Since our one YEAR anniversary is coming up in just a matter of DAYS, I thought that deserved some cake.
How awesome is that cake topper that my husband designed & built? It's made after the gazebo he built for his Eagle Scout project back in his hometown. We visit it every chance we get.
Also, that is totally an owl on top. A nod to Hedwig, of course.
We didn't get a bite of our cake beyond just cutting it but we will get our fill on our anniversary, I'm sure. We didn't save the top but our baker is going to make us a new one. He even offered to put words on it again if we wanted. Lucky kids, don't you think? In more ways than one.
Happy one year, maz! It's been a fun, trying, memorable, stressful, wonderful, full of love year and I can't wait to see what lies ahead for us. <3
The song my dad picked is not really a song and I don't even know it's name but I do know that he picked it when he was a little kid. I also know that he heard it the week before the wedding and he and my mom cried together. I wasn't going to say no to that. Would you?
That's my dad. And it makes me smile.
Then it was Richard's turn with his mom. He picked this song:
Because he's cute and he *loved* the Lion King so much that when his friends wanted to listen to Green Day, he wanted to listen to this. It was so fitting.
Then this happened.
Sometimes, you just need to have a little tradition because you want to. Or you're just trying to keep the peace. Whatever the reason, go with the flow. It's not going to ruin your day. It's going to make people happy and have more fun. I'm not saying bow down to every single thing that your parents, his or her parents, your aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents, etc. want you to have. They just want to be a part of your wedding too.
Speaking of which, next time we'll talk about something I did for my mom.
What else are you going to call this post? The moment I've been
dreaming of all my life? I've picked at least 5 songs for this specific
moment in my entire lifetime? (Don't lie, you know you have.) When I
was 6, planning to have a double wedding with my cousin at Wrigley Field
where she was marrying Jordan Knight and I was marrying Joey McIntyre
from the New Kids on the Block. At this time, I think my song was Please Don't Go
Girl.
Then when I grew up, I chose the following song. Unfortunately, the man who asked me to marry him wasn't too fond of it. (sad face!)
Romantic, right? I came a long way from choosing old boy band songs. (Let's be honest though, if Joe and I were friends, he'd be singing *something* at the wedding!)
The song that we did end up choosing might be a little weird for some, but we like it. Whenever I hear it, I always think how Richard could have wrote those words exactly. We promised not to over play our song so we wouldn't get sick of it so neither of us have heard it since the wedding. (Ok, I heard it on the radio once and I immediately started screaming NOOOOOOOO and turned it off.)
Ok, enough rambling. Here's the song for you to listen to while you scroll through. :)
I was so ready for dinner, I'm not going to lie. I really only had a couple bites of some corner bakery that Nicole picked up for me while I was getting ready and by that time, I was kind of starving. Good thing there was some yummy steak coming my way. :)
So while everyone was enjoying their dinner, we rushed through to take a few bites. Since we didn't have a receiving line, we wanted to go to every table and say hey and that we hoped everyone was having fun. Yeah...that took a lot longer than I had expected. (And don't worry, our food didn't go to waste! Our wonderful & nice personal waiter made sure our leftovers were wrapped up and sent to our room.)
We had the best intentions of heading around to everyone's table, greeting them all and then leaving in a timely fashion to the next table. I should have known though...people just want to talk to you on your wedding day. I wasn't ready for that, that's for sure. I still saw myself as just me and everyone else saw me as a bride...go figure! I'm definitely not the best conversationalist, nor am I good at getting out of conversations because I just don't want to hurt anyone's feelings. Even though things were slow moving, we made it through absolutely everyone. We got to see everyone, hug practically everyone, talk to everyone and I wouldn't trade that for anything. Don't underestimate greeting everyone. After all, they came there to support you and your groom!
I love that last picture. My new husband is talking with his pals since childhood and I'm talking to one of his friends with my knee up on the chair as if I'm not wearing a wedding gown.
And while we were visiting with our guests, plates of cake and dessert trays went out to every table. I'm glad my mom had the idea of dessert trays. It added just a little something.
I'm glad that we got some candid pictures as well. It's like our photographer was in two places at once!
my cousin looks so cute!!
I'll leave you with one last one. Just because I think it's kind of romantic. :)
Cocktail hour was a weird experience for me. I don't know why, I still can't explain it but we ended up hanging out by the elevators for at least the first 20 minutes (or maybe a little more). Maybe I wasn't ready to admit this was all going by so quickly or maybe I felt bad for not having a receiving line, I don't know. I do know though that there were a lot of pictures taken of us in front of a Steven Tyler outfit.
