In honor of our 17th wedding anniversary (yay, us!) I put together a compilation of 17 random wedding memories.
1) As a young college girl, I was notorious for forgetting to eat. (Yeah, those days are long gone.) My reputation for malnutrition didn’t fail me on my wedding day, though. In all the planning for my 6pm date at the alter, dinner plans somehow didn’t make it onto the schedule. Thankfully, some kind soul delivered sandwiches, fruit, and Snapple to the bridal room so my girls and I wouldn’t be totally famished during the main event.
2) Our pictures were taken prior to the ceremony to allow us the opportunity to see each other before we said ‘I do.’ In a quiet corner of the sanctuary, Jeff and I met for a few private minutes to pray before starting our life together as husband and wife.
3) Some of the best people we know agreed to stand up in our wedding. My heart overflows with love when I look at this group of amazing individuals! Jeff and I were the first of our crew to get married. Well, save much, much older bro Scott Melby who was a whopping 3 years older than us [wink]. This group of (mostly) single 20-somethings provided much hilarity throughout the whole wedding experience.
4) My bridesmaids were da bomb taking excellent care of me. We got our nails done, went shopping at the mall, had a hotel sleepover, and got dolled up at the hair salon. It was girly silliness the entire long Labor Day weekend.
5) After 3 years of falling in love with my boy and his family, I was so thrilled to be officially joining the Melby clan! I was family member #11. Since 1998 the crew has grown to 25!
6) Our pastor Ron accidentally lost his spot in his notes causing me to repeat the wrong things after him during our vows. Are we even legally married?!
7) During the ceremony, I presented each of our moms and grandmas with a single white rose from my bouquet. It was a sweet way to honor the amazing women in our life while symbolically showing that we were joining each other’s families. I later learned that my Uncle Bob loudly questioned in his deep, gruff voice “Aw, how long’s this gonna take?!”
8) One of the happiest moments of my day…the ceremony was finally over and we were officially hitched! I could just relax, greet all of our guests, and party with my new husband for the rest of the night!
9) Sarah McLachlan crooned her ditty Ice Cream for our first dance. Throughout the entire song we whispered memories back and forth to each other of our time as a dating couple and looked forward to the new ones to be made.
10) My niece Reagan was the world’s sweetest flower girl. She turns 20 this year and I adore her as much as I did on my wedding day. Well, more actually. In lieu of flowers, little Muffer sprinkled silver confetti from a tiny silver bucket before I took my stroll down the aisle.
11) It’s been 9 years since our friend Crystal passed away. I absolutely love that she celebrated with us on our wedding day and I especially love this picture of her and Jeff being silly together. At the end of the night Crystal gave me a wink and coyly told me to “Have fun!”
12) My cousin Misty was my maid-of-honor and spent the weekend in Wisconsin with me despite the fact that her wedding was just a mere 6 days later. She was violently sick the day before my wedding. (We suspect the nasty pizza from our rehearsal dinner was the culprit.) Despite the odds against her being there, she faithfully stood by my side on my big day. I love her to pieces for her commitment to me! And I had the DJ give them a shout-out and play their song – Eric Clapton’s The Way You Look Tonight.
13) My roommate Tammy was a wreck during our slow dance to the Titanic theme song. It’s unclear whether she was sad to say goodbye to her rockin’ roomie. Or depressed that she wasn’t the one getting married. 😉
14) Thank you to whoever caught great action shots of our hoppin’ dance floor. I’m in love with the pics of me and Jeff being crazy together.
15) Jeff surprised me with a song on the dance floor. I was a hot mess when he dragged me out to my chair as my conservative self (at the time) was adamant that I didn’t want to have him pull a garter off my leg in front of everyone [gasp]. Instead, all the single guys sang You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling to me. It was incredible! And then my girls surprised them with several cans of silly string.
16) Despite a room full of hundreds of people, Jeff and I managed to look at each other like nobody else was in the room. That intensity still makes me swoon.
17) And we both lived happily ever after!
I finally reached your blog/website and, of course, the first post I had to read was about your wedding day. I thought about you all day long that day (at a cook out in Brenda’s backyard for Labor Day) and your dad and I were tickled to get to ship you a VCR for your wedding gift! After many years of watching your video on your anniversary, I never tire of it – or of seeing cute pictures like these that you’ve shared of your special day. Here’s to HR x JM 4-ever!