If you don't remember, the summer of 2012 was hot. Really dry and really stinkin' hot. In fact, thirty-six U.S. states, including Illinois, were legally declared primary natural disaster areas in August due to the lack of rain and nationwide drought. It was the third driest summer ever recorded in our area. As you can imagine, this led us to believe that we would have a really dry and hot wedding day. That's a valid assumption, right?
Jump ahead a few weeks to the end of August. Tuesday, August 28th to be exact. Hurricane 'Isaac' makes landfall and crashes into the Louisiana coast. Forecasters predicted the storm's effects would slide into the Midwest by Friday, August 31st -- dumping as much as 12 inches of rain on the states. Perfect timing...
My, oh, my were they right.
Friday was SO humid. Like frizzy hair, hard to breathe, clothes-sticking-in-all-the-wrong-places kind of humid. (Despite all that humidity my mom, sister and I headed out to the ditches next to highway 40 to gather up some wildflowers for decorations. It was not fun at the time, but if you have seen the reception you should know it was worth it. The flowers were beautiful.) You could tell from all the moisture in the hair that it wanted to rain. And by Friday evening it had started.
Derek and I had a small rehearsal dinner at Anthony's restaurant in Flora that night. Just a small, quiet family gathering with lots and lots of pizza. Okay, so I lied about the quiet part! I love having all of our family together. It is a huge reminder of our blessings. We visited, talked about the wedding, watched the kids run and play, stuffed ourselves silly... and prayed. Derek walked me to my car and gave me his last hug as a free man. He kissed my forehead and squeezed me hard. I'm not sure if he was frightened of the life that would come with the next day's event or if he was excited of the life that would come with the next day's event. Probably a little of both, but we will go with the latter of the two. We had originally planned to skip the tradition and see each other before the ceremony but decided that it would make the trip down the aisle more exciting if we didn't. So he headed to his dad's house for the night, while I headed to my mom's. The next time we would see each other we would be Mr. and Mrs.
Mom's house was full of energy when I got there that night. Tyler, Helen and the kids were in town from South Carolina and were staying with us. That always makes for fun times! Andrew and Abigail were staying for the weekend. My best friend, Keri, also came to stay the night with me. The house was packed and rowdy, but all of the craziness helped to keep me distracted. Before I knew it, it was really late and time to get settled down. I finished up a couple last minute projects and finally headed to bed. If I remember right it was after one o'clock when I finally snuggled into the sheets. I'm pretty sure I woke up every hour on the hour that night. Not because of nerves; I think I was just so excited to finally see all of our plans put together. The fact that Lucy ended up in the bed with me and was practically sleeping on my head might have had a little bit to do with lack of sleep, too! I don't remember what time it was when I woke up to the sound of thunder and the rain pounding the roof but, I'm sure I was hoping it was just a dream. Back to sleep for a little while longer until around five-ish when my alarm was going off. And, yes, it was still raining outside. Pouring, rather.
From this point on my day was kind of a big blur. I remember we got the vehicles loaded with all of the 'goods' and headed towards the venue to drop it all off. Mom and Kevin stuck around to finish unloading while Keri and I headed to the salon to meet Helen, Stephanie, and Madeleine. Mom eventually joined us there. We had a ton of fun getting ready. Missy and Whitney at Vivid Salon are fabulous girls, inside and out, and made the process a lot of fun. After we were all 'beautified' we stopped to grab a bite to eat and then headed to Castle Finn Winery. As soon as we walked into the winery my jaw dropped. The entire room was gorgeous! A couple of girls from the area have a business called 'Two A "T" Events'. We gave them all of the decorations we had put together and they took care of the rest (setting up and cleaning up!). I am SO glad they did because it took a lot of stress off of my family and they did an incredible job. We spent the last hours leading up to the wedding getting our pictures taken by the phenomenal Alisha Sims of Alisha Sims Photography. She is an absolute doll!
We had such a gorgeous wedding day! If you weren't there with us you will truly never know how perfect it was. I may be biased by saying that, but it really was perfect.
I cannot say that things didn't go wrong, because a lot of things did not happen like I wanted them to: I had my heart set on an outdoor wedding. I had rented cute little chairs to set up out by the water near the vineyard. We were going to roast marshmallows and make s'mores over the fire pit. None of that happened. I wanted to wear my hair down but due to the weather decided it would hold up better in an updo. I couldn't wear the shoes I bought because my dress was hemmed too short. I did NOT want a buffet-style meal, I wanted it to be served to my guests. Guess what? It was buffet.
Despite all the things I thought I wanted that didn't happen, EVERYTHING WAS PERFECT. The rain stopped long enough for us to get our pictures done outside. Our indoor ceremony felt quaint and romantic. The decorations were impeccable. I wore my hair up and still felt beautiful. Our vows were perfect. Derek said 'with this wing' instead of 'ring' and had the entire congregation cracking up. The meal was delicious regardless of how it was served. We cried, and laughed and danced. I smashed cake in Derek's face and he nearly pushed me down trying to get me back. People got drunk and threw up. And at the end of the day we were married. And that is all that really mattered in the first place. :')
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