We greeted a number of people as they came into cocktail hour. One of my favorites was seeing my friend since the fourth grade get off the elevator and scream something that no one does anymore: "JENNY!" After people were making their way to where we were standing from the party, I figured it was high time that we joined the party.
As
we made our way in, I saw my co-workers gathered together and they
insisted we get in one photo all together. That took a while but it was
hilarious.
While we began to make our way through both rooms, Nicole came up to us, asking us if we needed something. Would you believe the only thing we drank at cocktail hour was water? And I finally took off my 4 and a half inch heels, not knowing how much pain I was in until they came off. Thank you Nicole for knowing those had to come off!!
I'll be the first to admit that because we didn't come in right when we got there, we didn't make it through the entire two rooms. In fact, we were very lucky that we made it to the second room at all. Then we got stopped to take a whole slew of pictures with different people in my family. At this point, I was beginning to feel like a Disney character. And I said so repeatedly. Luckily, I think our photographer sensed that so after a few pictures were taken, he made himself disappear into the crowd so a line wouldn't develop. I'm used to being the one behind the camera, not in front of it. It was strange to me that just because I was wearing a white dress all of these people wanted pictures of me or with me. I don't think I was having a 'zilla moment, I think I was just unprepared for how much attention we would be getting that day. (I know, how is that possible?)
all the way from Colorado!
Cocktail hour was quickly coming to a close. I couldn't believe how fast time was moving. Who hit the fast forward button that day? You need a talking to!
Next time, we'll talk details. I'll leave you with this:
It's been awhile, I know. I got sick for a couple of weeks and it's also National Novel Writing Month...I plan on being a winner again this year. Alright, enough with the excuses. On to the snow-I mean wedding-recap!
Since it was lightly snowing when we made our way to the church, I knew there was a good chance of it still snowing when we got out. This is Chicago, after all. I'm pretty stoked that it was, personally. Don't get me wrong, it was cold but the pictures look great! (And you'll notice that the junior bridesmaid is missing from these photos. The cold was a bit of a shock for her so she sat in the limo for these.)
That's me holding up my dress. While the following pictures were taken, Nicole was on the sidelines helping me bustle it up again. (What would I have done without her?!)
love this one, don't you?
I think I jumped for joy when I saw this image.
So following pictures of the boys, Jake took a few of me. I kinda love them. Ok, I do love them. I'm not ashamed to say it.
snow in my hair :)
cute with just a bit of a goofy air...yeah, that's me.
And with that, we made our way to the limo with the wedding party. Tune in next time for the last batch of wedding party photos! :)
Vows are a very important part of the ceremony. Obviously. From the very beginning, Richard told me he didn't want to repeat his vows, he wanted to say them from memory if he couldn't write his own. Since we couldn't write our own, we memorized them. I remember him walking around the apartment repeating them to himself. We even had a post it on our bedroom wall with them written down so every time we went to leave the room, we'd see them.
So first we stated our intentions. (aka, have babies & raise them to be Catholic. Kidding! That's only one part of it.) :)
Then comes the vows. Richard went first and he did it perfectly. Me? I had a problem.
After Richard, I whispered to Father Manny saying, I don't think I can remember all of that. So why are we all giggling in the photo above? Because once he got me started, I remembered it all! Also, it turns out that everybody heard me whisper that too. It's funny but I kind of wish that nobody did. Oh well.
After we exchanged vows, we gathered at the altar and prayed. If you look at the picture above, you'll see my brother holding my bouquet. Would you believe that I've looked at that picture quite a few times and didn't notice it until I included it in this post? Love that I'm still discovering the amazingness in our wedding photos!
Then we went to pray to the Virgin Mary. We decided to do this together instead of just me because two heads and prayers are better than one, right? When we were walking back to hug our moms, I looked at my brother who was supposed to hand off 2 daisies to us. He just looked at me and shook his head. Ok...so we don't have flowers to give our moms but we still have our hugs.
I thought it was cute that Richard's dad decided to get in on the hugging.
We took our places back at the kneeler that we didn't use and we were presented! St. Clement doesn't say "you may now kiss the bride." (Nor do they say "speak now or forever hold your piece"...which didn't calm my nightmares, unfortunately.) I don't remember what Father Manny said but I know we were excited about it.
Best first kiss ever, if I do say so myself. :)
And just like walking down the aisle, I don't remember seeing anyone as we were walking back up the aisle. There are pictures that I look at and I say to myself "wow, I didn't know that they were at the ceremony!" Really, nothing else existed but us. I'm so lucky that we got to have such a wonderful ceremony. For us, it was just perfect.
