Married life is great. Apart from not having water at our apartment right now... it's great. First apartments as a married couple are supposed to suck... right? This is totally normal... right?? Sigh. It would be fine if we lived in a place that was warmer and could go swimming at the beach, like, I dunno. Costa Rica or someplace.

Anyway. On to the wedding weekend!

We left after I got done with work on the 23rd, and drove through the night. We got to Indiana about 5am, and dropped him at his house. Pretty uneventful drive, so that was good. I got to the house where my parents were about 5:30am and then was attacked by my mom. I was all, Mom. Can we continue this in like, 4 hours? I'm exhausted. And she wouldn't let go. I finally got to sleep, but had to get up at 9:30 so I could get ready, Nix & I had errands to run! I planned on leaving at 10:30... didn't leave until like, 11:15. Oops. (I blame Mom for that one, she just kept taaaaaaaalking. Am I surprised? Not at all.)

So I went over to his house and talked with his grandparents for a little bit, told them about the kitties since they would be watching them while we were away. Then we went and got my ring cleaned (LOVE getting my ring cleaned, it's always SUPER sparkly and blinding!) and grabbed lunch. We made a few more stops along the way, and got back to my parents' place around 4. My sister & her boyfriend & my aunt were getting in right about then, so we hung out until they got there. She wanted to give us our wedding present right away, we weren't complaining!

She got us matching bags and water bottles, love them. We kind of wore the sweatshirts the rest of the day, hahaha.
We ended up having dinner with my family, and our friend A came over and ate with us. After dinner the 3 of us went to see A's new apartment (her first "big girl" apartment). It was fun to hang out with her again.

Friday was busy, and Nix & I didn't see each other until the rehearsal at 5:30. Anyway, I couldn't sleep in Friday morning because we (me, K (my sister), M (my friend from middle school), and my mom) went and got manis and pedis done. It was wonderful. After those, there was some relaxing and then Dad & I went out on a quick shopping trip. We got back and had to change for the rehearsal. We planned on getting there a little early so Nix & I could go over a few things (like writing out thank you cards and sorting a few things), so we agreed we would show up around 5. We both had on our calendars that rehearsal started at 5:30. Well, he got there at 5. My family is perpetually late, so we didn't leave until 4:45, and it was a 30 minute drive from the house.

Well, as we were driving Nix texted me and said that our coordinator thought we were supposed to start the rehearsal at 5.......... greeeaaaaaaattt. Luckily she checked again, and it actually showed 5:30 on her calendar. Phew... We rolled in right before 5:30, and we got underway.

Rehearsal was good, easy. Ran through it a few times, and we were golden. I got a little emotional during the first walk down the aisle because they had the music running too... But not overly. Just a few small tears. Oh, I ended up asking my mom to walk with me because she kept crying... and, fine. Yea, I just wanted it to be me & dad. But do I regret asking her now? No. Would I have regretted not asking her? No. But she bawled when I waved at her to join us. So, that's good. (I'm a little twisted, I know.)

After the rehearsal we went to dinner, omnomnom. Too bad they completely forgot to bring out the gluten-free meals when they brought out the rest of the food... so we were all pretty much done eating before those 2 meals came out. But, apparently the meals were very tasty and they didn't end up charging us for them because they screwed up, so that's good. After dinner, Nix went off to his bachelor "party". The boys went to a pub. Not a bar, a pub. Pubs here are more "low key" than bars, and that's what he wanted. I went back to my parents' house, and we had a family party. It was great fun, and I stuck around for an hour or so and then said, "okay, family, I need to go to bed. It's 11pm, and I have to be up early tomorrow." So I went to bed, and actually was able to sleep! (I was so sure I wouldn't be able to.)

Woke up around 7:30ish Saturday morning, and then headed to the hair salon with K & mom. M met us there. We got coffee on the way, and, because my mom is crazy, she told everyone around us that I was getting married that day. And hooray! Starbucks said, "Oh this drink is on the house!" So, I got free coffee. And as we were talking to the guys in line behind us, they asked me what I do and turns out they both graduated from the same university, and had similar degrees. As my mom got her card out to pay, one of the guys had already handed his card over. Super sweet of him!!! And, because Starbucks is amazing, they gave him a card that said his next drink was on them. Seriously. What an awesome way to start our morning.

We got to the hair place, and started in on the hair and makeup crazy after a few minutes. Our photographers showed up a few minutes after that and got some pretty great pictures while we were getting prettied up. (I don't have many pictures right now, so I'll have to come back and post those later.) I promise, I'll spam you with pictures. After hair & makeup were all done, we headed over to the church to get dressed.

So I tried to eat some food, didn't work so well. I wasn't nervous, just excited. So I got dressed and someone went to find my dad. Luckily the one of our photogs were there and captured the moment he saw me, which was super adorable. He doesn't cry, and he almost did. It made me cry a little bit. (I can't wait for those pictures!) Anyway, after that, it was FINALLY time for our private moment pictures. This decision gave me so much grief from a lot of people, but, it was the perfect choice for us.




That last one is my favorite picture, because I didn't see that face in person. But seriously. That face... makes me melt every time I look at it. Anyway, after we saw each other for the first time, every nerve I thought I had was gone. I was totally relaxed and good to go. No shaking hands for me! Phew.

Anyway, after freezing our butts off for a little bit outside, we went inside for a few more pictures, and then it was ceremony time! The ceremony was beautiful, and I only teared up a little when I was walking down the aisle. And, I actually saw people that were standing around us, not just him. (I was surprised!) So I got up there and my parents gave me away (Dad had a hard time saying it, though, lol). The ceremony lasted a whopping 17 minutes! It was great. We escaped to a side room and signed our license, yay! We hung out a little, and played a round of air hockey while we were waiting for our guests to organize themselves so we could do the "drive away" thing.

One of our photographers came with us (which meant we had to clear some of the balloons out of the back seat...) to the hotel so she could grab a few more pictures of us there. (We were only checking in so we didn't have to after the reception, don't worry. ) Then it was off to the reception venue for still more pictures of us, and then with our bridal party, and finally our families. Pictures took forever, but were really fun. Our photographers were great to work with. Note to all you ladies planning your weddings or parties or whatever who will be hiring a photographer: talk to them before the day. Interview them, get to know them a little. They will be the people stalking you the entire time, you want to get along with them.

So then it was party time. We started with our first dance (rather than doing the weird "first dance is halfway through the party nonsense). FIL said a blessing, and then we ate. Everyone LOVED the food, and kept telling us how amazing it was. Yay, brinner for the win! Good job, caterer. Big thumbs up to you. Then we got to dance - and boy did everyone dance! There were people on the dance floor all night long, which was awesome. Everyone loved the cupcakes, and people took some home with them! Yay! We had a hard time cutting the cake, lol, it was so dense! But sooo yummy. MMM red velvet cake. Yum yum yum. (Yes, it's now in our freezer, and we'll attempt to eat it in a year.)

At the end of the night we did our last dance to "At Last I See the Light" from Tangled. It. Was. Perfect. We wore our ears and my mom just bawled. People told us how cute our ears were and how perfect they were for us. Yay!

So fun.

We finally managed to escape, and made it to the hotel. After that.. well. It was good. It was a really good (and late ) night. I'll do another blog about the honeymoon, if you guys are interested. But, not today. I need to actually get some work done this afternoon. (I've been working on this blog off and on all morning. Oops. )