The Wedding Week
I picked up my mom at the airport on Monday night and Kevin and I took her to dinner at Mexicali Rose. This was the site of one of our very first dates and is located just a block away from where Kevin first lived when we started dating. It?s got a very interesting interior and has been voted Best Restaurant in New Jersey the last five years in a row. She loved it.
After dinner she and I went back to her hotel and we hung out for a while. It was nice just hanging with my mom.
The next morning I picked her up and we had breakfast at a place called the Tick Tock Diner before heading over to the train station. It took forever to find parking but once we did it was all good. We headed into New York and from Penn Station walked north on Fifth Avenue to the Plaza Hotel while stopping to window shop along the way. We had a blast. I love Tiffany?s. I saw the most wonderful necklace that I am still coveting.
After we were done playing we headed over to the Imperial Theater and saw The Boy From Oz starring the hotter-than-hot Hugh Jackman. ::sigh:: So pretty! We had kick-ass seats. I mean, really. We were roughly twenty feet from the stage and dead center. He looked right at me twice. It was amazing. Hi, Hugh!
The next morning my mom and I got manicures and pedicures and then went to a tea-house in Sussex County where I introduced her for the first time to Kevin?s mom and sister. We had so much fun drinking tea and eating these teeny little finger sandwiches. It was a riot. Yes, I said a riot.
The following day MORE family flew in and it was a bit of a debacle. My dad arrived at Terminal A and my aunt and cousins arrived at Terminal C and then we had to rent them a car at Terminal P2. Getting everyone to where they all needed to be was a little time consuming but it all got taken care of.
From the airport I took everyone back out to Sussex County where Kevin?s parents were having a barbeque. We all ate, drank and were merry. I had a great time. They had a shower for us and it was so fun to watch the families meld together.
The only bad part came when I had to drive all the way home to Bloomfield that night. I left at about ten and was dreading the hour in the car until up on the horizon I noticed something. Not only was the moon tremendous, but it was orange. The big, orange moon played hide-and-seek with me in the trees all the way home. It was a beautiful.
Friday was cloudy and chilly and for the first time I started to think that Saturday might not be nice weather. I packed my stuff for the weekend (stupidly forgetting things like PAJAMAS) and headed back up to Sussex County. We caravanned to the Inn at Panther Valley, checked in and a few minutes later my brother, sister and sister?s boyfriend showed up. We hugged and laughed and commented on how long the trip had taken. They drove from Iowa to Jersey in eighteen hours. Well, my sister?s boyfriend drove most of the trip so he gets major props for taking that one for the team and getting them all to the hotel safe and sound. Within another hour my friend Joy arrived and we went up to my room to hang out.
The rehearsal began at four and we practiced the outside version and the inside version. I was incredibly calm until at the end of the rehearsal when I was surrounded on all sides by people firing questions at me. It was a little overwhelming. That was the beginning of what would accumulate into a big, fat meltdown later the next day.
But I?m getting ahead of myself. From Panther Valley we went to the Lafayette House for the dinner and after a little bit more tension we all sat down and ate. I had two glasses of wine and some champagne and then I was pretty much good to go. We gave out our gifts for people and everyone had a great time.
After the dinner we all went our respective ways. My family back to Panther Valley, Kevin?s back to their house. A little bit of celebrating ensued. Laughing, talking, reminiscing, accusations of pregnancy?you know, the usual.
The next morning I was up at seven and at the hair place by eight. They did a beautiful job on my hair and at nine-thirty I was at the make-up place. By ten-thirty I was done and back at the room where I hung out with Joy, Kim, Jennie, Colleen, my aunt Kathy, my mom, and waited for the photographer to arrive. At about ten to twelve I got in my dress and we started taking pictures. Kevin and I displayed a flagrant disregard for propriety by having our pictures taken before the ceremony but let me tell you, it was so worth it. After the ceremony (which we?ll get to) we went right into cocktail hour and the reception. There was no waiting around with the pictures while my guests partied down in the next room.
