We did it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I can't believe we're actually married! The weather was miserable all day and we had lost a lot of great opportunities for photos as a result, so I am a little disappointed in that, but Tom took some amazing shots inside at Villa Lombardi's that really helped make up for it!
We're both going back to work tomorrow, since we're not leaving for San Juan until the 17th....I don't want to go to work BAH!
Very brief mini review...my day started out with a last minute email cancellation from my piece of garbage friend who ditched out on me 5 minutes before my shower too, and that really upset me even though I was fully expecting it. It's a blessing in disguise though, because that allowed me to give their seats away to Gail and Jen, who were already coming to CH, and were gracious enough to stay to enjoy the party. I really appreciate that and want to say a special thank you for coming and sharing my day to them!!!
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There was also some chaos involved with hair and makeup, although the end result turned out great. I used M-i-a, who was sending her assistant to prep my hair and do my mom's hair at 8, and then she was to arrive between 10-10:30 to do both our makeup and style my hair. The assistant ended up coming at 8:25 due to the weather, but M-i-a had another assistant call me at 10:20 to tell me that she was going to be 20 minutes to a half hour late. She then called herself at 10:35 to say she would be there in 15-20 minutes, which ended up being 35 minutes, so she didn't arrive till 11:10. At that point I was shizzing myself because the florist arrived just as she was settling in, so I had to take some time away from that to make sure they were all correct, and then the BP started arriving, and the photo/video team, and it just turned in to PANDEMONIUM. Hardcore. She did an absolutely fabulous job on me and my mom kicked up my color palette exactly how I wanted, and she is super sweet as well as her assistant, so it is hard to be mad at her, but it made us run a little behind schedule with photography and I would have felt more comfortable had they took the extra precaution given the weather to ensure timely arrival.
Burton's delivered earlier than scheduled, which was great, and everything was correct. The roses were a little tight, but they opened as the day went on. I guess you do get what you pay for though, because by the end of the night my flowers were starting to crisp and brown at the edges, but I'm OK with that because they were beautiful when they needed to be, and you all know how much I LOVE flowers
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They set up my CPs beautifully.
Thomas Paul and his crew was FABULOUS. I have said it all along, but I cannot say it enough how much I LOVED working with him over this past year and a half. We couldn't do much at my house because of time and space limitations, but he got beautiful and creative shots anyways. We also couldn't get too many shots at the church because of the weather and because another wedding was coming in after us. But since we had to leave at 4:40, we would have been at Villa Lombardi's over an hour ahead of schedule, and luckily we were able to do that, because we took full advantage of the extra time to get some sick, crazy, amazing, magazine quality art shots done there. WOW. From what I saw on the back of the screen I was blown away, I can only imagine the rest. I was deemed 'Gold Medal Bride' because I was completely willing to contort myself and climb on things and lay on couches and drape upside down over benches in my dress to get these crazy shots...but the end result I'm sure is SO WORTH IT. Can't say enough good things, and I'm eagerly awaiting my discs.
Our ceremony at the church was beautiful. It was decorated so nicely for Christmas, and is so ornate as it is, but I couldn't have asked for a better setting. Our priest is awesome, and he actually KNOWS us, so it was really nice that he was able to speak at the end of the ceremony (since there's no talking during it) about us and mean it, not just say it as a blanket statement. The Twilight programs were a hit! A few people got the joke and came up to me and were like this is AWESOME! Lol....the ribbon wands were a giant bust though, once again, due to the FLIPPING RAIN. We weren't able to use them, nor do I think anyone got what they were for. The BP used them for their entrances to the RH, so at least we got some use out of them.
Villa Lombardi's, as difficult as they were at times throughout the whole process, blew me away last night. Everything was just fabulous. Not a thing went wrong...or if it did, I didn't notice! Everything was set exactly how I wanted, the food was SICK, and it was just perfect. Our Maitre'D Kathy was amazing, she had everything under control and was attentive to all our needs. Our bridal attendant was also really good with helping out. We didn't get to eat toooooooooooo much, we were a little nervous, but we did get to enjoy CH and have our apps, a little salad, a little dinner, and dessert. They wrapped up our pasta course, which we didn't get to eat, and also DH's chicken, and gave us a huge tray of pork chops, lamb chops, chicken, cheesy potato croquettes, string beans and carrots to take home for dinner for the next day or so. And even bigger than that tray was the tray of pastries they gave us from the Viennese platters! There must be 50 canollis, tarts, eclairs, you name it. The decor was amazing and the room looked awesome all lit up with our CPs, pulled off my vision exactly with the dramatic red glow. I'm a little sad we couldn't use their grounds for pics, once again due to the facking weather, but oh well...the inside was gorgeous enough.
Tommy's Tunes was really great too. We had a very very specific must play list, and we really tried to cater to our own tastes as well as our family's, and they nailed it. Everyone was commenting on how thoughtful it was in DH's family, and even some of my younger guests was like this is so cool! Our MC was Dan and our DJ was Frank, but at points throughout the night they traded off, so it' s almost like we got 2 MCs! They did such a great job of extrapolating the other songs from the night based on what we liked. There was several Billy Joel songs, Journey, DMB, even ones that weren't on our must play list, and we were like this is awesome!!! The only *slight*, and I mean slight snafu was that they played the wrong version of the Zorba the Greek song, and FIL does his dance to it and was brought out to the center of the floor for it, and it was the fast all the way through version, not the classic one from the movie that starts slow, so he had to dance on speed LOL. Not a big deal, but we did ask for clarification on the song at our meeting and were told it would be the classic version, and FIL didn't seem to mind.
Well, that's about it! I can honestly say that all the stress, planning, tears, fighting, and anguish was worth it. We danced all night, we ate all night, we drank all night, we sang, we laughed, we didn't fight (!!!), and we seriously had the best time ever at our own wedding. We feel like it was the best one we ever went to, and it was ours!!!!
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It was so perfect...it went by really way too fast, but we really tried to soak it all in, and it was just all I could ask for and more.
Some of the non-pro pics are starting to trickle in....enjoy!
Nervous that we were LATE!
DH waiting for my entrance, knowing his fate is sealed, and looking the part haha.
First Kiss!!!
