Today is my anniversary. 14 years ago today, Husband and I decided we'd be together. That we were in it for the long haul. And 10 years ago today, we made it official.
I can't say those 14 years have all been sunshine and unicorns, but through it all I've had my best friend holding my hand. Here's to the next 14. I love you Pants.
***The rest of this post originally appeared in July 2010 on {Not} The Very Best Housewife. But the entertainment value is too great not to share again. So please enjoy the disaster that was my wedding.***
George Clooney's Got Nothing On Me
My wedding was a perfect storm of things gone wrong (not even counting the facts that it was two weeks after 9/11 and none of my extended family wanted to fly and didn't come or that my sister and co- maid of honor had only been out of the hospital after giving birth to her first child for about 3 days). It was a mess, but I was married at the end of the day so the rest was just material for stories later.
There is more crazy about that day, and the months leading up to it, than I could put in a hundred posts...so I'm just going to hit the highlights for you.
1) Months before the wedding, maybe even before the engagement, I found the dress. THE DRESS. I cut it out of magazines, made a folder exclusively for it, and hunted it down within a 3 hour radius of where I lived. I got the dress. The only hitch was that the dress had been discontinued by that point and the store only had one left. It was a size or two too small. I fit into it, but only if I didn't breathe. I bought the dress certain that before any alterations had to be done I would really fit into it. A month before the wedding we went for alterations. I had a small panic attack when the dress still didn't fit. I had not lost the weight. They could not alter it so that circulation would continue in the lower half of my body. I had to buy a new dress. I bought a second dress that day. It fit. Looking back it was not me at all. This pic is the second dress...
So new dress in hand I start the alteration process again. We went through the first round, I went back to try it, a few more tweaks were needed. I went back after the second alterations, the day before the wedding, and the sleeves had been altered to the point that I could not raise my arms more than about 15 degrees away from my body. We had so much to do that day...rehearsals, rehearsal dinner, gathering out-of-town guests...that I could not address it.
This is my mother cutting said sleeves off my dress the day of the wedding. You read that right. The DAY OF THE WEDDING. I was headed out the door to get my hair and make-up done when this picture was snapped. That's my uncle sitting with her. He was an industrial engineer so he felt certain between the two of them they could fashion some sort of new sleeves out of the random yard of fabric they found in my parent's laundry room. Surprisingly they did.
2) As I left my mom, my uncle and my dismantled dress behind, mere hours before the wedding, and headed to my beautifying it started to rain. Really rain. We were getting married outside. Good times.
3) Once we got to the wedding site...still in the rain...we found that the man who was marrying us was not there. He was late. And I don't just mean that he was later than we expected. I mean we started the wedding half an hour later than intended because he was not there. I never did find out what his hold-up was...
4) While we were waiting, I decided to go to the bathroom one more time. Anyone who has tried to do this in a wedding dress knows it's no easy feat. It took awhile. Apparently everyone arrived during this time and they decided to start the wedding. I came out of the bathroom to find that all of the families and half of the wedding party had already gone down the aisle. Guess they didn't think the bride was worth waiting for...
5) The rain did eventually stop, a few minutes before the ceremony. Something in the aisle runner when mixed with water became extremely sticky. I ended up walking out of my shoes completely, having to stop, back up and peel them off the runner.
6) The ceremony itself went along with no major issues. Once we started taking pictures afterward though I noticed something on Husband's face. I reached for it and he jerked away. He had cut himself shaving that morning. Pretty badly. So he had put a piece of toilet paper on his face to stop the bleeding. It was stuck there. We got married while he had toilet paper stuck to his face.
Seriously people...I could do this all day.
7) I'll just do one more though. My soon to be father-in law, who almost didn't come to the wedding because it was during hunting season...awesome, apparently lost his regular glasses the day before they left for the wedding. In a crafty move he grabbed the only other glasses he had that were prescription. They were safety goggles. My FIL wore safety goggles to our wedding. Don't believe me? Here's photographic evidence...note the plastic side walls to protect from any stray wedding shrapnel.
As many things as went crazy wrong, I still ended up Mrs. Husband at the end of the day. That's all I wanted. And along the way there were some beyond fantastic moments...lots of laughing and lots of love. There are so many things that are forever imprinted in the memories of our family. So many things that we still laugh about.
I can't say those 14 years have all been sunshine and unicorns, but through it all I've had my best friend holding my hand. Here's to the next 14. I love you Pants.
