The Lovely Geek Wedding

Considering I was married over a month ago, I am LONG overdue for a post on the wedding! Unfortunately Joshua and I did not go on our honeymoon right away, so I was thrown right back into being busy with school. Plus now that the wedding planning was over, people were all, “Hey I need you to work on web project XYZ for me!”

Now that I finally have some time, here is how the whole weekend went down!

Friday November 5th – The Day Before

The night before I was busy printing out the programs when I ran out of cardstock. Friday morning I was up early so I could get to Staples the moment they opened. As soon as I got my cardstock I waited while the printer cranked out the rest of the programs. Meanwhile Joshua was being amazing and getting the house cleaned. Around noon we left to run errands and pick up the favors (bride and groom berries from The Berry Factory).

Joshua dropped me off at my in-law’s house so I could finish putting the programs together while he ran other automotive-related errands. Serena, Amber, and Tiffany not only helped me put the programs together, but they helped me get the favor tags ready to go as well. Around 3:30pm we all left and headed to the church for rehearsal.

Rehearsal

When I got to the church, I was so excited and as more people showed up my adrenaline pumped up, especially when they test ran my music. I was just so excited to have all the people I love being in one room, hehe.

We did two run-throughs of the ceremony, one without the music and one with. My family was thrilled I chose to walk down the aisle to Star Wars, mainly because it made it easy to hold back tears of joy, hah. After getting all the details on lighting and whatnot taken care of, we all headed back to my in-laws’ house for the rehearsal dinner.

It’s no secret that Joshua and I love to eat at Chili’s, so the dinner was fajitas (one of the few foods Chili’s is known for). It was SO yummy, and we had a great time! Around 7pm Joshua and I handed out our bridal party gifts: RPM gift cards for the guys and cupcake-scented hand sanitizer, body lotion, and pink fuzzy socks from Bath & Body Works for the gals. Then we were off for the bridal party festivities!

The Bachelor and Bachelorette Parties

The boys headed over to RPM to race, while us girls headed over to my house to get a little more dressed up. Little did I know I was in for a surprise, as Abby and Dani snuck over to my house to decorate my dining room with my Barbies, Star Wars toys, Harry Potter dolls, and my favorite foods. It was hilarious, and needless to say it was G-rated!

The limo arrived to pick us up and took us to The Melting Pot for dessert fondue.

After fondue we still had an hour and a half left with the limo, and since we couldn’t go clubbing (we had two underage girls in my bridal party) we decided to crash the bachelor party. It was funny because our limo driver was trying to discourage us from doing-so because he’s done enough bachelorette parties to see disasters happen. He’s all, “Nooo you shouldn’t do that they’re probably at a strip club!” Yeah, he had no idea that our family is sooo not like that! 😆

We arrived just in time to see Marty and Joshua do one final race. Joshua had the lead, then his dad passed him, and after some shenanigans with people being dumb on the track, Joshua ended up winning. Joshua was so happy to know that I was there cheering him on. When the racing was done we headed back to my house in the limo while the boys headed back to my in-laws’ house.

We were planning to watch My Big Fat Greek Wedding, but by the time we got back and were showered, we were ready to hit the hay rather than watch a movie, especially since we had to be up at 7am. We all crawled into bed a little after midnight.

Here’s a little video I made of all our festivities that night…

Saturday November 6th – The Big Day

I was up at 6am because not only did I need to get ready, but I had to get packed for the weekend since after the wedding I wouldn’t be coming home until Monday. Earlier that week I went to IKEA and got some crêpes from their frozen food section (yes, our IKEA has a little grocery section), so I made crêpes and turkey bacon for the girls for breakfast. We left the house around 8am and got to Shear-Fx Hair Salon just in time for our 8:30am appointment.

My hairstylist, Brittany was a life saver! Two weeks before my wedding my original stylist went into the hospital for gallstones/pancreatitis and had to be transferred to ICU in San Francisco. Luckily my friend Amy recommended her friend Brittany whom I had met at her birthday, and lo-and-behold she works at the same salon my original hairdresser does. She was able to get me, Abby, Serena, and Dani in to do our hair that morning.

She even arranged to have another hairdresser who specializes in make-up to come in and do make-up for those of us who wanted it. I ended up doing my own make-up because my original stylist was going to do make-up as well, but when things didn’t work out I went to Bare Escentuals and worked with one of the artists to come up with a good look for my wedding.

While I was getting my hair done Abby and Serena got their make-up done. Both my videographer and my friend from school who is a professional photographer were there to capture all the lovely before shots throughout the morning. While all this was going on Amber went back to her house to get ready, so by the time she came back to the salon we were all ready to go down to the church.

