Weddingbee

The maid of honor (left) is in a dress from Banana Republic, and the bridesmaids are in J. Crew dresses (different styles all in the same fabric). I told them they could pick their own dresses as long as they were all blue, but they were having a lot of trouble coming to a decision so I had to lay down the Bride Law. They all picked their own shoes (obviously, hehe), and did their own hair and makeup and I think they all looked just perfect!

Me with MOH.

With one of the bridesmaids:

I love how you can see the barn in all of these photos! It was built in the mid-1800s.

Jane also took a few individual shots of the bridesmaids while we were getting ready.

And now…the most hilarious sequence of photos from our entire wedding!

First…best man sniffs?!?!? the side of Mr. Bluebell’s head. Mr. Bluebell has no idea.

Best Man realizes he got away with it!

And now…a normal picture. Mr. Bluebell seriously had NO IDEA about this and thought they were all normal photos until we got them back from Jane!!

And hopefully we’ll actually get to reception pictures next!!
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This is when my senses started heightening a little. They’ve been together nearly five years, and we were at a fancy restaurant and it was her birthday….

Then she pulled a CD out of the bag! They talked about that for a minute, and he said, oh and here’s the second card. She gave him a loooong look before opening it, and then, predictably, got a bit choked up after she read it. He then said “Should I?” and Mr. Bluebell and I, on the edge of our seats, are like “SHOULD HE WHAT?!?!?!?” But he explained that the card said all those mushy things they usually say to each other in cards, but don’t say aloud. Since C had previously pointed out that R is only ever mushy in card form, he ended the card with “and I want to say them aloud to you now.” So she nodded and he gave a beautiful little speech about how much he loves her.

Surprisingly, by this point, my guard was down. I thought it was a really sweet card and moment, but he’d already given her the birthday gift so we were about to go home now. But then at the very very end of his speech he suddenly repeated the same sentence about three times…and really, he’s an intelligent and well-spoken guy in general, so I was thinking “why would he just say the same thing over again?” before I realized it was because he was really really nervous.

Then right at that moment, he said, “C, will you marry me?”

Her first reaction was “Are you f***ing serious?!?”

Followed a moment later by all the appropriate mushiness and the shock at trying on the ring, and giddiness, and crying, and staring at the ring, and all that jazz.

The waiter came by after a minute to clear our plates and politely didn’t interfere in what was an obviously emotional moment, but I could tell he was trying to surreptitiously figure out what had happened, so I told him they had just gotten engaged! He was soooo cute and delighted and brought us over some celebratory pink champagne on the house! He said he had gone back and asked his manager if he could please comp it for us, and then she got all excited too and insisted upon it!

Regardless, the ring is gorgeous and we are so so happy for them!!

But mainly, CONGRATULATIONS C & R!!!! And thank you for letting us be a part of your proposal!!!

(image via citysearch) 
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My maid of honor’s toast was totally awesome. First she made everyone laugh…

…and then she made me cry!

The Best Man’s toast was similarly awesome even though it didn’t make me cry. Largely about how he and Mr. Bluebell used to play ninja-assassin when they were teeny kids.

And of course my family’s dog was the center of attention!

Even licking himself, he gets all the good photos.

Supercute pic of two of our friends watching the toasting.

Apparently, our dog thought it was getting a little dull at one point, so he started rolling around scratching his back and grunting in the middle of one speech!

The end!

Next, we’ll finally get to real reception photos!
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These lanterns were my pride and joy. I bought them because they were sooo cute and I had a vision of them lining the path through the woods. But…then it turned out that (a) there were a lot fewer trees lining the path than I remembered and (b) for no apparent reason, the lights all only had plugs on ONE END instead of both, so you can’t string them together?!?!?! That was incredibly upsetting and we were considering just doing one or two higher up and perpendicular to the path, but my uncle, brother, and family friend all teamed together and found a way to MAKE IT WORK!!! They strung lawnmower wire (like really really thick fishing line) allllll the way down the path and then attached the lanterns to the wire, AND attached a ton of extension cords to the middle of each pair of lantern cords. And much to surprise after resigning myself to just not getting that one thing I wanted - it came out exactly perfectly, even better than I was hoping for!!!

My family’s dog came to say hi as we were making the walk down.

….and we emerge! <picture by our friend Melissa>

Next up…toasts!
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The stationary table had:

• a variety of local Vermont and Quebecois cheeses
• a cast-iron pan filled with rosemary, roasted garlic, roasted mushrooms, mixed olives, roasted zucchini, fresh herbs, and goat cheese
• seared green beans in indo-sauce with sambal, molasses, garlic, and ginger
• grilled asparagus with maple syrup, sesame, and tamari
• mini-caprese: fresh mozzarella layered with tomatoes, basil, and balsamic vinegar
• roasted red potatoes with fresh herbs, smoked paprika, and sumac

They were all incredibly awesome!!!

During cocktail hour, we opened up the open bar (lots of local wines & beers), plus mojitos! They were the perfect refreshing cocktail for the day, so much so that they far exceeded our caterers’ estimate! They had calculated how many people would probably have beer, wine, and mojitos and only ordered the appropriate number of mojito glasses, but since everyone wanted mojitos, they ended up using most of the other glasses on mojitos too! (Luckily there were plenty of mojito-ingredients to go around so we didn’t run out of that!)

[above photo by our friend Leslie]

We also asked them to provide assorted sodas and juices for the kids & nondrinkers. There was a ton of good stuff, but the real star was clearly the homemade rootbeer!!! It was seriously almost as popular as the mojitos, even amongst the drinkers! Man, this stuff was awesome.

We also had passed appetizers, which were perhaps even more delicious, despite being less thoroughly photographed.

They were:

• Polenta triangles with caramelized red onion, pecorino romano, and balsamic vinegar
• Butternut squash wontons with squash, leeks, onion, herbs, and chili dipping sauce (despite trying to make our food as different and distinct from my brother’s wedding as possible, we just had to have this one specific dish even though they did because it was soooo good!)
• Mini eggplant parmigiana - small roasted slices of eggplant with fresh mozarella, homemade tomato sauce, and fresh herbs
• Phyllo triangles stuffed with fresh figs, onions, leeks, herbs and balsamic vinegar (pictured below)

When writing those down, I kept starting to write “I think this one was my favorite!” but then being like waiiit or maybe that one?! So I am officially not picking a favorite. They all rocked!!

More to come…
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With Mr. Bluebell’s parents and little brother.

With Mr. Bluebell’s brother (who facebook family-ed me back in the day!)

with my mom

This photo always makes me tear up.

Then we enjoyed a bit of the cocktail hour, took our portraits by the lake, did some toasts, and then got a few group shots of larger family groups.

…but first, Jane took one of my uncle (everyone always loves photographing him!)

For some reason, I love this picture of us all getting into position before we’re fully posed.

But don’t worry - there’s a posed version too!

And the other side of the family!

My beautiful sister-in-law (slash last minute DOC)

My “nephew” (brother and sister-in-law’s dog)

Isn’t he handsome?

My adorable little cousin with his pig!

And let’s not forget my family’s dog!! Best dog ever, just for the record.

An older cousin.

…and one last one of my mom!

All photographs by Jane Heller.
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