Wedding Day - before the wedding.

July 4, 2009 - Dane and Jennifer's wedding

First of all, I had originally told Dane that he had to spend the night somewhere else the night before the wedding because we weren't supposed to see each other that morning. After the bachelor party incident, and him not being home the night before, I really wanted him to stay home. So I got to sleep next to him the night before the wedding. I slept well. I don't think I would have if he hadn't been there.

We got up really early. I had to take a shower and dry my hair. We put all the dresses in Kristi's car, and she and I went to the hotel to pick up Robin and Ginny. Alex took her car and dropped Felicia off at the hotel. She then picked up the fruit tray and some other breakfast items. We all met up at Drab 2 Fab. Mary Jane was already there and waiting for us. We started hair at 8:00. Tess got there a little before 8:30 to set up and start working on our make up.

Mary Jane did Robin's and Ginny's hair first. She had their's done so fast, I wondered if we had scheduled our appointment way too early. But then she worked on Alex's and that took a lot longer. Our photographer, Kari Nichols, came in between 9:00 and 9:30. Mary Jane, Tess, and Kari are all in the same age range as Kristi and Alex. They were all talking about tattoos and Twilight. We had a really good time. After we were done, I was really glad we had started at 8:00. We were never rushed. Everything was done around 11:00 and our pictures were to start at 12:00.

The lady at the chapel had told me she would open up the bride's quarters a few minutes before noon, but Kari said we should go ahead and go because sometimes it's already open. We went ahead and started over there. On the way, we stopped and grabbed some bottled water to have on hand. We got to the chapel around 11:30 and the bride's quarters was locked, but after a few minutes a man came out. He had been doing maintenance and he was done. He left it open for us. We went in and immediately started changing into our dresses and started pictures.

Dane and I had our "special moment" at the celebration garden. He was waiting for me with his back to me. I walked up behind him and called his name. It still makes me want to cry to think about it. He looked so handsome in his tux. He was sweating bad, but he still looked so awesome. We took some pictures with the two of us outside, then we headed over to the chapel to take wedding party pictures.

We were in the chapel until 1:15. As we left, we could see some guests starting down the sidewalk to the chapel. We got out just in time! I was so hot! My petticoat was sticking to my legs and wrapping around them. I had sweat dripping down my legs, but I didn't sweat much from the neck up. My hair was up and I didn't have problems with my makeup coming off or anything like that.

After pictures, the girls and I headed back over to the bride's quarters to cool off and wait for the ceremony. The first thing I did was walk in and go stand over a vent. It felt so good, but then as I started to walk away, my dress snagged on some wood on the baseboard. It tore the edge of the organza away from the dress. Like a 8 inch long piece of the edge was pulled away from the dress. My mom came in and said she thought she might have some needle and thread with her. I told her I had a sewing kit. She got some needle and thread and did a quick stitch up job on my dress. It was enough that the tore piece wouldn't be noticable.

I stressed some because some of our parents didn't leave the chapel after the pictures. I mean, they were supposed to be walked in and seated after all the guests arrived, but they were sitting in the back of the chapel. ?????? I sent my mom to find out where they were. She came back and said they were at the chapel and weren't leaving. Dane's mom said her knees hurt and she couldn't walk down to where we were. My stepmom had a similar problem because she had foot surgery a couple months ago. Basically, the only air conditioning outside the chapel meant a walk and no one was willing to do it. So they were there in the chapel when the guests got there. Then they got up and left so they could be ushered in. Whatever.