At the church my caterer was already there setting up along with some family friends. While all my bridesmaids got dressed I had to hang around because my photographers and videographer wanted to get shots of my dress and shoes before I put them on.

So I hung out making sure my mom wasn’t freaking out too badly since the florist was running a little late. I mostly hung out in the bridal room playing with my niece and chillin’ with my bridesmaids. Throughout the afternoon moms, grandmas, cousins, and female friends came in to hang with us as well.

The Ceremony

3pm the ceremony began, and it couldn’t have gone smoother. Everything happened perfectly. All the grandparents were there in time to walk down the aisle, my niece not only did not freak out but she giggled when walking down the aisle with my sis in-law Tiffany, no one tripped, and I came out exactly when I wanted to with my music.

Since I walked down the aisle to Star Wars’ “The Throne Room” people cheered and clapped when I came in. It was awesome! Then to top it off, my father in-law, who was our officiant, started off the ceremony with a Yoda impression.

During the ceremony, my father in-law handed us a camera to take pictures of the audience:

Throughout the ceremony I was so nervous. I’m glad it was as short as it was. When the ceremony was over I was practically mobbed by my guests as everyone came out to hug and congratulate us. Eventually all the guests were ushered into another hall where there were some refreshments to keep them occupied while the bridal party took pictures and the staff set up for the reception. There was also a guestbook pumpkin (which my friend Debbie was in charge of) for guests to sign; the pumpkin was my mom’s idea to go with the fall season.

The Reception

For dinner we had cheese lasagna, garlic bread, french bread, and an open salad bar. Our cake was a cupcake cake along with a small top-cake that had our wedding berries (which were also the favors) on top along with this porcelain wedding topper my mom got for us.

It was delicious! It turned out exactly the way I wanted. I couldn’t have asked for a more perfect wedding cake!

For toasts, the champagne was from Frasinetti’s, the same champagne my parents drank at their wedding (as well as at my uncle’s wedding). My parents gave us one of their original bottles for mine and Joshua’s glass.

It tasted good, but it sure smelled old! LOL! I had to hold my nose each time I took a sip, and considering there were LOTS of toasts, I had quite a few sips.

The toasts themselves were amazing. Words can’t describe how touched Joshua and I were by my dad’s toast. Then we had Dani, Bobby, Abby, Stephen, Robert, Chris, Forrest, Beth, and Marty all make toasts as well. I love my family!

Speaking of family, probably one of the most important things at the wedding was that my 92 year-old grandpa was there.

Abby managed to get this lovely shot of Dani and I with out grandpa. Considering right now he’s showing signs of dementia, I am so grateful my grandpa could be at my wedding and actually know what was going on. He was touched when I told him the jewelry I was wearing belonged to Mormor. ♥

After all the toasts, bouquet toss, garter toss, cake cutting, it was time for the dancing! My first dance with Joshua was to our song Everything by Lifehouse. My father/daughter dance was to A Dream Is A Wish Your Heart Makes from Cinderella; my dad and I used to play Cinderella when I was a little girl, so it was very special for us. For the mother/son dance Karen and Beth came at Joshua with red lipstick and both danced with him; even my mom joined in!

When the traditional dances were done, the party really began!

We all had a great time, including Renee! Best part of the night was when we were all busting out to Ke$ha! GOOD TIMES!

My bridal party cracked me up with the way they decorated the truck aka our getaway vehicle. On my side they put up a bunch of Star Wars stuff and on Josh’s side they put up Star Trek stuff. It was nerdalicious in the truck!

Wedding Night and Weekend in South Lake Tahoe

We made a quick stop at my in-law’s house so we could change out of our bridal attire and into more comfortable clothing since we had a two hour drive ahead of us. Family started coming back to the house, so we were all able to snack on some of the rehearsal dinner leftovers together before heading out.

We spent our wedding night at The Embassy Suites in Lake Tahoe right next to all the big casinos. Sunday the weather was rainy, so we took a trip up to Carson City and checked out some shops. We came back to Tahoe in the afternoon and went to Hard Rock Cafe for dinner. By the time we were done with dinner it began snowing!

Monday we woke up with Tahoe covered in snow. We were very sad to leave the snow, but we both had work and school to attend to. Instead we’re going on our honeymoon the day after Christmas.

Aside from some miscommunication with my caterer about dinner starting and cleaning up afterwards, everything went perfectly. I couldn’t have asked for a better day celebrated with family and friends. We’re very blessed.

• Official Wedding Photos – Taken by our photographer Karri Koenigs
• Additional Wedding Photos – Taken by various friends and family