Getting Ready for the Big Day

A very exciting thing happened last week....

We got our wedding photos!! I'd only been checking my email every hour on the hour since the wedding. I was trying really hard not to nag the photographers but I broke down around week 5 and asked when they'd be done. They said on Monday so I resolved not to check my email anymore. Then I saw an email: Your photos are ready pop up on my phone the Friday before they were supposed to be done. It was the best honeymoon present ever. I couldn't resist going through them on the drive up to Tahoe, and then Joe and I went through them in more detail later that night. The wedding flew by in such a blur so seeing all the photos was like reliving the day at a more leisurely pace. 

There are so many great ones that I can't possibly fit them all in one post. Consider this your warning that there will be lots and lots more wedding posts around here. #sorrynotsorry I promise I'll definitely wrap up all wedding stuff by 2017 ;)

In my last wedding post I talked a little bit about how my sisters and I had a pre-wedding sleepover and got ready together the next morning. My sisters traveled far for the wedding, Bianca and Serena came from Germany and Daniela lives on the East coast. I also have one more sister who thankfully lives much closer, but she wasn't able to sleep over. Fun fact about my sisters: we were neighbors before we were sisters. I've known them pretty much my whole life and we were friends even before my dad and their mom got married when I was eight. So not only are they my sisters, but they're also my oldest friends. Pretty cool, huh? 

We didn't go crazy wild the night before the wedding because we wanted to look decent the next day. We got ourselves a few bottles of champagne and sat around with face masks on chatting and catching up on each other's lives while my sisters did their best to calm my nerves. That night I couldn't help but think how crazy it was that months and months of planning and anticipation had flown by and here we were, the night before the wedding. Just hours from the big day, instead of days or weeks. Thankfully my sisters were a great calming influence. I would've been freaking out if they weren't there, going over each possible worst case scenario in my mind - from weather, to toddler tantrums, to stains on my dress, you name it I dreamt it up. They kept everything lighthearted and fun and instead of stressing too much I started looking forward to all the excitement right around the corner. 

The morning of the big day we woke up and immediately went off in search of coffee and a few hair supplies. I pretty much never do my hair or makeup so I hired a very talented makeup artist to take care of that for me. My sisters are great with hair and makeup and they all did each others'. When we got back to the room there was basically a mad dash for the shower, and then the craziness began in full force. We tried to straighten up a bit since the photographer would be coming by to get some photos of just us girls. Amanda, who was doing my hair and makeup, arrived a little after 1:00. We turned on the VMAs and listened to music, chatted, and sipped champagne while getting ready. 

Once my hair and makeup were done my mom arrived and she helped me tear rose petals off the bouquets we bought earlier to scatter on the bed. I remember saying that I didn't think Joe would even notice, but in fact he did. It was a nice little touch. For my something old, something new, something borrowed, and something blue I wore: old sandals my friend gave me for my birthday three years ago, blue nail polish on my toes, new accessories, and I borrowed a bobby pin from my sister, which I made sure to return the next day (after I'd pulled approximately a thousand bobby pins out of my hair). I can't promise it was the same one she lent me, but hopefully that still counts. 

I definitely remember that around this point my nerves were creeping back up. I felt this need to just scream and shake all that nervous energy out, so I'm pretty sure we were jumping around screaming and yelling for no reason and probably scaring the crap out of the photographer. Maybe that's why he asked us to do some posed shots of us laughing, so he could take control of the situation a bit. We started out awkwardly fake laughing but then that turned into a real "I don't know why I'm laughing but I'm gonna go with it" laugh. It was actually a great tension reliever. Almost as good as screaming and jumping ;)

Now came the serious, it's getting real moment: putting on the dress. You can get a glimpse below of all the tiny, closely-placed buttons on the back of my dress. It was a multi-person job to get those all buttoned up in the right order. And tying my sash in a suitable bow was another ordeal. Funny how much those tiny details seemed like such a big deal at the time. Thankfully my sisters and their nimble little fingers saved the day and got me all ready to go. 

Around this time my mom let us know the driver was downstairs and waiting. Joe and I opted to do a first look pre-ceremony and we were meeting two hours before the ceremony began. Running through my list of everything that needed to get to the car, and making sure I had everything I needed not only for myself, but for Ez and Declan, started getting my nerves going really good again. We pinned my veil in, grabbed the million bags of stuff I wanted to bring, and I headed out the door with butterflies in my stomach. 

The car ride there was somewhere between "I can't believe this is happening" banter, nervous sighs, and hysterical giggles, and maybe a few more screams just to test the driver's patience. This is totally normal pre-wedding bride behavior, right??

To all you brides out there, what were you feeling right before? Excited, nervous, calm, stressed? I think I was a mixture of all of those. Except calm. 

Next up Joe makes his appearance in our first look!