Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Top Ten List

Okay...... I will leave the story of the wedding day for Janell to tell. I would like to share with all who read this blog briefly what we did leading up to the week of the wedding and things I have learned. For me two weeks before the wedding there was the Three Rivers League District Wrestling Tournament. I am the assistant coach at Lakeridge High School. We had 4 in the finals, 1 got first and 3 got second. We also had 2 others place, one got 4th and the other 6th. So this meant that the week before the wedding I spent all Thursday, Friday and Saturday at the Memorial Coliseum coaching kids at the state tournament. We had a good showing and had 3 state placers, the fourth had a hard draw but ended his season with a 35-4 record. The weeks before the wedding Janell was prepping her mock trail team for the regional competition. She was coaching JV and Varsity teams. They competed the same weekend as state wrestling. They did well but did not qualify for state. How all the planning got done with wrestling, mock trail, and teaching, I am still not sure. Janell says she just had to focus on what was at hand.

Through this whole process I have learned and experienced several things. Here is a list of the top 10.

1. I never knew I could look at plastic plates online for 6 plus hours and then decide on
paper plates.

2. I never knew that when I would unzip my wife's wedding dress it would be so she could run and go pee.

3. I never knew that the perfect place to be at 4 o'clock on my wedding day would be Kells Irish Pub eating fries and drinking a soda with my beautiful bride.

4. I never knew that standing in a receiving line for 2 hours would be so much fun (Thank you so much, everyone for attending!).

5. I never knew that a double bed was so small.

6. I never knew that the do not disturb sign was so important.....

7. I never knew we would have to train our Italian Soda Makers to cut people off.....12?? Really?? 12?? We suspect that sugar high wore off sometime Monday afternoon.

8. I never knew that wearing green shoes at my reception would get such a reaction.

9. I never knew how grateful Janell and I would be to all those who came and supported us on our wedding day. We are truly overwhelmed with with the love, support, and generosity of others.

10. I never knew how lucky I would be to marry such an amazing, beautiful, smart, insurance sharing women.


Sunday, March 14, 2010

Amazing Day!!

Tom and I are now married! We celebrated our one-week anniversary yesterday. So far, so good!! Let me tell you the story of March 6, 2010 -- it was an absolutely amazing day! The sun was shining -- everything was gorgeous. So blessed!!

Here's my story...Tom's story is a bit different...but enjoy my side of things first...

I had a hard time sleeping the night before. I found myself waking up every hour or so, but when 5:45 AM arrived, I got up feeling much more rested than I would have thought possible. I made it to the make-up artist by 7 AM. Nicole did an amazing job -- she made me look great. It was a bit out of my usual -- fake eyelashes!! -- but I felt great all day long. After make-up comes hair, so off I went to Korie, my hairdresser. Also there was our friend, Illya, who took some photos as Korie worked her magic. My hair looked great!

I now had to hurry to the temple so I called Tom (with my bluetooth, I promise!) to see where he was. I assumed he would already be there, but he was driving there, too. We ended up talking all the way there and he was the car right behind me driving into the lot.

We went in together, and we found my mom and sisters there. After a brief visit with the records department making sure the marriage license was in order and church records were accurate, we were off to dress for the occasion. We had to separate for a short time! After my sisters and mom helped me get into my wedding dress, Tom and I were reunited while we waited for our guests to arrive. We also met with our "sealer" who was the man who performed our ceremony.

The ceremony was short, but wonderful. Tom and I made promises to each other and to our Heavenly Father. It was so beautiful. There were this great moment when I was looking at Tom, and I realized that this was real, and we were making a commitment to each other that is to last FOREVER! I love him so much...it is so great!

After the ceremony, we left the temple and met up with the rest of our families. It was so great to see everyone that was there to feel their love and support there. We spent about an hour taking photos with our family and friends with our photographer, Steve. You know the drill, pictures with the moms, the dads, the moms and dads, etc etc etc. After that hour, the family went to get some food, Tom and I spent about another hour taking photos around the temple. One of the funny moments was when we decided to bustle my dress, but Tom and Steve couldn't figure out how to get it done. After moments of struggle, we ended up needing the help of one of the women working at the temple to get it done. Too funny.

After the temple photos, we headed downtown for some more pictures. We went to the Eastbank Esplanade first where Tom proposed. We got some great photos there, too. We also went over to the west side and walked around some of the streets and Steve continued to take pictures. We went down to Saturday's Market where people kept shouting congratulations at us. I have never been pointed at so much in my life. I guess a bride in green tennis shoes is kind of an odd site even in Portland!! :-) We even ran into one of my former students which was way fun. Here's a picture of us in the car...what do you think? Would we have gotten a double-take from you??

Our time with Steve was done so we headed back to Kell's -- the Irish pub we first met at -- and ordered some cokes and french fries. It was a fun down time in the middle of a wonderful day.

That's where I am going to stop now before you get reader fatigue. Some pictures I will include here...enjoy!!

Friday, March 5, 2010

26 HOURS!!!!!

Not long now until we are a married couple. I can hardly wait 26 hours until I make the best decision of my life. Plus in 33 and 1/2 hours we get to celebrate with friends and family. We are so excited that so many of our friends and family are going to be able to make it. This has been fun and stressful at times planning this big day. It has been awesome receiving help from all of you. We have some fun things to post on the blog but they will have to wait as today and the next couple of days will be busy and full of fun. I am thankful that this day has arrived and as far as I know Janell still plans to show up for the ceremony. See you all tomorrow!!!