Where was I? Oh, yes, the pictures. After the pictures the guys left the room and the girls all went downstairs where there was more tension and realizing that we would have to get married inside because of the weather and forgetting who doesn?t take checks and signing the license and what-not. I have to say that I was expecting this marvelous moment of catharsis when I would sign my name with a flourish, look up and be married. Didn?t happen. My sister signed, then our friend Bob signed and that was it. We were married. Before the ceremony and without me really noticing. It wasn?t a good feeling.
The pianist arrived then and needed to be shown where to go and my bridesmaids disappeared except for Jennie and Kim and there was another moment of tension when I couldn?t find anyone to help me answer all the questions being thrown at me by the minister, pianist and florist and others and it was all so overwhelming and difficult that I started to lose it in the lobby. My mom, Jennie, Kim and my aunt got me back to the room where I asked to be ?let out? of my dress. After taking it off I put on a denim shirt over my underwear, hose and heals and sat on the floor and seriously let go. I was crying so hard I got stomach cramps. It wasn?t pretty. My mom was great, though. She just held my shoulders, gave me Kleenex and kept telling me it was okay.
After I calmed down a bit and wiped my face I felt a lot better. The release had happened. When four o?clock came I was completely fine again. My mom and dad both walked me down the aisle and as I walked I saw nothing but smiling faces and happiness.
People told me later that during the ceremony I was beaming and I believe them because I felt like I was. Once we were up there I gave my flowers to my sister and Kevin and I just held hands and I sort of stopped paying attention to what the minister was saying which resulted in me answering one of the questions wrong ? luckily not the important question. The room had a good laugh and it broke the ice. After that I paid more attention.
We only had about forty people there and after we kissed they threw rose petals at us as we walked down the aisle to the receiving line. When that was over I went back to the getting-ready room changed out of my fancy white heals and into the pink cons I?d gotten when I visited Joy and we headed for the cocktail hour.
The great thing about having a small wedding is that we made all the rounds in that one hour and spent the rest of the night on the dance floor. Seriously. I danced every dance. Somebody told me I was the ?coolest little bride ever? because I only came off the floor to get water and pull people on. I had a blast. We danced to Fat Bottomed Girls, Bust-a-Move, Stuck in the Middle with You, Teenage Wedding, I?ve Loved These Days, Let it Bleed and more. I?ve never had so much fun at a wedding reception.
Throughout the reception I kept turning to people and announcing, ?I?m MARRIED!? partly in a state of excitement and partly in a state of shock. They kept answering, ?I know!?
Afterward, Kevin and I changed in our room and headed for the pub. We partied. Then we went back to the room with some friends and we partied some more. It was awesome.
Finally everyone left and we went to sleep. Yes, you read that right. It was late and we were both wasted.
Thought we were done? Not even close. The next morning I woke up at eight (I know, I?m a freak), met people for breakfast and coordinated the rest of the day.
I had rellies in town who wanted to see the city. Being the accommodating host that I am, I gladly arranged for us to go into New York. We had a such a great time. I showed them the Theatre District and Midtown. On the way to the city the bus driver told us the wrong gate number to catch the return bus so we were almost stranded but luckily we caught another bus to a stop that wasn?t too far away and Kevin picked us up. It was a bit of a debacle, but since he hadn?t gone into the city with us, it was all okay. Of course that meant that he and I didn?t spend our first day as a married couple together but it was fine.
It was my parents? last day in town so after he picked us up, we got my dad who had hung out at the hotel while we were in the city and went to dinner at a diner. After that we dropped them back off at the hotel and Kevin and I went home.
Once there we watched the Season Finale of the Sopranos (awesome), opened cards (a little shocking) and went to bed.
The next morning we picked up my parents at the hotel, took them to breakfast and then the airport and spent the rest of the day catching up on the practicalities of life. We did four loads of laundry, got all the grocery shopping done, checked the ten thousand emails received in the last few days, bought an air conditioner which we then proceeded to install incorrectly, took a walk around the park where we got engaged, watched Big Fish and went to bed.
Today was my first day back at work and it was a definite jolt. Now that all this nonsense is over look for more regular (i.e. daily) entries and as soon as I get some pictures.
Hey, you guys. I?m MARRIED!!!
