After my sister and I came home from the bachelorette on Friday, we got right to work getting everything packed up and ready to go downtown. My parents were so gracious in loading up the cars with luggage and décor boxes while I showered and repacked my bag for the next two days.
And Benjamin, you ask? Ben was HUNGOVER AF. Apparently, his ex-coworker had pulled the ol’ “when you see his drink empty, bring another” trick with the server the previous night.
He somehow managed to rally and we set off for the city at 2:00 PM. Three hours to drive in, drop everything off, and check into the Drake, where I would finish getting ready. Plenty of time!
When you’re planning out all the costs to get a wedding ceremony and reception off the ground, it’s sometimes easy to forget about the rehearsal dinner. … read more
Kicking Off the Wedding Weekend: Beach Wedding Rehearsal
We’ve finally come to the point where I can start the Eel wedding recaps! We received the last of our professional wedding photos, and I can’t wait to share them with you all. But before we get to the actual wedding day, let’s rewind to Thursday, August 18, 2016.
It was an overcast and rainy day, which was not a good sign for our upcoming outdoor Saturday wedding. The forecast was rain for the remainder of the weekend, but I tried to push that out of my mind as we got ready to leave for our beach house. It turned out to be a task that wasn’t very hard to do as there was so much to be excited about waking up that morning—Mr. Eel was officially on vacation, BM C and her husband were flying in from Santa Barbara that morning, and the rest of our wedding party was en route to meet us at the beach house for a weekend sleepover (and not to mention a wedding).
The view from the patio of our beach house on Thursday: The weather left much to be desired, but you can’t go wrong with ocean front property, a hammock, and a crazy beautiful view.
As soon as we all arrived, we cracked open some beers and wine, and kicked off our wedding weekend. It was a relaxed afternoon spent with our closest friends and just what I needed to calm my nerves before our wedding day. That night I took my bridesmaids, mom, and future mother-in-law to dinner at a local restaurant known for their massive prime rib, while Mr. Eel and the boys (his groomsmen, my dad and brother, and my future stepfather-in-law) stayed back at the beach house and ordered pizza.
Because apparently it’s not one day anymore. At least, not when 75% of guests are coming from out of town, you haven’t spent a ton of time with your East Coast family in a while, and everyone’s excited for as much togetherness as possible.
Now, while that sounded a little whiney, I really am happy to get to spend lots of time with family. It’s the planning that’s got me overwhelmed. So what “wedding-related events” are we having?
Thursday Night: The World Champion Chicago Cubs vs. the almost-as-good LA Dodgers at Wrigley. Mr. W’s older son is a HUGE Dodgers fan, my dad’s a huge Cubs fan, and they’re playing each other. It’s a good chance to get Mr W.’s kid to one of the most classic stadiums in baseball, to relax, have a few beers, and just enjoy each other’s company. I think we’re booking a block of 10 tickets for my dad, my mom, Mr. W, W sons, me, and whoever else wants to go. First come, first serve. I know my buddy Mike is in. I’m hoping my sister will be able to make it. We’ll see.
Can’t think of a better place to unwind | Image via Fox Sports
Friday Day: NOTHING. I’ll be doing centerpieces and favors with Mr. W and a few family members/friends. We’re going to put together a list/map of our favorite things to do in Chicago and encourage guests to explore one of the greatest cities on earth.
I know it’s been a while, but I’m back on the recap wagon! Life hit Mr. Blue Moon and me hard right after the wedding, as we’re tackling constantly changing hours at his place of employment and both working through our first semester of grad school.
For those of you who are just now tuning in to the Blue Moon wedding weekend, I kicked things off with a spa day and bridesmaids’ luncheon with some of my favorite ladies! I’m so glad we started with these two events before the official festivities began, because they really helped calm my nerves and get me in a relaxed frame of mind before becoming a bride.
After the luncheon ended, many of our out-of-town guests were beginning to arrive, so we headed back to Mr. Blue Moon’s parents’ place as a central meeting point to greet everybody.
My best friends from college sent goofy photos while en route to Nashville to keep us entertained.
To reiterate for the 1,000th time, I was not thrilled with life the month before the wedding, and that really came to a head the day of our rehearsal dinner. I was feeling so overwhelmed by everything, and just ready for this whole ordeal to be over.
