The weather is one of the things that I have only touched on. To say the least, it was a challenge. Thursday and Friday were beautiful! Sunny, warm, just beautiful spring days. But Saturday was a different story. We knew that rain was being forcast, which made me even more thankful that I had opted for an indoor facility, but I really had my heart set on taking pictures down by the water and the arbor. I knew that there were always back up plans, and when I woke up the morning of the wedding I was too excited about marrying the love of my life to worry about minor details like the back ground of pictures. I can tell you we were so lucky! The rain held off until we got everything carried in, all the prewedding pictures taken, the ceremony finished, and the formal pictures taken. Then the flood gates opened up! It rained, it poured, it stormed... thunder and lightening..., and even produced a tornado warning for the area. It was actually kind of cool because my friends from Southern California hardly ever seen storms like that, and they really enjoyed experiencing a good southern spring storm. Plus, it was one of those storms where it just makes you want to curl up with a warm cup of something and a good conversation. This worked out perfectly because of the type of reception we decided to have. Due to our limited budget, we decided to have a cookie buffet made by my wonderful friend who has a bakery on the side. Instead of a traditional wedding cake, we decided to have the same friend make a cookie cake pie and a pecan pie. We also bought a red velvet cake (which is what we cut) and a cheesecake. And what goes better with cookies and cakes than coffee, hot chocolate, tea, and milk. So, even though it was raining and storming, we had plenty of warm drinks and good conversation. After having a moment to ourselves, our wonderful Best Man, Dan did us the honors of introducing us for the first time as Mr. and Ms. Bonnie and Jeremy Stafford as we reentered the facility. We then went right into our first dance, which was to One Boy, One Girl by Colin Raye.
Then my dad and I had our father-daughter dance to I Loved Her First.
Then it was time to get the party started.
Sometime in the middle of the reception, our officiant's adorable son Gabe was playing in a water puddle during a break in the rain. At some point he decided that it would be totally cool to sit down in a puddle. Which he immediately realized was not as fun as he thought it would be.
Then it was time to cut the cake! Yay!
And to take some pictures with my girls!
Then it was time for the last dance. Steady as We Go by Dave Matthews Band was a song that I clung to for comfort during Jay's deployment. I felt like a song with the chorus of "So when the road gets rocky girl, just steady as we go" was perfect to end such a special day.
And then it was time to say goodbye to everyone and leave.
Hiring a limo or anything was out of our budget, but our best man offered to drive us to the hotel in his dad's crown vic. It was still raining but had lightened up a little. We had no idea when or if it was going to stop, so in true Bonnie style I put on the white flip flops I'd brought for when my high heals started to hurt my feet, hiked up my dress, grabbed my new husband and made a run for it!!! It was wonderful and is probably one of my most treasured memories from the evening. Unfortunately, we didn't give our photographer a heads up before we left so it didn't get on film, but still.
The really amazing thing is that after everything was packed back into the boxes and the facility was cleaned up, the rain stopped! Just in time for everyone to pack up the cars. Then when they got back to our apartment to unload everything, it stopped raining there too! It was truly amazing how it all worked out.
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