***The rest of this post originally appeared in July 2010 on {Not} The Very Best Housewife. But the entertainment value is too great not to share again. So please enjoy the disaster that was my wedding.***
George Clooney's Got Nothing On Me
My wedding was a perfect storm of things gone wrong (not even counting the facts that it was two weeks after 9/11 and none of my extended family wanted to fly and didn't come or that my sister and co- maid of honor had only been out of the hospital after giving birth to her first child for about 3 days). It was a mess, but I was married at the end of the day so the rest was just material for stories later.
There is more crazy about that day, and the months leading up to it, than I could put in a hundred posts...so I'm just going to hit the highlights for you.
1) Months before the wedding, maybe even before the engagement, I found the dress. THE DRESS. I cut it out of magazines, made a folder exclusively for it, and hunted it down within a 3 hour radius of where I lived. I got the dress. The only hitch was that the dress had been discontinued by that point and the store only had one left. It was a size or two too small. I fit into it, but only if I didn't breathe. I bought the dress certain that before any alterations had to be done I would really fit into it. A month before the wedding we went for alterations. I had a small panic attack when the dress still didn't fit. I had not lost the weight. They could not alter it so that circulation would continue in the lower half of my body. I had to buy a new dress. I bought a second dress that day. It fit. Looking back it was not me at all. This pic is the second dress...So new dress in hand I start the alteration process again. We went through the first round, I went back to try it, a few more tweaks were needed. I went back after the second alterations, the day before the wedding, and the sleeves had been altered to the point that I could not raise my arms more than about 15 degrees away from my body. We had so much to do that day...rehearsals, rehearsal dinner, gathering out-of-town guests...that I could not address it.
This is my mother cutting said sleeves off my dress the day of the wedding. You read that right. The DAY OF THE WEDDING. I was headed out the door to get my hair and make-up done when this picture was snapped. That's my uncle sitting with her. He was an industrial engineer so he felt certain between the two of them they could fashion some sort of new sleeves out of the random yard of fabric they found in my parent's laundry room. Surprisingly they did.2) As I left my mom, my uncle and my dismantled dress behind, mere hours before the wedding, and headed to my beautifying it started to rain. Really rain. We were getting married outside. Good times.
3) Once we got to the wedding site...still in the rain...we found that the man who was marrying us was not there. He was late. And I don't just mean that he was later than we expected. I mean we started the wedding half an hour later than intended because he was not there. I never did find out what his hold-up was...4) While we were waiting, I decided to go to the bathroom one more time. Anyone who has tried to do this in a wedding dress knows it's no easy feat. It took awhile. Apparently everyone arrived during this time and they decided to start the wedding. I came out of the bathroom to find that all of the families and half of the wedding party had already gone down the aisle. Guess they didn't think the bride was worth waiting for...
5) The rain did eventually stop, a few minutes before the ceremony. Something in the aisle runner when mixed with water became extremely sticky. I ended up walking out of my shoes completely, having to stop, back up and peel them off the runner.
6) The ceremony itself went along with no major issues. Once we started taking pictures afterward though I noticed something on Husband's face. I reached for it and he jerked away. He had cut himself shaving that morning. Pretty badly. So he had put a piece of toilet paper on his face to stop the bleeding. It was stuck there. We got married while he had toilet paper stuck to his face.
Seriously people...I could do this all day.
7) I'll just do one more though. My soon to be father-in law, who almost didn't come to the wedding because it was during hunting season...awesome, apparently lost his regular glasses the day before they left for the wedding. In a crafty move he grabbed the only other glasses he had that were prescription. They were safety goggles. My FIL wore safety goggles to our wedding. Don't believe me? Here's photographic evidence...note the plastic side walls to protect from any stray wedding shrapnel.As many things as went crazy wrong, I still ended up Mrs. Husband at the end of the day. That's all I wanted. And along the way there were some beyond fantastic moments...lots of laughing and lots of love. There are so many things that are forever imprinted in the memories of our family. So many things that we still laugh about.
Especially great was dancing with my dad to James Taylor's Mexico. It's a fast song, an unexpected father-daughter dance song, but one with lots of history. My dad and I used to dance to it when I was little, with my small feet on top of his grown-up ones. Then we took dance lessons and choreographed something for the wedding, we were hysterical through the whole thing. By the time the song was over my side ached from laughing. And then last week, on my vacation, my dad danced to it with my daughter...talk about full circle.So all of that boils down to my advice for anyone who is getting married...the wedding is just that...a wedding. It's a very expensive party. The important part is what comes after. If you take the things that will inevitably go wrong on that day with a grain of salt, it will help put you in the right frame of mind to start your marriage. No matter what, if you're married to your best friend at the end of the day, then it was a success.
