Wedding Wednesday: The Ceremony

I'm so excited for Wedding Wednesday this week! This week is all about the ceremony. First I want to show you a few pictures from right before the ceremony.

 

After we did our formal pictures we all went back into the bridal room to relax for a couple minutes while the guests arrived.  As I mentioned last week, it rained all day on the day of our wedding. To some people that's not a big deal, but to someone who is having their entire wedding outside... that is a very big deal. At this point I had already have two meltdowns, one minor and one pretty major, because of the rain. I was sitting in the bridal room about 5 minutes before the ceremony and it was still raining outside. My dad was all the way on the other side of the room and I yelled (to be heard over everyone, just to clarify), asking him to say a prayer for the “stupid rain to stop”. The room got quiet and he said an amazing prayer. Within 5 minutes the rain stopped for about 20 minutes. Just long enough for us to have our ceremony exactly how I pictured it. Under a beautiful gazebo, without the rain. Prayer and a dad’s desire to make his little girl happy are two very powerful things!

 

 

The whole time we were in the bridal room before the ceremony I was focusing so hard on the weather that I didn't even notice that my Mom and Grandma were up to anything. When I went back over to the table to pink up my bouquet I noticed that they were both watching me and that one of my photographers was standing with her camera ready but I couldn't hear the shutter so I knew she wasn't taking any pictures. I kept saying, "What? Do you want me to do something specific?" because I thought she was trying to get a picture. Then they started saying, "That's the front of your bouquet." and I just kept saying, "yeah I know the pictures go in the front."

 

I think I stood there talking to them for about two minutes before I realized that my Mom and Grandma had added a peacock feather to my bouquet and they wanted a picture of me when I realized it was there. I've had a lot of people ask me if there was a reason behind the feather and here is what my Grandma will tell you if you ask her, "We wanted to add something special so that each time you saw it you were reminded that it was made by the two women who love you most."

 

So here is the order that everyone walked in..

1. My parents
2. His parents
3. My Grandma & Grandpa Gonzales
4. Dennis walked in his Grandma Lamborn (his Dad's mom) and carried a single white rose that had lace from his mom's wedding dress on it for his Grandma Roland (his Mom's mom) who passed away three years ago
5. His good friend from high school, Ernie, walked in with my best friend since 7th grade, Patty
6. My little brother, Eric, walked in with my cousin, Katie
7. His good friend, Kyle, walked in with my best friend, Brandi
8. His best friend (and Best Man), Paul, walked in with my sister (Maid of Honor), Natalie

My wedding party walked in to Canon in D Major 

 

I was so proud of our ring bearer and flower girl. Everyone kept telling me not to expect to much out of them since they are only two and three years old but they did amazing! J made it about half way down the aisle before he took off towards Dennis in a sprint covering his face with the pillow and trying to hold up his pants. I had someone go out and put some peddles down before the ceremony started because I wasn't sure how A would do once she realized there were so many people watching her but she did such a good job! She sprinkled those peddles like she had been doing it her whole life!

 

 

 It took me forever to decide what song I wanted to walk in to. I knew that I wanted to walk in to something different than the rest of the bridal party, but I couldn't decide what. It seemed like all the songs I was finding just didn't feel right to me. Then three days before the wedding I was driving home from work and I had my iPhone on shuffle and "When You Kiss Me" by Shania Twain came on and I just knew that was the song that I wanted playing when I walked down the aisle.

 

 

I just have to stop for a second and ask. Was my wedding venue amazing or what?! I mean seriously, look at how beautiful this pictures is..

 

 

Not only was our venue amazing our ceremony was exactly what we wanted! I couldn't have asked for a better officiant! From the very beginning she was amazing and made me feel completely comfortable with her and the fact that our ceremony would be exactly what we wanted. When I first started talking to Stacey about our ceremony I told her that I wanted something simple and to the point. My guests weren't there for a church service. She was there for our rehearsal and was even able to keep our group focused which is not an easy thing to do. I'll say it again, I couldn't have asked for a better officiant! I've uploaded a copy of our ceremony if anyone wants to read it.

 

 

So can you tell by all the pictures of my sister that it was a very emotional day for her. She started crying as soon as they lined up to start walking down the aisle and I don't think she stopped until the reception started. Wait no, she cried during our first dance and my dance with my dad. Then she cried when it was over and we were getting in the limo to leave. She has always been one that wears her emotions on her sleeve and that day was no exception.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I am a total lover of Disney movies. So when I saw Anastasia the first time and heard the song "At the Begining" by Donna Lewis & Richard Marx (listen here) that was played at the end of the movie, I knew that was the song I wanted played at the end of my wedding ceremony. Then when Dennis and I met it made even more sense since the song says "No one told me, I was going to find you. Unexpected what you did to my heart." That pretty much sums it up right there. I mean come on people, we met at Special Olympics and I was in a relationship, a crappy one but still a relationship. Neither of us expected to find each other when we did and I sure as heck wasn't expecting to fall for him, but after a year of knowing each other we finally started dating and look at us now. Yup, I'd say it was the perfect song for us to walk back down the aisle to.

 

 

 

 

 The original plan was for all of the wedding party to walk out to the same song. Then at the rehearsal, Paul and Dennis said that it would be fun if after we walked all the way out the music stopped and "Sexy and I Know It" came on and the rest of the wedding party danced out. I wasn't sure about it at first but I eventually gave in and it ended up being really cute and everyone loved it!

 

 

 It seems like everyone in my family was involved in the wedding in some way or another. So when I decided that I wanted to have a quick prayer to bless the food right after our ceremony it only made sence to ask my Grandpa Gonazles to say it. Sadly the microphone wasn't loud enough for me to hear it where I was at but I hear it was amazing.

 

 

After the ceremony everyone was able to go into the tent and start eating while Dennis, Paul, Brandi and I went back into the bridal room to sign the marriage certificate. I know that traditionally the best man and maid of honor are the two witnesses but my sister can't legally sign any documents so Brandi signed as our second witness. The four of us have a very close friendship and often joke that we're our own dysfunctional family (we call ourselves the Gil-Borns) so it was perfect that they were our two witnesses.

 

 

 

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