mom sitting at her table, teary eyed, and realized that she should be up there with us. I called her up there and Me, Dad and Mom all danced together. It was a really sweet moment and I think she really appreciated it.

After that was of course the Mother/Son dance, our anniversary dance, and the cake cutting. I had warned Josh many times that if he smeared cake on my face I was going to be very angry. The photography suggested that if I went first, and was nice, that he would have no choice but to be nice too. Yeah, not so much. He got me, so I promptly loaded my fingers with some frosting and chased him until I could get a good smearing in.

The rest of the reception was a lot of fun. I danced the whole night. Neither Josh and I had time to partake in the open bar, but hopefully everyone else did! The reception shut down at 10:30, and most people had gone by then since it was a Sunday night, but a good grouping of us went over to Pechanga Casino and Resort nearby to get some drinks and just hang out. Josh and I booked a suite that night there so that we didn't have to worry about driving. It was a gorgeous room!

These are just some of the pictures our photographer posted on her Facebook. We should be getting to see ALL of them early this week and I can't wait.