ReCaps! Finally.......Prep Before Ceremony

Hello all. I know it's been a very long time since I've actually blogged, and all I can say is I'm sorry. This here is my first recap of the wedding. I didn't really know where to start, and I will probably be all over the place with this, but for this first post I will be recapping the church set up (the day of) and getting ready for the ceremony. I really didn't feel the need to go into make up, hair, etc. because I did my own at home in a big rush! More about that later.
I've gotten a bit lazy when it comes to blogging, so I've arranged the pics as collages.....I hope you don't mind. OK....so let's start. We were married on September 18, 2010. The weather was a very nice and comfortable 86 degrees.
We were married in a very old stone church that my dad's side of the family has attended for generations. In fact, my grandmother lived right next door to it.
The church has been there since 1888.
The Pastor was to meet us at the church to let us in to decorate at 2:30. But I think he didn't show up until about 2:55......right about the time I was scheduled to start getting ready. But ok......it's a good thing I had minimal decorations for the church. My 28 year old daughter met us there and was able to help out decorating. Thank goodness! And of course she brought her 4 year old daughter (my flower girl/granddaughter) and I of course brought my 13 year old daughter/granddaughter (I adopted her when she was 2). She was appointed as the Flower Girl's Escort. Such a prestigious title. ha! We just needed to ensure that the flower girl would make it down the aisle. You see, when I first asked my darling granddaughter to be my flower, she was animatedly against it. I told her she would be wearing a beautiful Cinderella dress, I showed her videos on YouTube of flower girls walking down the aisle, I begged and pleaded, tried guilt trips.....you name it! And still....NO! I don't want to be a flower girl! So I basically had decided that we would have to trick her. Long story short, she did wonderfully and had full knowledge of what she was going to do. YAY!
~~~MAKE SURE YOU CLICK ON PICS TO SEE LARGER~~


So in the above pic, you can see her sitting on the bench and waiting to get changed into her dress. But first, setting up. You can see my 13 year old putting the signs on the pew bows. I really didn't spend much time or effort on the pew bows. I just bought the Dollar Tree bows, and added lavender tulle to them. The signs were very simple.....card stock and ribbon. My Mr. ran the simple runner that I had gotten from LinenTablecloth.com down the aisle.
While they did that, I was decorating the entryway.

I put out the layered programs that I made, the bubbles I had decorated, the Tears of Joy tissues I made, the guest book I had made at Photoworks.com. They had a coupon last year for a free book, so I jumped on it! I also put out pictures of our grandparents and parents on their wedding days. I especially love the one that has my grandmother and grandfather exiting this very church on their wedding day back in 1927. After decorating, we headed to a small church reception area to get dressed. It was just a few steps away. When we walked in, we noticed that it was set up for some sort of reception. I wasn't told about this. All of the areas I was planning to have photo ops in were completely changed. There had been a perfect corner in which to take pictures, but now that was gone. Oh well.....

So Alayla quickly got dresses in a corner....hiding from everyone. She's so cute, and she actually really seemed ready for her part! So now it was my turn. My daughter and Mom helped me with a few things.
Ah....I feel like a princess! Good thing I brought a small mirror......hey, ya gotta make do with whatcha gots! lol
I made my necklace, by the way. It was during crunch time, so nothing fancy. Seeing as I had never made any jewelry before, I thought it came out pretty good. I had planned to do a much nicer one, but I'm lucky I made one at all. I really don't even know why I was so determined to make my own.....darned blog world!
I made my shoe clips, but somewhere, somehow between the ceremony and reception I lost one. grrrrrrr........you can see that I had lost one in the Mr & Mrs Shoe Shot (coming later). Grrrrr.....
Well anyway, I added little blue beads to my garter for my something blue. My 13 year old (Sunshine) helped put my shoes on while Alayla sat patiently with "Baby", her giraffe that she never leaves home without. After I was ready, we had time for some pics. My sister and nieces joined us.
You can see the corsage that I made for my mom. I used a lot of the same elements for the corsage, boutonnieres, and my bouquet. Yup, I made my own bouquet too! I think my next post will be closeups of my bouquet, so it won't be as looooooooooooong as this post.
Sorry about that, but you seemed bored. hehe

pictures taken by: Sweet As Pie Weddings

Yes, I did end up hiring a photographer after all. I got a great deal.....all pics shot, unedited, all on dvd. So, in other words......I had to do any enhancing, color adjusting, etc. that needed to be done on the pics (which I love to do anyways!).