Posted Sunday, April 22, 2012 5:40 PM
So Juli and I woke up early that morning... this was The Day... The day little girls dream about... My wedding day. I was excited and nervous at the same time. Excited for obvious reasons, but nervous that the weather wouldn't cooperate. Which it didn't of course. Was I surprised? No. Devastated? No... I had a little come to Jesus meeting with myself the Wednesday before the wedding because I had a feeling this would happen. Once all the girls met me in the bridal suite for morning coffee and all- I got a call from Anne. This was the moment of truth. She said it was probably going to rain (honestly I can't remember the exact percentage now because I try to block out painful memories). I went out to the patio and shut the door. I asked her about options... they were 1- all inside, 2- all outside, 3- ceremony out, reception in.... the issue was the arch lady needed to set up early afternoon.. and the DJ wouldn't set up in both places. So at this point I couldn't make a decision so I called Ben.... then John... then finally Chris answered (they were playing golf then). Ben said we needed to just play it safe and do it inside even though that's not what we wanted or planned on. (Oh well) I'm glad he made the decision not me. The rest of the day was great... no nerves or anxiety minus having to tell everyone we had to have everything inside. People were upset for me... and I was too, but I honestly just wanted to forget about the "upsetting" part and just do it. Just have a good day without being made to feel like the "poor pitiful me"...
Halfway through the morning my mom had a breakdown and came into my room very upset. She felt like she needed to be entertaining me, my dad, and my grandparents. I pretty much just told her that she'd never be a mother of the bride again and needed to to just decide what SHE wanted to do for the day... without any influence from her mother, husband, or daughter. I honestly just wanted her to be happy. Thank god for my friends because I would've ended up crying and being a hot mess... Brittney and Melissa came at the perfect time and hugged mom and all was well again. After that we went down to get coffee, saw Ben's parents down there which was nice because they could let other people know about the change in venue... My bridesmaids, me, flower girl, mom, and brother went down to the beach and took pictures, hung out, drank our coffee and just enjoyed each other's company with the sand between our toes and the wind in our hair. Ha! Christopher took pics of us which was nice because he didn't feel the need to be in any of them... Ah, love my brother!
Then, we went to the beach restaurant for the bridal luncheon (plus brother). They ordered Mimosas... I finally got my cheeseburger... It was perfect minus the server being slow as molasses! Ha! Halfway through lunch my mom came by to say she was picking up my grandmother to get her hair done... so she proceeds to down my Mimosa... and Melissa's... and Brittney gave her 1/3 of her chicken quesadilla! I will pretty much never forget how much we laughed about it later... It was like hey, what's up, I'm gonna eat ur food and drink ur drinks, k bye! Nice Debbie... I have the best mom ever!
Then we went back to my bridal room and starting getting ready... :)
Posted Friday, April 13, 2012 6:02 PM
Well, the wedding's over but I wanted to start writing a blog just so I remember everything that happened. The plan was to be married on the beach in Hilton Head Island, SC. We had planned a fabulous DJ, florist, photographer, and menu to add to the celebration! Ben and I went down to HHI to make decisions regarding the little things. My mom and I went down the month before the wedding to finalize payments. We stayed at the hotel we were staying at for the wedding- the Marriott Resort and Spa which is a beautiful hotel on the beach. We decided on the Crazy Crab for the rehearsal dinner. The food and atmosphere was amazing! We were very happy with all our decisions and counting down the days until the wedding...
I worked the Sunday before the wedding, then was off the rest of the week to prepare for everything. I finished the wedding welcome baskets, final makeup choices, got waxed, and got the dreaded mani/pedi. I swear I'm just not good with going to salons... I had figured out exactly what I wanted earlier in the week, and I should've just shown them the picture I had instead of trying to explain it... to someone that doesn't speak English as their first language. Poor Brittney and my mom saw my wrath as the man that had been doing my nails told me he was done... and proceeded to lotion my arms. Ugh. I promptly freaked out, washed my arm off, and almost cried. Finally, Brittney (thank god) told me to show them the picture (duh jen!)... and the guy finally understood what I wanted. So I was a little bit mortified for almost crying at a nail salon... it would've been the first time I cried over anything wedding related. I didn't even cry when my wedding coordinator told me we couldn't have the cool lanterns, which I had already bought, because they are a fire hazard. Boo dumb fire codes! Ha.
Also during that week I attended a special wedding ShBam! This is the dance class that I go to with my mom and dad every Wednesday and Saturday (when I'm not working). My ShBam instructor got married on the same day as me, so we had been talking wedding stuff for the past 6 months plus! It was fun to do it with someone else too! Anyways, we both wore our veils, and I wore a wedding sash during the class... and my parents brought cupcakes for everyone. Hmm....cupcakes after working out- I think not! It was fun though.
So the day came when Ben and I had to drive down to HHI finally!!! We left early that morning to get there with plenty of time to check in and get together with the coordinator. We dropped off Karma with Ben's sister (she couldn't stay at the Marriott with us) and went to meet with Anne our wedding coordinator. I had been checking the weather like crazy... and of course there was 40% chance of rain for the wedding afternoon/night. We crossed our fingers in hopes that it was just "island beach weather" and it would blow over. More about that later... But anyways, we dropped off all the "things" with Anne and made our way to the hotel. Melissa and Christopher had already checked in and were hanging out at the pool when we got there.. and Juli was hanging out in her car because she had finally gotten Mikayela down for a nap. Ha! We ended up being able to check in at 4pm... and the room was not what we thought it would be. It wasn't on the 10th floor as was promised, and it was basically a pool view. We almost changed rooms, but there were a bunch of college students that would've been next door... and we didn't have alot of time to move rooms since rehearsal was at 5pm. We did end up getting to the rehearsal on time.... and was able to do it on the beach instead of inside. Anne seemed to be confused and didn't know what we wanted even though we had been talking about it for months AND went over with her a few hours prior. But honestly, non of this mattered because 1- I didn't see any of it and 2- the entire ceremony all I could see was Ben... I didn't even know where the photographer was! The rehearsal went as well as it could be... at least everyone knew what was going on regardless of how Anne make it seem. We made it to the rehearsal dinner... (which was supposed to be outside on the patio, but when we walked in we were at two separate tables inside... boo times 5 at this point) Once we sat down and ordered drinks I was fine. I guess I just felt like all the planning and communicating was for nothing and people weren't really listening to me... at least I had my very best friends there along with an amazing family. I really can't complain. We had a great seafood dinner and the bridal party ended up going out to the beach with Ben's ipod dock... We hung out on the beach for a few hours just dancing, singing, hanging out, and taking pics... and laughing!!! It was a great time! Juli and Mikayela stayed in my room the night before the wedding, and Ben stayed with Christopher and Melissa. It was a good time for me and Juli to catch up and look at the bachelorette party pics! I ended up with a stomach ache... probably nerves? I barely slept that night at all... excitement and worry about the weather...