Amy's wedding continued

I realize I need to end my account of Amy's wedding weekend.

I think I left off with the wedding day. We all got into the limo and headed to the church, which was convienantly located only a few miles away. My groomsman, Frank and I lead the bridal party procession with flair. Amy's niece-3 and nephew-1, were the flower girl and ring bearer, respectively. Actually Annika, the flower girl, refused to be refered to as flower girl and instead prefered to be called the princess. She even wore a tiara to prove it. She did a fine job walking down the aisle, though her brother, Kai had some trouble. Eventually he made it down with some assistance from his father.

Amy's friend, Karen and sister bawled when she went down the aisle. I was strangely unaffected. I never seem to be able to predict when I will lose it at a wedding. Sometimes I try to make myself cry to feel like I am really getting into it. If Amy and I had just left Maui where we were spending 90% of our free time together, I am sure I would have been upset. But now I figure I will see her just as much, if not more since her husband has a good job.

Anyway, Amy looked awesome and Shawn seemed to have tears in his eyes. Amy's dad definitely did. Amy's brother, Ryan performed the ceremony. I always like it when family members do the wedding since they have a lot of insider info. It's definitely weird when you can tell the person marrying the couple doesn't really know them.

After the ceremony, we were supposed to go immediately to take bridal party pics. Unfortunately Amy and Shawn stood in the hallway too long and an unexpected receiving line began. This delayed the pictures quite a bit as they schmoozed with their guests. Finally we headed out into the wintry weather for some pics. It was freezing. The groomsmen kept lending us their jackets to cover our strapless shoulders. The pictures looked great, I am sure but I was glad to get back in the warm limo.

The reception was fun. Lindsay, Amy's sister, started a little jellybean war. She tried to throw jellybeans into our cleavage. It was a fun game, for sure. The food was excellent and there was quite the array of pastries. Amy's cousin/Bethany's brother, Graeme was the MC. Canadian weddings always seem to have a friend or family member who announces stuff and makes sure things run smoothly. Graeme made up a great song at Bethany's wedding about how there better be gluten-free in Georgia. Bethany is allergic to gluten. It was just hilarious. The song he wrote about Amy was equally entertaining. It was all about how Shawn needed to be prepared because Amy was addicted to lululemon pants. For those of you who don't know Amy, she pretty much only wears pants from lululemon, a Canadian yoga/athletic wear company. The song was very fitting.

The speeches were good- funny yet heartfelt and it's always nice to see a man cry. I was excited about the bouquet toss but was thwarted by Kristy Bartunek. She gave me a hard shove from behind and dashed my hopes of catching the bouquet. I am not superstitious. I have already caught two. I am just competitive. Later Kristy and I made our fun by taking random pics including ones where we were wearing other people's coats.

After the wedding, we helped clean up and went back to Amy's to change. Then a bunch of the former YWAMers went over to Courtney Mowat's house to hang out. It's always interesting to see where your friends live. I called it the Courtney reality tour. Courtney lives in a teenager's dream house. They have a pool, hot tub, pool table, ping pong, huge media room with leather lazy boy style theater seating. And a projection screen with a wii. There also seemed to be endless snacks. It was awesome!! We had a lot of fun. I'd like to have a house like that when I have teenagers so they will want to hang out at home and not get into trouble.

The next day, Amy's dad drove me to the airport and it was back to teaching. Hmmm...