My day started out super early, I woke up around 5am and could not fall back asleep. I read online for a bit, I tried crawling back into bed to relax but that wasn’t happening, so around 6:45am I hopped into the shower. I crawled back into bed with Dave (who was still sleeping, the lucky boy!) and asked him if he wanted his present now or later – he said now.

Our hair appointments started at 8am and mom picked me up about ten-till. The place was still dark at this point and we got worried – but then we saw the girl walking down the street! Five of us spend from 8am until about 11:30am in the hair salon getting ready – hair and makeup for all of us. It was a good time, we were all laughing and joking around. I actually ate a bagel and drank a sprite, which was way more than I thought I could eat. I was so impressed with the woman doing our hair and makeup – it was only one woman doing all of it and to do it in such little time! She was laughing and joking with us a lot, along with her secretary Mark who went to school at IU and was making fun of Indiana people with us.

On the way home, we called the house and found out that the photographer had been there since 11am (he was scheduled to be there at noon) but was worried about traffic. Getting to my parents house I went right to the fridge and ate a few pieces of fruit, thinking I could grab more later. I was made to brush my teeth and use the bathroom, as I was about to put my dress on. This is when all kinds of people started coming over, as well: grandma, aunt Ger, Aunt Elaine. I strip down and put on the slip and bra and am in the kitchen like this getting ready to put my dress on (all while the photographer is taking shots of this). Put the dress on, and I’m pretty much done. I start getting my posed pictures taken. As more of the people get dressed, they start getting added into the photos as well, and by this point the Ushers and readers were at the house, along with Jim, Tina, and our ring bearer. Took lots of pictures with all assortments of these people. It was a bit crazy-like because people kept walking away to do other things, and the photo-nazi would have to wait for them to get back. Jimmy was so cute in his little tux. He hated having the collar so tight, though. Flowers arrive, tried to get cate into the kitchen to see the hot flower-delivery boy, but didn’t happen. The flowers turned out better than I could have expected! They were so beautiful! On to the church…

I walked into the church and I saw David before he saw me. He was so handsome in his tux and shaved face! He turned to me and just sort of whispered, “You’re so beautiful!” Yeah! Got the flowers all handed out to everyone, and tried again and again to get everyone up to the front to get pictures taken. There were already some people in the church (at 90 minutes before the ceremony started!) and they were talking to my mom and dad. We took a million pictures. The film was all digital, so the photo-nazi could tell right away if the shot was good or not. That’s a good thing in most cases, but it also meant we had to take some shots five times because people blinked. IT WAS SO HOT IN THE CHURCH. I’ve been telling everyone not to get married in the summer. We went over with the priest how everything was going to work. It still was not feeling real. I don’t think I was nervous at this point – I was just very hot, slightly annoyed at the bizillion pictures, and very very excited. The whole time he was not in pictures, Jimmy was practicing walking down the isle. I still had my fears that he was going to chicken out.

More and more people were coming in at this point, so Dave and I thought we should ‘hide’ – keeping in mind that my church is super-old and doesn’t have a cool bride’s room, or anything of the sort. We were just sort of standing in the back of the church saying hello to people as they walk in. We finally decided on going into the Baptismal room, while off to the side, has glass doors. Didn’t stop a single person from coming in and talking to us. It probably didn’t help that I kept calling people in, either!. Finally, I promised Dave I would stop, when the organist walked in. We didn’t know if she had the music we wanted or not, so Dave had to run out and catch her to find out.

This was very frustrating because there were so much going on. My family was milling in the back of the church – not going to their seats, I remembered that the priest needed the marriage license and it was out in the car (Dad went to get it and had to come in like twice to ask where it was). I was getting nervous because it was getting to the time that the ceremony was to start. We called our ushers over and my mom and told them to get everyone seated. The next five minutes FLEW by! Before I knew it, we were all lined up to walk down the isle. Parents got to head down the isle, an of the wedding party, Jill went first. Jimmy was next and we all just had to see it. Instead of staying hidden, we all were looking around the corner to watch him walk down the isle (they were walking to Cannon in D). Cate’s up. Since there was only one Maid of Honor and two best men, when the boys met the girls in the middle of the church, she had a guy on either arm. I had to look down to see my sister being all pimp-like.

My turn. The music changed. I see a look of confusion on everyone’s faces, and then they all start to smile – some people were really cracking up. Our organist found the music and I got to walk down the isle to the Death March. It was so funny! It took away my anxiety to see everyone laughing. I almost forgot to give my sister my flowers before I walked up to the alter. She had to call me back. Oops.

Standing up on the alter was very surreal. The whole ‘watching a movie of your own life’ thing. Cara came up to read the first reading, and tried not to laugh the whole time. I thought it was because her reading said something about “My lover is like a young gazelle” and she had been acting it out at the salon, but as it turns out, the ring bearer was making faces at her. I couldn’t look at her because I wasen’t able to not laugh when I did – I had to keep my head down in the “I’m praying” pose. Some people later told me they thought I was fighting off crying, when I was really fighting off bursting out laughing. Banks and Justin both did a great job with their parts, it really meant a lot for them to help us out.

