a fun fun fun wedding weekend

I am waiting ever so patiently to have access to Roxanne's professional wedding photos. I have a feeling they are going to be spectacular.  Roxanne and Jonny are off Honeymooning, so I'm sure we won't see the pictures until they get back and they can take care of that transaction.  In the meantime, we do have photos from family and friends. Here's some of the fun we had before, during and after the wedding.

Roxanne bought a strapless wedding dress that we all loved and I was sure I could re-make and build a bodice and sleeve that would go with the style of the dress.  I told her we could get it done before the end of February and not have that to worry about.  In actuality, it was done and steamed and ready to wear 48 hours before the wedding.  I thought she and I might have long-term emotional damage to our relationship over the near disastrous project I took on for which I clearly did not have an adequate skill set.  (By the way, thank you Juanita and Vicki for giving me some sewing direction and advice.)  We took a layer off the bottom of the dress to make the front bodice and sleeves, but ran out for the back, so I valiantly searched every store in town and found something that perfectly matched the color, but was too shiny.  We decided we would take clear mat spray paint and spray over the fabric to take the shine off.  But I had to do a fire resistance test on the fabric first.  She was going to be ending the evening at the reception walking under a hundred sparklers and I didn't want the shoulders of her dress to go up in flames.  It worked, and the shine was dulled down a bit and nothing caught on fire.  All is well.

Also, I was asking Rachel to do some research on where we could buy sparklers this time of year.  She sent me a text - call this guy, he doesn't have a store, but he will meet you and the prices are good.  I ended up going across town and buying fireworks out of the trunk of his car.  I felt like I needed to give him a code name and a secret handshake to make the cash transaction.

Dave was so excited about the party, he was promoting it all week.  "Make sure you come. There are so many lights in the yard, you can see it from space".

Melanie made a run to Costco to meet up with Shannon to pick up the flowers and I also had a large order of dinner rolls waiting to be picked up.  Apparently, I didn't communicate the whole assignment to Melanie.  She took the long way around Costco until she found the floral dept, so she had already walked about a mile, then after getting the flowers ready to load up, Shannon sent her over to the bakery for the rolls.  Since she didn't know she was getting rolls, she heard "bowls" (maybe they were to put the flowers in??). It didn't make sense, but she dutifully asked the bakery staff for some bowls. They looked at her like she was clearly crazy, then Melanie tried to reason with them, maybe Shannon had sent her for 'boxes' for the flowers? Again they looked at her like she was crazy. Melanie hiked the mile back across the store and clarified that she was picking up rolls. (Dinner rolls from the bakery? Well, now that makes sense!) Aren't the flowers spectacular?? Thank you Shannon!

Jonny and Roxanne went out the day before their wedding for a photo shoot. The photographer kept calling Jonny the wrong name all morning. (Tony? who's Tony?)
Roxanne: "There are ants on this log!"  Photographer: " Oh don't worry. The ants should be fine. The last bride had grasshoppers on her dress when we finished." 

Melanie shows up on our work day, we're all ready to decorate: "I don't have much to offer, but I have an orange safety cone in my car if you need it for anything."

Brady's head was about to explode when he realized that the decorating was going to be not only all day, but into the night too. But I think he got into the spirit of things by the time the party started.  "So Brady, will anyone be able to top this wedding?"  Brady: "The first wedding in our family will NOT be the best one!"

I fell in love with chalkboard markers!


After the guests were seated at the ceremony, there were a few minutes before Roxanne and Jonny came in. Grandpa: "Should I get up and sing for everyone?" Me: "Shhh, No! We're in the temple". Grandpa: "Oh, that's right. Ok, I'll sit quiet."

After the temple ceremony, we walked out onto the temple grounds for some family and friends photos.  Poor Jonny had some horrible allergic reaction to the olive trees.  There were several photos with him posing like this: (it didn't stop us from taking about a bazillion pictures, Sorry Jonny)
:

A mid air jump is always a fun shot, however, there is an issue with dresses flying up inappropriately.  Melanie tried to make sure her dress stayed where it should stay.

It is impossible for so many photos to be taken and not have some of these:



Grandpa was thinking we were taking a very long time with the photos.

Mom and Wayne needed to leave after the temple ceremony.  There were the obligatory pictures on the steps of the temple, then they told me they needed to sneak away.  I told them they better sneak away and RUN down the sidewalk or someone would think of a yet one more group picture they needed to be in.

No one in our group drinks, so the wedding toasts involved plastic cups of water.  I hope that still makes the toast valid.

My nephew and his wife, Dave and Chelsea, graciously offered to do some video of the festivities this weekend. But along with the video, they took a lot of pictures.  A LOT!  During the luncheon, someone at my table pointed over at Dave taking pictures at the buffet table.  "I think he's taking pictures of the grated cheese."

It was a long day, there was a bit of relaxing before the reception started.  A couple people were laughing that Roxanne had accepted their Facebook friend request at 4 pm on her wedding day.  "What is Roxanne doing on Facebook on her wedding day???"  (Actually, people were posting some photos of the morning and she wanted to see the first pictures)
Suzanne: I have been talking to you for weeks about this wedding and I didn't know it would look like this.  Me: Heck Suzanne, I didn't even know how it would look until it started coming together on Friday.

Penny and Suzanne were prepping food before the reception.  Penny's work apron had come untied around her neck and the top half was dangling from her waist.  Suzanne: "Penny is cutting all this watermelon topless!"

There was a lot of conversations among my kids and their cousins about bringing a date to the reception. Ben was trying to decide whether or not it would be to his advantage to have a date, or be available to the possibilities of the young adult masses that would be in attendance.  Melanie almost brought a friend to the reception.  "Roxanne, I'm bring someone to the reception." "You can't bring a random person to my party"  "Yes I can, he's my +1"

I asked my friends to help me make much of the food - prepping ahead of time.  But my math didn't quite work out.  I cooked a bag of pasta, then measured with a serving spoon - and figured there were 10 servings per bag.  Then there was a math equation involving the estimated number of guests, size of servings, those who might have two plates, those who won't have any, and some extra just to be sure. Then they cooked and seasoned a load pasta and we packed it in an ice chest to use through the evening.  When the evening ended, the ice chest was still completely full (sorry Kristi, Suzanne, and Melissa for wasting your day cooking pasta) apparently we needed about 1/4 of what I calculated. I figured about right with many things, but there was SOOO much pasta left over. Go figure. (But there really were a lot of other things to put on the plates too)

By the way - this is Debbie. She is the magic behind the magic.

Sunday afternoon naps were abundant - bodies everywhere lying around our house after church.

What a fun fun weekend.  I'll post more later. I'm sure I will post pictures until everyone tires of them and unfriends me. And then I will post some more!