The BIG day: Round 1

May 21, 2011, was the longest, but best day of my life! It's going to take more than one post to sum up this day! So we'll start at the beginning. The night before the wedding, after the rehersal dinner, I went back to my parent's house with my sister and Scotti for a slumber party. (Ben and Brian made an appearance of course). Stephen and his groomsmen went out that night for one last hoorah before the wedding. (I needed my beauty rest!)

That morning, I was awake bright and early. The nerves hit like a ton of bricks! There was a swarm of butterflies flying around in my stomach and I was too anxious to close my eyes. So I got up. My mom was already up and getting ready. (**Side note: This wedding wouldn't have happened if it weren't for her! She kept me in line the whole way with planning, and the day of she had everything together. She should consider going into event planning!) She and some amazingly wonderful volunteers went out to Hemingway's and got set up. I wanted to go help so I could see how things looked together, but the schedule for getting ready wouldn't allow it. We had breakfast early, since we were all awake.

After breakfast, my Mom, Aunt Cheryl, and Sophie left to go get set up. Lindsay, Scotti, and I climbed into my mom and dad's huge bed and managed to get a couple more hours of sleep(which I was grateful for later!!) Then we started getting ready. We had some time to kill before my hair appointment so we ran to the mall in search of a new bathing suit for my honeymoon.

I found one at Victoria's Secret(my favorite!) and grabbed some lunch before finishing up the getting ready process. Lindsay and Scotti came with me to my hair appointment to keep me company.

My hair dresser was AWESOME!! I used Megan from 10th Ave Hair Design and she copied the picture I brought her to a "T"! I recommend her to any bride getting married in the Pensacola area! After hair was done we went back to my mom's to finish with make up and meet up with the rest of my beautiful bridesmaids.

We were finally all ready! (Except for my dress) So we loaded up the cars and headed out to the beach(talk about some serious nerves!) so I could get into my dress and we could take the pictures of the girls before everyone started showing up. My next post will be the wedding day summary and the wedding pictures, but that may have to wait until tomorrow night! It's already way passed my bed time! I'm slowly, but surely getting all caught up with our big weekend!

Wedding weekend: Friday

And so it begins! Thursday was a nice relaxing day of hanging out. Friday was the kick off to all things wedding. I started my day by meeting my wonderful bridesmaids, and all of my family at the Village Inn for a yummy breakfast! It was a great way to get everyone together and start off the weekend in slow motion. After breakfast we all went down the road to my favorite nail salon to get our nails and toes done for the wedding. It was so relaxing(well as relaxing as you can be with this group!) and fun! I loved going with the whole group because we really took the time to enjoy it and hang out instead of rush through another appointment to get it over with before the wedding.

                                                   Baby Annisten got to come too! :)

With a group our size, this pretty much took all day. We got done at almost 1 in the afternoon. I had just about enough time to rush home, shower, and finish getting my stuff together(not to mention wrangle up the guys!) and then head out to the beach for the rehersal.

We had our rehersal at Hemingway's at 4:30. It took a few minutes to get it all together, but everything went really smoothly! I felt much better about everything once I saw it come together.

After our rehersal, we headed over to McGuire's Irish Pub for our rehersal dinner. Stephen's parents threw the rehersal dinner and it was wonderful! Everyone had a great time and the food there is always delicious! It was the perfect way to end our day.

                                                                My family at dinner

                                                                  Stephen's family

                                                             Handing out bridal party gifts

                                                      Whitney and her bridesmaid bag :)

                                                         Adam with his groomsman mug :)

                                  Shawn ordered the garbage burger... and actually ate it! YUCK!

                               The cute cake Stephen's mom ordered for us for the rehersal dinner! Disney and beach themed! Perfect!

Let wedding weekend commence!

I know, I know. I let another week pass, AGAIN! But here it is without further ado, the recap of our wonderful wedding festivities!

Thursday:
I took off work Thursday and spent the last day relaxing at the beach with friends. That night all of the rest of our family and friends got into town. I went to dinner with my family to our favorite local Mexican restaurant, and Stephen went out with his buddies that were in town for steaks and burgers(I will never understand men's obsession with beef!) After dinner, everyone met up at our apartment and we decided to go out for one last group outing so we headed to Seville Quarter to hang out at the Dueling Pianos show. Best way to spend our last night out together unmarried! We all just hung out and enjoyed each other's company and the awesome piano show. Our night wouldn't have been complete without a trip to the stage to celebrate the upcoming wedding with the entire bar! Leave it to our friends to make sure that happened! We were called on stage to play "Head, shoulders, knees, and toes" It was a blast. Round 1: we had to follow with the song and touch our own body parts. Round 2: we touched each other's body part as the song named it off. Round 3: We put our hands behind our backs and had to touch each other's body part with our head. (Ending the song in a lip lock as they got to "eyes, and ears, and MOUTH and NOSE) It was a cute idea and we had so much fun!