Seriously, I do not know why this has taken me so long!! It has been three weeks but I'm finally getting this posted. For some reason when I decide to write a specific post, I end up procrastinating so long that sometimes I never actually get around to it. But the spontaneous posts get posted really fast. Hence the spontaneity factor. It's ridiculous.
The last weekend in January was absolutely packed with people and parties and fun fun fun. We went to our first fire department party at the martini bar in Enumclaw, we attended Compline on Sunday night, which almost put me to sleep, we got Molly Moon's ice cream with a few YSSC friends (always good to see them) and, my favorite part, we celebrated with Tim and Annika and the rest of the Piehler/McInnis clan over the course of another wonderful wedding weekend.
Friday night I spent at the Piehler's house chatting with Annika about some last minute wedding details, visiting briefly with Ronnie, having heart-to-heart conversations with Sue and Mike, and tending to 120 stems of hydrangeas. It was a lovely evening that completely revitalized my soul and left me feeling a bit like Eliza Doolittle from My Fair Lady. There's something truly marvelous about being surrounded by buckets of flowers.
Saturday morning I was frantically searching for some flowers to add to the hydrangeas to help spice up the bouquets a little. I was getting incredibly anxious. We had stopped at five different grocery stores and florists on our way out to the Pickering Barn for the rehearsal and I finally decided I was just going to have to bite the bullet and drive up to the Metropolitan Market in Kirkland where I knew I would find exactly what I was looking for. And I did. 15 white tulips, two bunches of green mums, 2 bunches of white spray roses, and some fun yellow-ish green spray stuff, and all of the sudden my heart rate returned to normal. Well, mostly normal. It was a crazy weekend and Steven reminded more than once that maybe I'm a little too high-strung and maybe, just maybe (no, I don't think it's "maybe" at all, I do believe he was quite certain about this particular point) I let myself get a little too stressed out. So, now that I was breathing a bit easier, I drove back to the Piehler's where everyone had gathered for the rehearsal dinner. We had such a great time!! The food was wonderful -- phad thai, chicken satay, and coconut ice cream -- and the company was even better. We met and chatted with a few new people and visited with Annika's parents a bit and got a healthy dose of Piehler love and it was just lovely.Insert Fire Department party here. It was fun, you don't need to know the details, except I might mention that I learned first-hand about that whole "beer before liquor" thing. Basically, not a good idea. I can tell you what is a good idea though -- mudslide martinis. Oh. My. Goodness.
Sunday morning my alarm went off at 5am and I got straight to work. Well. Sort of. I was exhausted (I was maybe more than a little bit anxious slash stressed all night long and might have woken up every ten to fifteen minutes thinking about the flowers and wedding stuff and worrying about not getting everything done...) and it definitely took me a few minutes and a cup of tea to get moving but I came around.
Isn't this exciting? Look at all these pretty flowers I got to play with!!
Yes, those are kitty litter buckets. For some reason my mom and Grammi both save them -- there are towers of them in their garages -- and they just happen to work really well for holding fresh flowers. They're deep enough that the water doesn't slosh out and they fit perfectly wedged into the back of my car so they don't tip over while I'm driving. It's a trick we (really, my mom) discovered when we bought all of my wedding flowers at Pike Place Market.
I all of the sudden started to feel super nervous and worried that I just really didn't know what I was doing, but I decided the only solution was to get started. So I did! The bridesmaids bouquets came together quite quickly once I had completed the first one and knew what I was doing. Then there was Annika's bouquet, which took me a full hour but, I must say, I was pretty darn impressed with the end result. (Quick note, much better photos may be found here: https://www.facebook.com/#!/media/set/?set=a.10150501210337890.367799.65760432889&type=1 my camera definitely does not do these flowers justice.)
Next up: Corsages. Eeeeeek!!! I'd been nervous about this part for a while. They turned out pretty cute though. I used a hot glue gun for the twine and wired and taped all of the pieces before putting them together. I wish I had taken more photos but I was in a bit of a hurry. I am SO GLAD that I bought the mums! They were especially perfect for this part. Five hours after I had woken up, the bouquets were finally finished, I was showered and packed, and Steven and I were on our way out the door. It was pouring down rain, which complicated things a bit, but once I had wrestled everything into the car, we were all set. I used the car ride to wrap and pin the bouquets. The bridesmaids bouquets I wrapped with strips of lace and Annika's I wrapped with a navy blue ribbon that matched the bridesmaids dresses almost perfectly!
Thank goodness for all of these pickle jars I've saved! They're so useful.
Bridesmaids bouquets all ready to go.
(Yet another slightly out of focus photo. My camera can't handle dim indoor lighting. It only really does well with sunshine. Sorry about that.)
And the Bride's bouquet. Lookin' good!
And the corsages. Phew -- I did it!
The barn looked absolutely beautiful! All of Annika's ideas came together perfectly with the help of her creative team :) There were so many people helping that everything was set up and ready to go by noon and the wedding didn't even start until 3:30! It was crazy. Everyone had time to go home and shower and change if they wanted to. Steven and I stuck around (as there are always more details to help with) and actually ended up walking across the street to Costco to buy polish sausages for all of the Piehler boys :)
There were hydrangeas everywhere!!! And twinkle lights and books wrapped with twine and lots and lots of really sweet photos of Tim and Annika. Their guest books were really cool too. I wish I had gotten a picture of them (also wish I had remembered to sign one of them.... oops). They were two vintage books that had all of these paper doilies glued onto the pages for people to sign alternating with photos of Tim and Annika. Such a fun idea! One of the front covers had been cut out to look like a picture frame so you could see the photo on the first page. It was adorable. I was kind of jealous of them. Trying to figure out how I can fit that idea into my life :)
The wedding party at a point in the photo shoot when they had been told not to smile. Not sure why I chose this moment to take a photo, since it was the only moment all day that I caught a single one of them NOT smiling, but it's the only photo that I took so I have to include it because they're so darn good looking.
Cake Table! Isn't it beautiful? A friend of Annika's made the cake. I was really impressed. I want to learn how to do that too.
Me and my hot date :) He is the BEST person to bring to a wedding! Seriously. He is incredibly helpful and thoughtful and an excellent dance partner. I was in charge of coordinating the reception and he was right there with me the whole time. He checked in with the bride and groom periodically to see if he could get them anything, then made his way over to their parents to see if he could get them anything, then reminded me when there was nothing to do for a few minutes that I needed to just sit down and drink some water, and he danced with me and made me feel beautiful and sexy and fun -- which is no easy task let me tell you. But really, what's more fun that swing dancing to Like a G-6? Pretty much almost nothing at all.
We are so incredibly happy for Tim & Annika!!! They are two of our favorite people and we are the MOST excited to be married friends with them :) We are so blessed to have been a part of their big day.
