Monday, June 30, 2008

Do do do-do....Do do! do do....(You know, the wedding song)

Now that the European Cup is over and Liverpool's own Fernando Torres scored the winning goal for Spain, I can resume talking about the most important day in my life. Or something like that ;o).

After returning home to a house full of commotion with all the attendants getting ready for the ceremony, I finally found a freed up bathroom so that I could actually get ready. Of course, I wasn't worried about getting ready in time since I have plenty of experience getting ready for discos with Erika and I know I tend to get ready a few minutes faster. So I showered, shaved, and gelled down my hair. Turns out I was having a good hair day, probably cuz my hair just got cut 15 minutes prior :o). I put on my crisply ironed shirt (thanks Nana!), somehow managed to tie a perfect half-windsor, and then went out to mingle with the guests. And by "mingle", I mean drink two cups of wine in quick succession :o). I am man enough to say that I needed a drink to chill down these nerves - and finally lose the hangover from the previous night!

Erika finished up getting ready and looked more gorgeous than ever in her white dress that she - I mean "we" - bought in New York. If I can say myself, it really was the perfect dress for her, since it had a little "wedding" look to it, but was casual enough for our ceremony.

People were getting antsy, so we were ushered out the backdoor and walked right into the ceremony, following my niece, the shoeless flower girl, Ellie. I was feeling just fine with the wine at that point and was ready to get the show on. The musician for our wedding played a wonderful acoustic song that Roland picked out and that I recognized from my iPod playlist from a few years ago. Our family friend Frank did a great job with the ceremony, it was short, sweet, and succinct and we had a few funny points to interject with in order to loosen up the occassion enough. Summer read a surprising, sweet email from my sister who was in Africa to us and my mom also displayed enough courage to say some things to Erika and I - in Spanish!! Since meeting Erika and her family, my mom has put in some serious effort to learn some Spanish and it paid off at our wedding. Finally, the time came to exchange rings - at which point Frank pulled two candy ring pops from his pocket that we had given him just before the wedding. The precious metal versions will be procured and presented at our next wedding on February 14th, 2009. You're all coming, RIGHT?

So that was the ceremony in a nutshell. After this, we had a champagne toast with everyone using my parent's own wedding goblets, which was great. Someone who looked at the pictures of the wedding noted that the champagne we had was the kind that Tupac Shakur and all the other rappers sing about - obviously quality goods! We also nibbled on some snacks while out in the yard the catering staff quickly setup the dinner table to get the celebration really going. We had a wonderful, freshly cooked meal (with an amazing salad, I should add), not to mention a few bottles of wine floating around and refreshing and stiff mojitos perfected and concocted by my sister Summer and her friends. There was a lot of laughter and fun at the table, it was great. We followed that up with a moist guava cake from a cake shop in San Jose that Erika ended up tasting only when I stuffed it in her mouth!

Eventually, we started migrating inside the house because the weather was not cooperating and it was getting chilly outside. But the mojitos didn't stop there and the pictures we took inside tell the truth of the mood of the party. My sister-in-law Brie was the life of the party and I can't forget seeing my my clinging to the wall for dear life in order to stay upright :o). It was a great time!

And the best part is, my wedding was not a stressful blur! Obviously, not even a European Cup tournament can dim my memories of the perfect wedding!

J. Riley, thanks to everyone for making it great. Especially my mom and dad, who had everything planned, organized, and executed to a "T"!

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