But I digress. Wedding. Dave wasn't a groomsman, but he did escort Mike's mom down the aisle (Mike had escorted Dave's mom at our wedding last year), served as an usher, and read the scriptures during the ceremony. He was quite the busy guy. And since Mike forgot to tell him most of this, he only found out about it on Friday when we showed up at the church for the rehearsal. Dave's so easy-going and just rolled with it. And he did a great job on the readings at the wedding.
Donna was walked down the aisle by her brother, which was special for her because they have such a close relationship. 
The rehearsal went fairly smoothly and was followed with a catered dinner in the church social hall. The food was pretty good, with New York-style cheesecake for dessert. This was definitely Donna's touch, since she's originally from Long Island. Since the wedding wasn't until 3:30 pm on Saturday, we relaxed and did our own thing, then had lunch and got dressed to head over to the church. The weather was beautiful. Clear skies and sunny, with a nice breeze and not at all hot and humid like it has been for the last few months. It was a perfect day. We got to the church, probably too early, but Dave wasn't exactly sure. For me it was a lot of waiting in the pews. For Dave, it was a lot of waiting in the back of the church.
Dave escorting his aunt, Jo (Mike's mom) to her seat at the start of the ceremony. 
The ceremony was lovely, performed by Mike's father (Dave's uncle, Jeff). I'm sure that was really special and you could see on Jeff's face that he was very happy. The ceremony went quickly and the couple had a bubble exit, which was cute. We stuck around for a little while to do some family pictures and then drove over to the reception hall. 
Unfortunately we took this picture while Donna was taking portraits. If we would have thought to get her in it, we'd have all the ladies that married into the family (left to right): Madaline (Dave's Mom), Annette (Dave's grandfather's wife), Jo, (Dave's aunt), and me. The reception hall wasn't too far away, and very near the hotel. Despite our deepest protests, Donna and Mike are big Yankees fans (everyone has a flaw), and instead of table numbers they used Yankee player names. We were seated with Andy Pettitte (at least it wasn't Jeter) and a few of the groomsmen with their wives and girlfriends. They were a funny group and we had a good time.
Donna loves penguins like you would not believe. The girl has more penguin stuff than you can imagine, including the seat covers in her car. Someone told her that she was being mean by sitting on them when she drove, but she retaliated, saying that she wasn't sitting on them, she was letting them give her a hug. Only that kind of logic can describe this obsession.
Now, I knew this about Donna when I bought the cake topper for Dave and I. I wanted something a little bit different and found a seller on Etsy who makes all kinds of bride and groom animals. We looked at them together and settled on these penguins.
The penguin cake topper from our wedding last year. The seller added the pink details at my request to go with our wedding colors. When Donna saw them, she just about lost it. Since Mike and Donna were engaged already (they were actually engaged before Dave and I), I knew what I needed to do.
Enhance: 
I contacted the seller and bought these for Donna last fall as a engagement gift. The seller added the navy blue details and even did the bouquet and veil flowers as daisies, Donna's favorite. We had a pretty good time and did some dancing. Of course, for the limited amount of dancing we did, there is still one picture of me (and Dave this time, too) on the dance floor in a not-so-flattering pose. I swear, I could make an album of just awkward pictures of me dancing at weddings. It's as though it's my destiny. So of course I'll share.
In our defense, the DJ was playing the Animal House version of Shout by Otis Day and the Nights. We were so glad to be able to spend the day celebrating with Mike and Donna. We wish them the best and a lifetime of love.
No comments:
Post a Comment