How do you recap your WEDDING?!

So. We got married.

Photo Credit: www.allisonharp.com

The question is. How do you recap your wedding? Answer – with lots of crappy Iphone pictures, of course. I’m going to have to do this in like seventy five different segments. And I’m going to start with the week leading up to the wedding. Partly because it’s necessary backstory, partly because I want to get some of these pictures off my phone. It’s a win-win for everybody.

It wasn't something I discussed here on the blog, (didn't want to jinx it!) but a lot of our friends and family knew that for the past few months, Taylor had been going through the hiring process with the Fort Worth Fire Department. Back in March he found out that he had been accepted into the academy. This is something Taylor has been dreaming of for a LONG time, and it finally happening right as we were getting ready to start our lives together could not have been any more perfect. 

His first day of training was Monday, April 21. Our wedding was Friday, April 25. Yes, I am for real. Crazy whirlwind/huge blessing of a week. Anyway, the Monday of wedding week, the academy hosted an orientation/meet & greet breakfast for the families of all the new recruits. I went, met some nice people, got to drive a fire truck (kidding, that didn't happen. I WISH.), and I left feeling SO beyond proud of that guy.

 Anyway, that was basically Monday. After the breakfast, I worked Monday and Tuesday, and then took off the rest of the week.Wednesday was “do an obscene amount of wedding-related errands” day.

Such as Target, Hobby Lobby, DSW for shoes, Whataburger (duh) and then back home to sign for wedding flowers. I opted to DIY flowers, mainly because have you SEEN the prices florists want to charge for a bouquet? It’s obscene. OBSCENE. I knew I didn’t really care about wedding flowers, since they were just going to die in a few days anyway, so I opted to order in bulk from Sam’s Club. 

OMG GORGEOUS GORGEOUS!

I wasn’t doing any real or fancy "centerpieces” and we were only doing eight bouquets, and Allison convinced me that it would be super easy and about 100x cheaper. Aside from my bathroom being taken over by plant life for two days, she was totally right. Pretty easy.

PS If you ever feel down on your luck, or overwhelmed, just remind yourself: you could be at home, buried in hundreds of dollars worth of bulk flowers, on the very day they decide to test ALL the fire alarms in your apartment complex. 

So yeah. That lasted about an hour. As my hearing gradually came back, I panicked when I realized I was short about 20 buckets short of being able to store/hydrate all my flowers. In case anyone was wondering, Sam’s will let you raid their bakery and give you as many five gallon buckets as you want. I snagged approximately one million. Approximately.

Turns out, 90 hydrangea stems and 200 roses is a LOT of flowers. Well, not really a lot of flowers, but a lot of flowers to fit into a one bedroom one bathroom apartment. Luckily I managed to trim all the stems and put them all in water just in time for my FAVORITE errand of the day – picking up this girl from the airport!

Yes this picture is super old. No, I'm not sorry. Because it features french fries y'all.

We continued the flow of the day by running approximately 97 more errands. We were STARVING by the time we made it to the mall for our last errand of the day, so while she made a trip inside, I stopped by Red Robin to pick us up some burgers to go (again,what wedding diet??) and decided it was a good time for a drink. Or two. Or three. Or nine. I don’t know I lost count. 

Y’all, I needed it.

We went home and kept the momentum going late into the evening with more last minute DIY projects and then passing out from complete and total exhaustion by midnight. #partyanimals

Onto Thursday:

When I was hopping into bed Wednesday night, I realized I hadn't finished writing my vows to Taylor. OOPS. #worstbrideever So I woke up at the crack of dawn that morning to finish that stuff up and sit in my living room thinking about the fact that I was getting MARRIED in 24 hours. No big deal right? Right.

A few hours later, Allison rolled out of bed and we tackled flowers and bouquets that morning. (Okay, FINE. Allison tackled flowers and bouquets, I watched and handed her ribbon and floral tape and cut some thorns off of roses. Just give me a break, okay?) Later in the morning Bryn showed up with my freshly pressed dress and seventy five different scones, cookies, and brownies from Starbucks (bridesmaids who run errands are THEBOMB.COM). We got our mess together and then met up with two other bridesmaids for lunch, and most importantly, PEDICURES.

After pedicures all my favorite people headed over the my apartment to help us load an obscene amount of flowers, decorations, and just overall CRAP over to the venue for rehearsal. 

FLOWERS FLOWERS EVERYWHERE.

Our venue was awesome because we were allowed in the evening before the wedding and were allowed to store EVERYTHING there the night before. It was incredible not having to worry about lugging anything over to the venue the day of the wedding. So nice. Before heading over to rehearsal, I had a little down time with my favorite people in the world. Bridesmaids are the BEST.

 And perhaps my favorite wedding gift of all time, a book of marriage advice from Emily's first grade class. Um, yes, just YES.

And then we rehearsed. And I cried when I practiced walking down the aisle. I know complete and total SAP. After our late night rehearsal, it was time for DINNER. 

After we got engaged Taylor’s parents offered to host our rehearsal dinner at their home. Y’all, it was perfect. It was so incredibly intimate and reminded me of every family dinner on Parenthood. It was a perfect slightly-chilly spring evening with a fire and twinkle lights and all of my favorite people in the world. My heart pitter patters just thinking about it. Seriously, SO perfect.

I’m going to wait until we get pictures back to do a recap of the whole day, but it was absolutely PERFECT.

Until then, we will resume regularly scheduled ridiculous blogging. Prepare yourself. And as always, you’re welcome in advance.

LOVE&HUGS,

Nat