OK, I’ll try to keep this short since these narratives are getting excessive! To be honest, there is not a ton to say about the reception. We had four glorious hours of eating, drinking, and revelry!
IT WAS SO MUCH FUN. It was about a zillion times better than the ceremony and I wished we could have just tacked that hour onto the reception instead!
As soon as we finished portraits I snuck up to the reception room to take a look. We were minutes away from opening the doors and transitioning the guests from the cocktail hour. The lights were dim, the room was full of candlelight, the centerpieces looked AWESOME, and the band was rocking some instrumental warm-up type music. The cakes were set up, the table numbers were out, I was blown away. All my planning had come together to create this glowy, flowery, explosion of awesomeness. It was bride-gasmic. I was IN LURVE.
Ahem-hem. Sorry. So, everyone moved on into the room and we queued up outside with the party and the parents. The band played “How Sweet it Is” and in everyone went! Jeff and I came in to the theme from the Blues Brothers, a special surprise I requested for him… you’re welcome, groomie!
What’s crazy about these pictures is you can really tell the photogs were rocking some uber-pro-grade flashes… the room was NOT this bright!
Let’s see, what else… we had our first dance (I’ll spare you from an encore of that boredom); we had sweet, memorable toasts (nice jobs Dan, Gracie, and Best Man Sha!), and we ate! Well, not so much us, but everyone else had really good things to say about everything!
And our ridiculously awesome band got the party started! A few(ish) faves…
Gracie channels her inner… western lowland gorilla?
Love this…
Here is our dear friend Jay who actually had NEVER been to a wedding before this! We were so flattered to be his first! And he was definitely a hit of the evening… Love everyone’s reactions here…
For four hours in our lives we actually had people paid to take care of this sort of stuff for us, and my mom is the first to run in when a glass of wine went down… sigh… Mom…
Now… NOW. Here comes the #1 most awesome thing in the history of all that is awesome… the PEANUT BUTTER CUP that came to party with us!!! This idea came to me one day and I decided I WOULD make this happen. Jeff, in a bizarre streak of seriousness and solemnity, fought this idea valiantly, insisting it was “like something you’d see at a child’s birthday party.” To which I responded “Yes… AND??” I did not let the dream die and eventually he caved 
Spoiler alert, our surprise peanuty guest was BELOVED and a complete hit. Jeff now sees the silliness of his ways, and I will delight in gloating over this forever. Mwa… ha… ha!
Heee’s here!
And, my #1 favorite image from the entire weekend, would be this timeless image of our conga line taking to the balcony, with my father in law affixed to the back of the life-size likeness of a Hershey confection…
Lima Oscar Lima my friends. Ahh, it was a fun, fun night. And it broke my heart that it was over so fast. At midnight, we migrated the party to the hotel bar, which actually stayed open beyond their regular hours for us. SCORE! I was pooped by this point. My hair was a mess, my shoes had come off, and my killer tummy ache was back. I ordered more toast!
Oy… unfortunately what I remember first about this part of the night was these two MEGA CREEPY dudes that were lingering at the bar. About 25 wedding guests and these two losers that would. not. leave. They leered at girls, got verbally aggressive with dudes, and worst of all, I turned around to find one of them EATING THE TOAST I ORDERED. I was so freaking flabbergasted I said “EXCUSE ME…. did you just…… EAT someone else’s FOOD in a public setting!? Namely MY TOAST?” I don’t recall the details but this lowlife then proceeded to get fresh with me and some of the chicks with me. Normally this would raise the question: WHO has the nerve to hit on a person wearing a WEDDING GOWN, but the answer clearly is: someone who eats a stranger’s food at a restaurant. And, if you’re wondering, my darling HUSBAND was nowhere to be found, out on a balcony with a group of guests sharing a spaghetti pie they had delivered. Ha!
Anyhoo. Phew. We got the bartenders involved and they eventually moved along. As much as it pained us, we had to wrap the evening up. We said our goodbyes. My mother couldn’t bear to see the centerpieces go to waste and was hauling them out to her car. Jeff’s aunt had grabbed one of our initial letters and groomsman Dan had the other. Our year and a half engagement was over, our beautiful wedding and celebration had come and gone, and we were married
Kim caught this last image of us as b & g
The rest of the story? We SLEPT, enjoyed a goodbye breakfast with our families the next day, followed by a romantic newlywed lunch at Red Robin, I slept again while Jeff watched another NHL playoff game, and we flew off to Vegas for our minimoon! My feet killed for days to follow, including losing feeling in one of my toes for a few days, and about a week and a half later my stomach started to feel better, yay!
And there you have… our wedding!
Le fin!
