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Interrupting the story to say… November 1, 2008 in Halloween | 4 comments “We’re twins, but we’re individuals.”
Ashley and Mary-Kate. “It’s so hard being me.” The Rehearsal October 31, 2008 in the future Mrs. Michael, wedding planning | 23 comments Wednesday, October 22nd The Wednesday before my wedding I took a half day from work. Which basically means I did my best to finish up my work week while simultaneously thinking omigod…wedding, wedding, wedding! I headed off to the pedicure you all recommended and let me just tell you, I was 99% in heaven the whole time. Bubbles, wine, a thrown in parafin wax treatment just for being a bride. I may have even texted a few of you saying yessss, you were right! Until the lady slipped while pumicing my heel and scratched my ankle. Like, really scratched my ankle. As in, I still have a really ugly scab on it. Meh. Afterwards, I ran home to finish last minute things and wait for the arrival of two wonderful bridesmaids. Thursday, October 23rd I woke up bright and early and rolled over to face Michael. This is the last morning we’ll see each other before we’re husband and wife, I thought. Just then he opened his eyes and smiled at me. “Good morning, my almost wife,” he said. Love. Unfortunately, there was no time to swoon, as I had to wake my poor, jet lagged, west-coast bridesmaid and load up the car with 800 pounds of votives, votive holders, pillar candles, hurricane glasses, rose petals, and more odds and ends. We arrived at the venue for 9 a.m. and while it was a beautiful day, it was COLD.
(OK this was actually taken the morning OF the wedding, but it looked the same the day before!) We walked into the venue, arms full of stuff — and walked into a construction zone. Boards and paint cans filled the lobby, a table saw whirred somewhere in the background and my heart? Officially jumped out of my chest, ran across the street and threw itself into the ocean. As I stood there, momentarily paralyzed, the venue coordinator assured me that they were just doing some work on the outside of the building and it would be perfect by the next day. Deep breath. OK. More bridesmaids began to arrive and we headed off for our manicures before heading back to the hotel to get ready. I walked into the hotel room, saw my dress hanging on the closet and realized that the wedding had really arrived. Wow. At four on the dot, we arrived at the church to begin the rehearsal. Even as we walked our way through, it didn’t feel real. Like oh yeah, we’re doing this wedding thing. Some day. What DID feel real was the fact that we still had no music. Still, you ask? Yes, still. You see, on Tuesday I had received a call from the Reverend saying that when they went to practice playing the CD of our music, it had somehow slipped off the tray and fell INTO the CD player. Yeah, I don’t get it either. I had supplied them with a backup CD in case something happened, but as of the time of our rehearsal, they still weren’t sure if the CD player would work. They actually had a tech guy there during our rehearsal pulling apart the system and saying that he would return by 6:30 a.m. the DAY OF OUR WEDDING to keep working on it. I wish I had a picture of my face when he said that. Pretty bridesmaids at the church. We left the church and headed to dinner, which was one of my favorite parts of the whole weekend. The food was delicious, the company was outstanding, and the speeches? They were so heartfelt and moving. I made it through all of mine without a tear (mostly laughs!) until I got to the ones I had written for my parents. Then I started to choke up. By far my favorite part of the rehearsal was during my dad’s speech. He began to talk about how when my sister and I were little, we used to sing songs in harmony. One song in particular: Going to the Chapel of Love. Suddenly, my dad pulled out a little harmonica, hummed the first bar, and began to sing. “Going to the chapel and we’re gonna get married…” And everyone — all 45 guests — joined in. Suddenly the room was full of song and as my sister and I joined in for the harmony, I felt so very loved. As we said our goodbyes to everyone at the end, I headed over to Michael for one last embrace as an engaged couple. “Are you ready?” he asked me? “Absolutely,” I replied. That night, I lay in the hotel bed next to my sister and tossed and turned, unable to sleep. It wasn’t really the idea of getting married that was keeping me awake. It was one nagging question. Would we have music at the ceremony? October 30, 2008 in married life | 31 comments Well hello there! I’m back and I’m married and as cliche as it sounds, it absolutely was the best day of our lives. At least five times a day we talk about how we wish we could do it all over again because it was just so fun! I’m planning on doing a full recap for you over the next few days, starting with the rehearsal and working my way to the end. But I have about 600 emails to get through first and that whole easing back into work thing meeehhhh. I’ll leave you with two of my favorite candids from the day. I hate having to wait weeks for the professional ones, but at least I have friends that are snap happy. Thank you to Anna for both of these! If I Knew Then… October 29, 2008 in guest blogger, weddings | 1 comment The last guest post is from Darci, the first wedding blogger I ever read. She has an amazing sense of style and design and her wedding was sigh-worthy. I’ll be back tomorrow so see you then! First off, huge congratulations to Molly and Michael! I hope that you’re wedding day was all that you wanted and that you’re enjoying some much needed relaxation and cocktails on your “mini-moon.” Molly asked me to try and entertain you while she is away, so here is my feeble attempt… I write a blog called With This Ring, which is how I have come to know Molly over the past several months. I started the blog when I got engaged last July and it became a place for me to chronicle our planning process, share pictures of things that inspired me, and basically write about all the wedding thoughts that consumed my head for over a year. Now that I’ve made it to the other side of the wedding gauntlet, hopefully some of you can benefit from my experiences! I don’t think there is such thing as a perfect wedding, but there are definitely things that went really right with ours and things I would suggest based on lessons I learned the hard way. Ahhh, the beauty of hindsight. Things I would recommend… Negotiate. No matter how much you’re working with, we all have budgets. I was afraid to negotiate with vendors at first but I quickly realized that if you’re honest and respectful, they’re more than happy to work with you. Saying things like “Our budget for flowers is only X amount of dollars, can you work with us to accommodate that price range?” definitely saved us money in the long run. Prioritize. Outline what is the most important to you and cut back on other things to make it work. We wanted to have our reception at a nice resort where everyone could just walk back to their hotel rooms, so that meant cutting back on the flower budget (read: that negotiation was a real example). Communicate over email whenever possible (and save them all). The coordinator for our venue left halfway through our planning process and had I not saved some of our emails, some of the promises she made would not have been honored. Vendors are dealing with so many weddings at a time it’s easy for things to get confusing! If you can wait to pay certain vendors, wait. It’s a lot easier to withhold money for broken contracts than to fight and try to get it back. See: lessons I learned the hard way. Things that I am glad we did… Hired a great band. Our first band actually cancelled on us two months before the wedding (which as you can imagine was a blast to deal with) but we wound up with an amazing alternative. If you’re hosting the kind of reception where people dancing like maniacs is a priority, put some thought into the music. Whether it’s making some excellent play lists for your ipod, being really specific with a DJ or hiring a great band, pictures like this make it work the effort: Saw each other before the ceremony. I know this is a really personal choice so I won’t say a lot about it, but it was the right decision for us. I was feeling a little jittery the morning of the wedding and once we were able to spend some quiet moments together I was completely calm. We took all the pictures beforehand so we were able to hang out all day, then go straight to the cocktail hour to spend time with our guests. |