Vacation 2011: K&M Wedding- Reception

Since Donald and I were both a part of the wedding we couldn't exactly take pictures during the ceremony and we didn't grab my camera during the first dance since we both had to be introduced with the wedding party.  But I did manage to grab my camera in time for the Father/Daughter dance and then all events following!

Kari and Matt were introduced as Mr. and Mrs. and then shared their first dance as husband and wife to "Smother Me" by The Used.  They were adorable and it is a sweet song. 
After the first dance we had lunch from Q's BBQ- BBQ sandwiches, potato salad, coleslaw, and baked beans! Yum!

After lunch Kari and Matt wanted to take some pictures with family members, I missed the first few because I was decorating their getaway car! But here are a few that our camera caught:

After all the pictures were taken we went back inside to watch the Father/Daughter dance.  Kari and Sean danced to "Ready, Set, Don't Go" by Billy Ray Cyrus.  It was a sweet moment.

After Kari and Sean danced, Matt and Kari had a Money Dance (where you pay to dance with the Bride and Groom).  This a small handful of those pictures.

After the Money Dance we did the toasts and cut the cake.  We didn't get any pictures of the toasts because, well I had the camera and I was giving one of the toasts.  They cut the cake and to my delight, they smashed it in each others faces! (I love when people do that!)

The Happy Couple after cleaning off all the cake!

Then they did the bouquet and garter toss.  Tobi caught the bouquet and Nathan caught the garter!

Then it was finally time to say goodbye to the newlyweds. We sent them off in a sea of bubbles!

It was such a GREAT day! The ceremony was beautiful and the reception was perfect! There is one funny story that I have to tell! During the Father/Daughter and Money Dances we had a real wedding CRASHER enter the reception.  She came in and got a drink and then asked the caters for a plate of food and they gave it to her! She watched a few of the dances and even danced and clapped herself.  Donald saw her come in and he kept an eye on her. Ha! It was too funny!

P.S. Sorry this was such a long post, but there were too many pictures that I wanted to share!

Vacation 2011: K&M Wedding- Rehearsal & Rehearsal Dinner

After our bellies were full and our nails were pretty we headed down to Maymont for the rehearsal!

There is only a few things you can say about a rehearsal for a wedding- we just rehearsed! Here are some pictures:

For the rehearsal dinner we went to Roma Italian Restaurant. It was very good! Here are some pictures:

Vacation 2011: K&M Wedding- Lunch and Nails

The first offical event for the wedding was a Bridal Party lunch and getting our nails done!

For lunch, the Bride picked Applebee's! We had a really good time eating and talking! The resturant was not too busy, so we could just hang out in the booth without feeling rushed!

After lunch we went over to a nail place and got our toes and fingernails painted!

We had a great time hanging out with Kari one last time before she became a Mrs!

Vacation 2011: Airports and Airplanes

The first leg of our vacation was, well, getting there! Our flight was set to leave at 3:15pm from DFW and arrive in RIC at 10:50, but when you are dealing with planes and airports that doesn't always happen! 

We get there and find that our first flight was delayed an hour because of storms on the East coast (we had a layover in Newark).  We were a little nervous because of flight leaving Newark was set to leave at 9:30 and if we were arriving an hour later than planned, we wouldn't have much time at Newark- we had to change terminals and that's not simple in Newark.  But "thankfully" we were delayed leaving Newark (I say that we were "thankful" because we had PLENTY of time, but that meant that we would be arriving in Richmond later than planned and it was already too late for my taste!) But we did have plenty of time to eat $10 airport pizza!

Now for all you people that live in New Jersey, please don't be offended by what I am about to say!  Newark Airport is a terrible airport and I don't ever want to fly through there again! We arrived in terminal C, but needed to be in terminal A.  Now terminal C wasn't so bad, it was terminal A that I have issues with!

First, because there were so many delayed flights departing, the terminal was way over crowded.  Second, our ticket said we would be flying out of one gate and once we got there we were told it was leaving from another gate.  And about 45 minutes into waiting we were told, once again, that our gate had changed! At that point, we told ourselves that were was a good chance they would lose our luggage, but thankfully they did not! Third, it smelt terrible- like throw up! We changed seats a few times trying to avoid the smell, but we had no such luck! Even the plane had a bad smell! I was never so happy to feel us land than at that time!

The flight home was much better! We left Richmond at 7am and had a small layover in Charlotte and were back in DFW by 11! We did have to sit at the airport for about 2 hours because we didn't drive and someone had to pick us up and everyone that we knew that could have picked us up was in church and we didn't feel comfortable asking someone to miss church for us! So we just hung out and shared a $7 sandwich and a $2 bag of chips! Ha!

There were a few pros and cons to flying.  While we loved that we got 2 extra days in VA, it was a bummer have to be at the mercy of the plane and airports.  Had we driven we would not have had such long layovers on the way there- just a long drive!  But had both flights been as good as the one coming home, then it would have been great! Also, I hated having to spend $50 to check luggage! It such a waste of money, but we really didn't have a choice since we were going to be gone for so long!

Overall, we were glad that we got to fly- it was way cheaper and A LOT faster! We probably won't get to fly for Christmas because flights are a lot more expensive during that time.

P.S. Sorry there are no pictures for this post- we didn't take any of us sitting in the airport- ha!

Vacation 2011: Prologue

So it could possibly take me until August to blog about everything that happened during our vacation! We had a busy, busy week and a half! We had great time visiting family and friends and we were sad to leave! We got home and totally crashed from sheer exhaustion!

As a teaser to the upcoming blogs, here is our vacation in numbers:

• States visited (or drove through): 5- Virginia, Delaware, Maryland, New Jersey, Pennsylvania
• Hours in the car: over 20
• Nights away from TX: 11
• People on the beach trip: 9
• Little people we loved on: 6
• Sermons preached by Donald: 2
• Guests at the wedding: over 90
• Pictures taken: at least 500
• Nights at a hotel: 1
• Newlyweds: 2
• Days in Lynchburg: 2
• Hours at the Airports: 10
• Hours on the plane: 8.5
• Temperature when we returned to TX: 103

Lots more pictures and blogging to come!