Wedding Weekend, part two: Friday

Despite Blogger's consistent refusal to post any of my pictures, I'll continue the narrative of the fun weekend...

My mom, not surprisingly, didn't go to bed on Thursday night, but she did get all of the dresses done. I was able to do some of the hand-sewing while she slept on the couch the morning of the wedding. (I really need to learn how to sew!) The girls went over to the hair salon to get our hair done. Since Emily is a hairdresser, of course we all had to have nice hair for her wedding! We went to a salon where one of Em's friends from hair school worked. While I was waiting for my turn, I drove over to A.C. Moore and Michaels and bought a ring pillow, a couple of garters, and some ribbons to make sashes for the dresses. The cashier at ACM totally didn't believe me when I told her that the wedding was in six hours. After the hair I glue-dotted some woven daisies onto the ribbons for the girls' dresses... in case any scrapbooker is wondering, the glue dots worked great for the sashes, but didn't work as well holding little bows onto Emily's garters, so she dropped little bits of ribbons behind her when she walked...



When hair was done I finished some other last minute things and watched Emily get her makeup done - which took a really long time - and did my makeup - which didn't take very long, so I must be prettier than Em to start with. She got zipped into her dress just in time when the car showed up: instead of a limo, they rented a sweet vintage Rolls Royce, and Em and my mom rode together to the church. (I rode in style in my minivan, in case you were wondering.

Kickoff was at 3:30 so we hung out for a little while in the crying room, touching up lipstick and whatnot. (Betsy had to have concealer since she had a huge bugbite right smack in the middle of her forehead. Yes, I did put makeup on a 3 year old.) I did worry a little when we were queueing up for the aisle march and Betsy started screaming "NO NO I CAN'T" but she got over it, I think because she realized she got to hold hands with her beloved Aunty Molly. After that Betsy was pretty well behaved; she entertained herself during the mass by yanking apart her little basket of flowers. (In case you were wondering... the pink ones don't smell like perries anymore.)

Emily looked so beautiful walking down the aisle! Russell's smile was really sweet as he was watching her come towards him. Russell and Robert both wore their dress blues - I know this because guess who hemmed Rob's pants the night before the wedding? - and they both looked really sharp. There was a funny bit at the end when thepriest was announcing them to walk bak up the aisle. All during the rehearsal the priest kept forgetting Russell's rank - I think at one point he was General Brown or something - so in the wedding, he said "STAFF SERGEANT and Mrs. Brown" and we all had a pretty good chuckle.

Yes, it was all lovely. But the really important part was... the PARTY.

We arrived at the reception hall and right away there were guys circulating with mini quiches and stuffed mushrooms... very classy... and I'm sure I wasn't the only one who was STARVING. Holy cow, they were good. Plus, there were sliced vegetables with, like, a ranch dressing fountain or something but I didn't waste any calories on vegetables. Once all the bridal party had arrived we got to do the whole 'go into the banquet hall arm in arm but nobody cares about you unless you are the bride and groom' thing. Catherine and I shared a groomsman since there were way more chicks than dudes in the wedding party and we ended up just going arm in arm with each other, which was fun since we were the only ones that had identical dresses. (Everyone else's dresses were at least a little different.) The food was pretty tasty, and I actually got to enjoy it because I was at the head table and my kids weren't. Rob gave a brief yet classy toast about how when he was in Basic, he never dreamed that he was sleeping next to his sister's future husband (they alphabetize the bunks... both last names start with B... and the rest is history!)

Anywayyyy... (are you beginning to see why I've broken up this blog post by days? Perhaps I should have done hours) once we had all stuffed out face with free steak and yummy wedding cake (Steak'n'Cake! haaa)... then it ws time to hit the dance floor. Emily danced with Russell, 'acause she got married to Uncle Russy, and then she danced with her daddy because that's what princesses do, and the Russell danced with his mom which was pretty funny because she dipped him (he's not a small guy, either) although my reflexes weren't fast enough to capture it on film. Then the bridal party danced, which because of the aforementioned gender imbalance, I got to dance with my man. We invited Betsy to dance with us, but she ran off screaming "I CAN'T I CAN'T," because if you dance with someone it means you are getting married to them, and everyone knows Betsy is getting married to James.

After that we all pretty much danced the rest of the night. Matt completely busted a groove, Betsy ran in circles for three straight hours, and Emily was shaking her bouffant heinie, but the real shockeroonie of the night was my dad. He's an engineer, if that tells you anything. I'd think that the fact that he paid for the whole thing, plus the knowledge that he was leaving for China (You know, China? In Asia?) in thirty-six hours, would have put a damper on Dad's enthusiasm. The fact that he and my mom danced pretty much non stop that night is a testament to what a fun wedding it was.

Emily tossed her boquet to a respectably large group of available women and my fabulous cousin Becca caught it cleanly (this is one of the few times I've seen her when she didn't have an injury of some sort, she's lucky she wasn't on the DL) which meant that I'd better start shopping for a dress for her wedding.

My favorite part of the whole night was "White Wedding." See, the whole time Em's been planning her wedding, Dad kept teasing her that they should play Billy Idol's "White Wedding" for the daddy-daughter dance. And they didn't; they went with the infinitely classier "Butterfly Kisses," but towards the end of the party, Em made a request to the DJ. (I should mention that the DJ was the former bishop of Dad's ward, and Dad served on the bishopric with him for years, so if anyone has Dad's number, it's Jeff Sykes.) And yes, he did play "White Wedding," and Emily and Dad totally danced together, and it was full on priceless.

Like all great parties, this one did eventually have to come to an end. Em and Russ drove off to their quasi-honeymoon in the Rolls (with Russell going back to Iraq soon, they didn't leave town or anything, but they got a few days at the Coutyard Marriott) and I went home and regretfully had to take my awesome dress off. On the plus side, when I went through my camera, I found out I took 152 pictures, which should provide weeks of scrapping fun.

And Porter? He slept through pretty much the whole thing.