Then the whole marriage thing. We started our conscent, and David and I didn’t answer a single thing the same. They ask you, “Are you coming here freely?” and those sorts of questions. We each answered with ‘yes’, ‘we do’, or something of the sort, but never at the same time. The priest had a big grin on his face. We did the rings. David went for the wrong hand. I couldn’t get his on, I was scared I was going to hurt him. I cried during the traditional vows. We also said our own, and he reciced a song that he had written for/about me a long time ago. There was no way I was going to have mine memorized, so I had them written down. In a wedding dress, however, there is no place to keep a sheet of paper. I had stuck it, folded up of course, in my bra. That got a chukle out of everyone when I pulled it out. I cried during this part as well. When I finished, I again didn’t have anywhere to put the paper, so I reached over and handed it to my sister. I heard people giggle, and I thought it was just because of that, but it turns out that Cate sort of looked at the paper, looked around, had a confused look on her face, and then stuck it in her bra! We did the unity candle (I got wax all over my finger), and then gave flowers to our parents. When we turned around to step back on the alter, the wedding party was all bunched up there – “Uh, Dave? Are we supposed to walk out now?” “I guess so!” Oh, yeah. We had already kissed. We headed to the back, did a lineup to thank people for coming, and thought we were going to relax. I had wanted a few pictures of my rings on my hand on my flowers, and we had to take them after the ceremony. The photo-nazi was up to about 45 minutes before we cut him off. We were hot, cranky, and tired. The limo, we thought, was supposed to be there at 3, Dave called about it – turns out we were wrong and it was for 3:30, which was just fine. We didn’t feel any different after the ceremony – maybe it was because it had not sunk in yet, maybe because we already live together, but I think it was because we already considered ourselves married.

We got into the limo and cranked the air conditioning. Broke out the bottle of champagne to drink. We first headed to Barnes and Noble (this was a 30 minute drive from the church). After the champagne was gone, the boys started in on the beer that was in there. Between the three little built-in coolers, there was about a case of beer! We get to the bookstore, head in, and go to get in line. The people in line (about 5 of them) we really nice and let us go ahead of them. They were cracking up at seeing a bride and groom in line for their Harry Potter book. We got them and got some pictures of us outside holding the books. At this point we were all starving and dinner was still 2 hours off. Yes, we went to McDonald’s. We all ordered and sat down and ate – next to us was some of the bridal party of another wedding! Their dinner wasn’t until 7pm either. We drove around for a bit after this, I’m not sure how long as I put my head on Dave’s lap and fell asleep. Woke up as we were pulling into the reception.

First thing we did was to find a bathroom. It is not fun to cram three girls into a handicapped stall and make one of them pee. We then went into our reception room and started greeting people. Dave and I had planned on going around to the tables and doing the formal greeting thing but as it turned out later, we didn’t have time. We separated and talked to almost everyone. So many people were coming up to us and telling us how beautiful the place was, how great I looked, how nice the ceremony was, etc. The cake was so cool looking! Dave was a dork and set up one of the Harry Potter books on the head table. We did also take some pictures outside on the grounds, but we only took a few – we wanted to be in with our guests. I found out that being the Bride gets you to the front of the bar line!

It was almost time for dinner and the DJ had to introduce us – out in the hallway for all of us. We walked in to the theme of Jurrasic Park, which was really cool sounding. When we were all seated at the head table – and let me tell you how freakin’ hard it was to sit in that dress! – Dave and I realized that we were both too excited to eat. We did try a bit of everything, which was all amazing, but for the most part we didn’t touch it. The head server (who was awesome) told us that she’d pack us up to-go boxes for the hotel later that night when we got hungry. I think we did the cake after that. People were cheering us on to smash it into each others faces, but we already said that we were not going to do that. As dinner is coming to a close, the DJ asks Dave if it’s time. I’m thinking he meant for the first dance. Nope. Dave tells me not to turn around, and in a minute he comes out with his guitar and a microphone. He then sings me the song that he recited for our vows while playing the guitar. I didn’t cry ever though I was close, but I guess that almost everyone else in the place was. A cousin who is getting married in September later told Dave that he’s going to kick his ass because how could he top that? We had a few people that didn’t show to the reception, which was sad because they were missed. But overall it balanced out because a few people showed up with dates that we didn’t expect.

Then we started our dances, we only had three of the special dances. We did me and Dave dancing to Phish’s Waste, which is as close to having a song as we get. Then we did me and my dad/dave and his mom in one dance, and we danced to Unforgettable. The third dance we called the whole bridal party up (plus Cara, our reader, to dance with my brother) and the parents and we danced to the Wonder Year’s theme song – drawing a blank right now as to the real name of it.

We were worried to begin with that nobody would be dancing because only a few people were out on the dance floor. Dave and I didn’t dance every single dance, we were up talking to almost everyone! I really do think I hugged everyone in the place. Lots of people were outside – the smoking area – so we did spend some time out there. Ryan brought a box of cigars and handed them out. We had a birthday cake for Scott and had everyone sing to him.

It really, really was the most amazing night of my life. It was so fun to be the hostess and get to walk around and talk to *everyone!* We received so many compliments on so many things: the food, the cake, the hall, the ceremony, etc. The main thing was that our wedding was SO US. People said that they couldn’t see us doing anything differently. All the little things that we did really made it our wedding. So many people came up to ask if it was mine or David’s idea to do the Death March and so many people just came up to tell me how unique that it was. The best part of it, and David and I agree, is that EVERYONE had a great time. Everyone had fun. Everyone had a smile on their face. That, along with marrying the person you love most in the whole world, was the point of the night.