We mobilized first thing in the morning on Friday and got to the venue for setup. Eventually I split off for a bit to get my nails fixed, while Mr. Dreamcatcher and team continued prepare the room. After a few hours, it was starting to look like a wedding!
Sorry for the long delay in posting our recaps. Life got busy! I plan on finishing these in the next few weeks, and I’m so excited to share it all with you.
We left off with everyone arriving the week of the wedding. It was so fun having our family and friends arrive to our home. While North Dakota really wasn’t the top destination wedding location, I love that we got to show our home to people. That was the biggest reason to keeping it in Nodak, and I’m so glad we did.
The morning before the wedding was hectic to say the least! We had the set-up in the reception hall in the morning, and the wedding rehearsal in the afternoon, followed by the dinner! It was snowing and slushy, so I knew it was going to be a wet occasion, but everyone worked really hard to get it all done quickly.
I had already spent the weekend before arranging all of our decor in boxes where it needed to be, so we got my truck loaded up quickly, and then I bossed everyone around while we set up. I loved seeing my vision slowly coming together—I was going for a sparkly, colorful event, and as it all went up, I couldn’t stop smiling. There were some things I didn’t 100% like but decided not to argue about, like the placement of my LOVE sign that I had made. It ended up on the wall behind our table, and I didn’t like how the cord looked on the wall. But it wasn’t worth trying to fiddle around with, and so I let it be. Overall, set-up was quick and painless, and made me happy.
It’s a good practice to rehearse your wedding ceremony before the fact, so everyone knows what to do. Our officiant and coordinator recommended it (and included it in their fees), so we decided to hold a rehearsal for our bridal party the day before the wedding. Unfortunately, our venue was booked for a wedding that night, so we were unable to rehearse at the actual wedding site. We decided instead to do it at the Mt. Pleasant Memorial Waterfront Park. We chose this park for a few reasons—most importantly, it was free. We just planned to stand on the grass somewhere. There was covered space (under the bridge), so we were OK for most weather. (If it had been raining hard, we would have just done it inside the hotel.) The park was a three minute walk from the hotel where most of our guests and bridal party were staying and where our welcome party was held a couple of hours later.
The Friday morning before the big day was a pretty crazy busy one—you know, all the prepping and stuff. Stepdaughter K and I woke up fairly early and, after a family breakfast, we headed off to the nail salon. We wanted a chance to spend some time together before all our friends and family arrived, and this was a perfect chance to do so. While K and I were getting our nails done, Mr. Farmer and Stepson R were doing a bit of last minute shopping. Something we completely forgot to tell the kids about was the dress code the Florian Gardens has.
You see, the Florian Gardens has a pretty strict time frame for when you can host your rehearsal, especially on a Friday, which has become a pretty popular day to get married. You could wear whatever you wanted except jeans. Thankfully, because we were aware of this beforehand (read those contracts, folks) we were able to let all of our bridal party know so they could dress accordingly. However, we neglected to let the kids know, so we both ended up doing some last minute shopping before the rehearsal to make sure the children were outfitted appropriately. Hey, you can’t win them all.
Anyway, after Mr. Farmer and R got R’s outfit all situated they were the welcoming committee for our arriving bridal party members. K and I were running a tad bit late, kind of a theme for me it seems, so we had very little time to get ready for the rehearsal when we got back. With a little help from K I was able to throw myself together and be presentable enough.
The week leading up to our wedding wasn’t really eventful—or maybe it was and I’ve just blocked that part out of my memory. I’ve already mentioned that some tasks took some last minute effort, and others got scratched from the list, and I spent a significant chunk of my time checking the weather. The Monday before the wedding was Memorial Day, so we had an extra day off of work to take care of those last minute items. We had done most of the hard work a few weeks before, which involved packing up all that glassware, labeling the boxes, and loading them into my parents’ giant van, but there were still a million things on the to-do list.
The madness, and the result
But you don’t want to hear about the week-of crazies, no more than I want to relive them. The biggest item to get done was on Wednesday: Sphinx, his parents, my mom, and some other awesome helpers delivered all that decor to the Board of Trade, and they stored it in a back room. This was so helpful, because we didn’t have to worry about transporting all that glassware to the guy who would set it up, and we got it out of our hair a few days in advance.
