wedding photos, round 1

people are starting to post pictures from the wedding on facebook, and i am super excited. (so excited, in fact, that it took me three tries to type "excited" properly)

overall, i think the whole event went splendidly. the decorations turned out amazing, which i can say because i'm not the one responsible. sister gets a rockstar award for making my hodgepodge of fall purchases come together in one splendid decor. her fiance, my little brother, and his girlfriend also win rockstar awards for spending two whole days busting ass and doing all the manual labor. it never would have worked without all of them. another rockstar, sara also did pretty much anything i asked her to do for the week leading up to the wedding... thank god for family and friends!

now i totally stole these pictures from sam, sonja, and jenny. thanks ladies!

the front of the "church." couldn't ask for lovelier weather.


the front "alter."


the reception tent out in the orchard.


the seating tags... everyone had their own apple.


best idea i had for the whole wedding was the coloring books. kept the young ones (and some of the older ones) occupied.


cornhole also keeps the older kids amused.


the dreaded martha stewart pompoms. mike and lorrie also win HUGE props for sticking around and helping us pouf (not sure if that's a real verb or if we just turned it into one) them all. all 110 or so.

the bouquets went into decorated mason jars to decorate the head table.


my super gorgeous cake!! also martha stewart inspired, courtesy of Premier Pastries of Rochester. complete with caketopper from Lauren Alane.


jay and dominic helped us out by making sure the cake made it out to the tent between the ceremony and the reception. i hear it was very anxiety-inducing, but they did a marvelous job.


when there was a generator disaster of some sort (which the men in our lives handled splendidly, and most guests never knew there was a problem) our candle centerpieces lit the tent.


people also seemed to dig the sparklers later in the evening.


considering the great snapshots people got, i can't wait to see how Kristina's professional photos turn out. we got TONS of compliments, particularly on the "details" and the "unique-ness" of the wedding. both of which were things that put a lot of effort into. we owe a huge thank you to our family and friends that went out of their way to help make sure our day was fantastic.

if i could go back and do it again, there are only a few (very minor) things i would change.

1. i would have gone over the actual entrance at the rehearsal dinner so that my brothers would have closed the doors and my dad could have straightened my train prior to everyone seeing me

2. i would not have been so nervous that i forgot to give my dad a hug and kiss when he gave me away :(

3. i would have looked at mr. z more, even if it did mean i cried more and my mascara ran everywhere

4. i would have made sure the ushers knew who was supposed to sit in the reserved pews so the aunts/uncles hadn't ended up in back

5. i would have tried harder to make sure i got around to say hello to everyone at the reception. this is the one i am kicking myself for the most. there were several people that i never got a chance to talk to and i feel quite bad about it.

so, all things considered, i think that's pretty good. we couldn't have asked for better weather, the dj was good, the food was delicious... it was definitely worth the stress of planning. i think everyone had a good time.