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| Congrats Mom & Eddie! |
The weekend before last was my Mom's wedding. It was on the beach about an hour and a half south of Jacksonville, in a place that is very special to her. In fact, the last time she "ran away" and wouldn't answer her phone for about a week, she was there. We always tenatively wait until she gets back for whatever life-changing decision she's made while there - it's just one of thsoe "change your life" kind of places. Anyway, that's why they wanted the wedding there.
Since it was out of town and the sweet bf still had to work, for him it meant driving down on Friday morning, partying like a rock star after the wedding Friday night, driving back to work on Saturday morning (he left at about 6:30 a.m.), driving BACK Saturday night for dinner, then driving BACK again on Sunday morning to be at work by 11 a.m. I think he only spent about $250 in fuel - not to mention how exhausted he must have been - but he did it all with a smile! I still owe him sexual favors for this, I'm sure.
Anyway, the wedding was Friday night and was to be outside on the beach. It stormed the whole. freakin. trip. down. We anxiously kept checking the forecast on our phones and it looked rough. We began to wonder if there was a Plan B. Pshhhhhh. Please. So we crossed our fingers and hoped for the best.
We arrived at the "NO PETS" hotel early Friday afternoon, with Baron in tow. I could not stand to leave that sweet precious baby by himself and I figured my awesome beach bag would do the trick for sneaking him in and out. We met my brother and his sweet gf at the hotel and Operation Doxie Sneak-In commenced. After some ridiculous maneuvering around, we finally got the little pup-pup up into the room. I promised my bro that he wouldn't bark and Baron immediately pranced out onto the balcony and started woofing down some seagulls. Whoops.
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| Trust me - it looks totally natural when you're walking. HA. |
The four of us had a cocktail or two and reviewed our individual wedding duties - KB (KB = bro) was to give a toast/introduction, I was the official photographer for the event and was to read everyone's advice/well wishes cards aloud at the ceremony, and KB's gf was the official "bubble girl". We couldn't help but laugh at the bubble wands... though they matched the color scheme perfectly, their uncanny resemblence to a giant turquoise schlong and/or a lightsaber was too funny to ignore!
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| honestly what would you think? |
We headed over to Mom's condo a smidge early so I could get some "before" shots (that's
pictures, not jager bombs). Being the official photographer has it's perks - I was let in on one of the biggest ceremony surprises beforehand... my uncle had been ordained and would be performing the ceremony! Now this is awesome for several reasons. #1) It's just so dang sweet. My uncle is a tough and proud purple-hearted Marine, but when it comes to his family he is such a softy. #2) He loves to party. He loves Budweiser. He once told me (and my Grandmother, with whom he was arguing at the time) that he hated water and hadn't had a single sip of it for two years. For whatever reason, when we would all take big family trips together he would get stuck driving me, my brother, and my grandmother. Now that I am older, I totally understand why he used a cooler full of ice-cold Bud as his armrest. Anyway, as we were doing some last minute prep, UT (my uncle) sat quietly on the sofa reviewing his sermon (and finishing a little brewskie) and then when it was announced to me that he would be performing the ceremony he proudly proclaimed, "I haven't even been drinking beer today!" I glanced over at his empty can on the coffee table and then looked at his smiling little face and said, "Cool UT!" (What he MEANT was that he hadn't been drinking on the beach all day with the rest of the fam. I got your back UT!)
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| Rev. UT poppin' a cork pre-ceremony - hey it's not beer! |
Oh and did I mention that UT's robe had a custom pirate scarf? Perfection.
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you may kiss the bride - ARGHHH!
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The ceremony itself was lovely. Miraculously the rain held off and the sun came out for the rest of the afternoon.
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The whole crew ready for the bride and groom
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Highlights of the reception include Rev. Ted telling my precious aunt to watch her behavior because she's "a minister's wife for God's sake", a toasty Tish (who's been friends with my mom for 47 years, literally) taunting my sweet bf into dancing with her and then mortifying both of us when she shouted across the reception hall that "he must be good in bed", and the mommy and baby toilets in the reception hall bathroom.
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| he's such a sport! |
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| yes, as the night wore on, they were used simultaneously. |
Oh yes and aside from all that fun, the bride and groom did a sand ceremony that involved everyone, Mom's new hubs sang her a song that he wrote for her himself (so sweet), and the toasts were very heartfelt. My favorite thing (which I don't think was one of the planned "activities") was that a week or two before the wedding, Mom requested that everyone send a song to her to be put on the playlist for the night. As each couple's song came on they got up and danced to it. It was really fun to listen to the first part of the song and kinda try to guess who's song it was. Very cool.
So we had lots of cocktails throughout the course of the night and by the time we got back to the hotel we had just enough energy to sneak Baron out to potty, shove some pizza in our faces, and pass out in time for Lane (BF) to get about 47 minutes of sleep before he had to get back on the road to go to work for the day.
My
beer induced coma peaceful slumber was interrupted shortly after Lane left by a dancing little dachshund just aching to go outside. It was 9:30 a.m. and as soon as I shoved his pudgy butt into my beach bag and opened the door, housekeeping was bringing the heat. I had to run down the hall and hide by the ice machine until the elevator was empty. I snuck on and managed to go down ONE freakin' floor (we were on the 8th) and when the doors slid open, two more merry maids greeted me with a cheerful "mind if we ride down with ya?!" Ummm yes. I kinda do. I managed to blurt out, "I'm getting off here anyway" and shove past them with my twenty pound wiggling beach bag in tow. I finally conceeded to walking down the remaining seven flights of stairs and got the little baby outside in time to avoid a big doxie dump rollling around in my bag. I guess my mind was too clouded with residual hopps and barley to think it all the way through, because I didn't consider that once Bear-bear's business outside was done, I didn't really have a non-stair way to get him back to the room.
O. M. G. Eight mother freakin' flights of stairs. Doesn't sound like much, does it? Well, IT IS. And aside from being grossly out of shape, add in a raging hangover and a chunky squriming dachshund in a bag that is ripping your shoulder straight out of it's socket, and I'm here to tell you that it's a recipe for a 29 year-old's first mini-stroke. By the time I got to the sixth floor, I was seeing stars. I managed to work through the jello legs by the seventh floor, and by the time I burst through the door to the eigth floor hallway, I could have given a fuck less if housekeeping was there to bust me with Baron or not. It was brutal, but we managed to make it back to the room undetected. Even the sun shines on a dog's ass every now and then, right? Well, not if it's stuffed in a beach bag I guess...
The rest of the weekend was awesome. Spent some time during the day on Saturday chilling by the pool with friends and fam, and then we all went out to a lovely dinner at a beautiful place called "The Garlic" on Saturday night. Well, I say it was lovely... and it was, but my judgement would be based strictly on the atmosphere and the drinks, because out of a group of TWENTY FIVE, mine was the only dinner that they forgot. Oh well. I'm sure I didn't need that seafood cannelloni anyway.
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I'M STARVING!!!
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All in all it was a great weekend and a great way to celebrate the start of a new chapter of my Mom's life. I loved spending time with my family, and especially getting to be all goofy and fun with my bro and his lady. I do NOT miss toting a baby boy puppy in and out in a beach bag however... that reminds me - I meant to look into stairclimbers...
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I'd truck up 20 flights for that face!
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