May

Quite a few things have happened since I posted last. Awana ended for the year. Our family went to MD/VA for Jess's graduation. My car (the ford escape) broke down on the way home. Jessica got married. I went to NC for a week. I came home. Most of us went on an overnight canoeing trip. I've uploaded pictures of all of those things (except the canoe trip) on facebook and google+, so I'm not going to put pics in this post (and if you still need a link to either of those places to see the pics, let me know!).

Today's post is going to be about the wedding. Jessica came back a week and a half before the wedding. I got done with finals the day she got home, so we were able to hop right into serious wedding prep mode. We tied ribbons around bubbles, made tissue paper flowers, and went shopping. On Saturday, Emily flew in, and Grandpa Bob and Grandma Suzy arrived. I have to say that Emily was an amazing help. She was fun to be with, really helpful, and a nice stable influence in the chaos.

Monday night, Rachel came up and Jess, Annetta, Emily, Rachel, and I had a sleepover down at the bachelor pad (aka Grandpa's house) to test out the accommodations. We did practice makeup, ate snacks, painted nails, and watched a movie. Then we slept. And I use the word "slept" in a fairly loose and general sense of the word. Tuesday morning was Decorate the Church Day. We got most of it done. We set up for the reception, decorated the sanctuary, and even managed to hang the paper lanterns from the ceiling. After discovering that both fishing line and floss are very stretchy, we used baling twine and it worked great.

Wednesday evening, we did a little more decorating in the evening. I think that morning was when we went shopping for flowers/cake and chocolate for the chocolate fountains. We got two chocolate fountains from a church friend, but both had issues. So we got another chocolate fountain from a friend of ours, but it had issues at the reception and we ended up having the chocolate in a crock pot. That worked just fine...people skewered their fruit and dunked them in chocolate, or put a scoop of chocolate on their plate. At any rate, the chocolate fountain saga added some intrigue to the wedding story, and in a few months I'll be able to laugh heartily.

Thursday evening, the Derrs came, as well as all but one of the groomsmen. Kevin and Lisa (his sister) surprised us all by coming up early Wednesday night, but everyone else came Thursday evening. We had supper, and then went back down to the church for some last minute decorating. The decorations really did look good. We did the first set of decorating, and Thursday night was when a lady from our church came with her decorating stuff and added the finishing touches. Kevin was abducted by the guys to go watch some movie (something about star trek, I think) at a theater, so we girls finished up and went home and watched a movie. We watched My Big Fat Greek Wedding...a movie I've heard about, but hadn't seen. Jess's college friends Courtney and Allison came later that evening...Allison is the one who did the girls hair, and Courtney was all around awesome!

Friday morning, we ate breakfast and hung around talking, and then most of us played a rousing game of Fishbowl. Rachel got dropped off a little before noon so she could come to the rehearsal lunch and then spend the night. Lunch was pizza and salad at the church, and it was really good. The rehearsal went very smoothly, too. We had already basically figured out how we wanted the bridal party to stand, so all we had to do was position everyone and make sure it looked good with the actual people instead of random siblings/friends as fill ins! So we practiced the ceremony part, and the walking into the reception, and went home.

When we got home, we found that the guys vests and pants had arrived. (Jess and Kevin had been planning on picking them up Thursday afternoon, but due to an error on the store's part, the suits had been delivered to the wrong stores, so most of them were in MD. Not good.  The outfits were overnighted to Erie, and then the manager personally delivered them). The drawback to getting the suits delivered was that we had absolutely no wiggle room with the sizes we got. (No pun intended ;P ) Ardee, Andrew, and Josiah's suits looked fine. Tony and Ben's vests were basically billowing out behind them...we tightened them as much as we could, and they were still too big. So, Rachel and I spent about a half hour adjusting, pinning, pinching, and tucking before we determined how to fix it, and then we spent another hour-ish hand sewing two side seams in the back of their vests. Some pricking may or may not have occurred...some may o may not have been intentional...but Ben and Tony did a fine job of letting us sew and seam rip their vests. And frankly, I liked how ours turned out better than the original version.

Friday night, we (we =  most of the bridal party, plus Allison and Courtney, and anyone else who was at our house) watched the movie Hitched. It got done around midnight, and we said our goodnights and headed off to try to sleep before eeeeeek the wedding!

So, Saturday morning arrived! I woke up around 6 am, and Rachel (who slept in my room) and I started chattering. Jess heard us and came in and we talked a little bit. Allison started with my hair around 7:30, and so the morning (well, from 7:30 to about 10 or 11) was filled with breakfast, hair, and makeup. Rachel did most of my makeup...Elizabeth came up and started whipping Lydia, Hosanna, Joanna, and Katrina into shape :) Rachel and I waled across the road to a lilac bush and picked two bouquets for Jess...one for real and one for just in case. I drove down to the church to get ribbon. Mrs Arnold, the photographer, and her assistant arrived and started taking pictures. The guys, meanwhile, ate breakfast, cleaned Kevin's car, got ready, and took pictures.

Around 10:15 or so, Jess and Kevin had their first look and things started happening for real :) the girls dashed upstairs to don our dresses, and then we went outside to have bridal party and immediate family pictures. We got done around noon, so we packed vehicles and ate lunch. Around 1:15 or so, we loaded up and went to the church. The guys lit candles and the ushers got ready to ush, and the bridal party girls retired to the ladies bathroom! We sprayed perfume on, talked, helped Jess get all ready, and then we prayed for her. Then we took a few pictures and it was time to line up on the stairs! We walked out of the bathroom into the fellowship hall, where we watched on the tv monitor what was happening upstairs. We could hear the Pride and Prejudice soundtrack playing the prelude music. Then it stopped and Mrs. Berndt started playing for the seating of the grandparents. We lined up on the stairs, and Mrs. Berndt started playing the song for the lighting of the candles by the mothers. Emily and I unbustled Jess's train. Daddy came from escorting Mama and stood with Jess. Then Mrs. Berndt started playing the bridesmaid song, and Elizabeth (thanks so much, Elizabeth!!) nodded at Jenn to go. And then Rachel. And then Annetta. And then Emily. And then me. The guys were all perched in their places, already. I got up to my piece of tape and had enough time to see about 1/3 of Josh and Katrina's walk down...Katrina did a great job throwing petals and smiling, and Josh did a good job letting her hold his arm. Then Mrs. Berndt started playing the bridal march, the doors opened, everyone stood up, and Daddy and Jess walked down to Kevin.

The rest of the ceremony went fine. Pastor gave his exhortation. Christina did a fabulous job playing her violin. I adjusted Jess's dress every time she moved. Daddy gave an exhortation that made everyone cry. They said their vows. Andrew and I didn't lose the rings. They lit the candle. They kissed. He carried her down the aisle. And then it was time for us to walk out and stand in the receiving line. After the receiving line, Andrew and I got to sign the marriage license/witness signatures/whatever it was we did, and then it was time for us to head into the reception. Jess and Kevin cut the cake, Rachel and Andrew gave toasts, we decorated the getaway car, ate food, and talked to some people. After everyone left, we cleaned up...basically it was our family, the Der family, the bridal party, and a few friends. It was a lot faster coming down than it was going up :) We were home by somewhere around 8, I think. And we ate leftovers and watched a movie and talked and basically crashed.

Sunday morning, we had breakfast with the people who were still here (I guess that would be the Derrs plus Ardee), and then they left to go back home.

And that was the wedding.Tune in next time to hear about other stuff!