Part 3: Surprise wedding!

Catch up with Part 1 and Part 2.  

So funny story.  My grandparents, aunts, uncles, everyone came in for this "surprise engagement party."  We were all having dinner the night before our wedding and my grandma looks at me and asks, "so Linds, when are you going to get married?"

I responded with a sassy "Eh we already have a mortgage together, that's pretty much a marriage, so we probably won't."  Well wasn't she surprised ;)

And let me also say that it is super hard to plan a surprise wedding when all of your family is staying at your parents' house.  Oh hey, just going to get my nails done with Lauren.  See you in a few hours.  I'm going to get my hair done.  Oh and can you go to the restaurant to help set up for an "engagement" party that I'm supposed to know nothing about?  Thanks.

So Saturday started off with getting nails done with Sam's girlfriend, Lauren.  Then jetting off to get my hair done before heading to the hotel to get ready with my mom, Lauren, and MIL Beth.  Sam was nice enough to go out and buy us some McDonalds (because Lauren was hungry) and got me some french fries which turned out to be the only thing I actually ate that day :)

We planned to start pictures before anyone got to Meson Sabika.  We only had an hour before people would start showing up and I would have to leave again.  Now for those who have ever had wedding photos taken know that it takes FOREVER and we didn't achieve a whole lot in that hour.  Before I knew it, I had to go back to the hotel to hang out while everyone arrived.

my parents, us, Andrew's parents

Soon it was time to drive back over.  By this time, I was getting a little nervous, which I shouldn't have been because we were already married.  But I hate being the center of attention, and guess what: at your wedding you're the center of attention.  I remember my dad turning to me in the car and saying, "So is this going to be legit? Or does some other state have your marriage certificate?"  To which my mom whipped around and said "Did you already get married?!"  Uh yes, surprise!

We pulled up through the back entrance of the restaurant and everyone was outside sitting down.  Within minutes of arriving, I walked in with my parents to everyone's gasps and surprise.  I had typed up a ceremony for my brother to perform (thanks, Google) and Andrew and I wrote our own vows.  I never thought I would be one of those who cried at her wedding, but I sobbed the whole time.  I couldn't believe we had actually pulled this off.

my "maid of honor" Katie

My favorite part of our ceremony was turning to everyone and saying "SURPRISE!"

After lots of hugs and more pictures, we were able to get the party started!

best friends from high school

my favorite kiddos!  Jack, Ellie, and Katie

There were lots of margaritas and tequila shots, two of my favorites :)
   

And delicious Spanish cuisine.

Good thing that we got to eat everything at the tasting a month before because I didn't eat a thing at our reception.

Andrew and I danced to "Your Song" by Elton John.  When we were in high school, Andrew gave me a card, probably for Valentine's Day, with the lyrics to this song inside.  Out of all of the cards that I have saved from him, this is the one that I managed to lose just days after getting it.

my favorite picture

My dad and I danced to "You've Got a Friend in Me" by Randy Newton.  You know, from Toy Story :)

Then I got my dance on!  Thankfully I had many awesome dance partners.

dancing with Poppi

Katie

Ellie

Pi Phis

Surprisingly, we didn't have wedding cake.  Anyone who knows me knows that I am obsessed with cake.  LOVE it.  But, of all the weddings that we gone to, there have maybe been 2 cakes that were actually good.  Disappointing.  So I went with my second favorite: ice cream.

And my bestie Liz made me a sundae :)  Thank goodness because it was the only thing I ate that night!  (You better believe that Andrew and I inhaled a pizza at about 1am.)

 While we didn't actually get "married" on July 30, 2011, it will always be my wedding day.  Now did everything going as planned?  No.  We had our share of drama.  But it was a perfect day and it was our day.

First Anniversary part two: Planning a surprise

Where were we?  Ah yes, our first wedding.  To catch up and read about our wedding part 1, click here.

In order to tell the whole story, we need to back up quite a bit.  I'm talking March 2010.  I went up to Ann Arbor with Lucy for part of my spring break.  It was during this trip that we decided to go ahead with a surprise wedding.  I immediately started looking up venues and photographers.  I had originally wanted to get married at the Brookfield Zoo because we love the zoo, but being the foodies that we are, we wanted to go with our favorite restaurant, Meson Sabika in Naperville, IL.  Right before we moved to Madison, we told our parents that we were going to go to Meson Sabika for lunch.  If our parents had dined there before or were really familiar with the restaurant, they would have known that they don't serve lunch.  We met with the event planner and booked the place on the spot.  Easy peezy.

Oh wait, except that my best friend and sorority sister had gotten engaged just months before and was planning a wedding for July 2011 and Andrew's brother just got engaged.  Panic ensued as I prayed that neither would pick our day or one close to ours.  I really didn't want to have to share our secret so early, but thankfully we didn't have to.  Both picked dates a few weeks before and after our wedding date.  PHEW

Fast forward a couple of months and still dodging those engagement questions.  Now that we were living together, people were expecting it.  I even remember my mom asking me one day when we were going to get engaged.  I just shrugged and said "eh, eventually."  However, the dreaded wedding dress shopping was quickly approaching and I knew I couldn't do it by myself.  I told Andrew that we would have to tell our parents soon.

We were planning to go back to Geneva for a weekend in October.  I called my parents and told them that we wanted to go to dinner with them and Andrew's parents.  Of course, everyone assumed that we were going to tell them that we were engaged.  We went to Molcajete on October 22, 2010, snacked on some chips and salsa and ordered some food.  My mother was giddy with excitement.  I wanted until after we order to spring the news on them. It went something like this:
Me: Ok, now I know you're all thinking this, however, we're not engaged.  BUT we are getting married... next July.
Everyone else: wait, what?

I proceeded to explain the surprise wedding concept and why we chose this type of wedding.  They were all on board, but pretty disappointed we weren't celebrating an engagement and even more disappointed that they were sworn to secrecy!  My dad thought we were just getting everyone together to announce that we were getting another dog.  Good guess, Skip :)

My mom is a wonderful person and immediately jumped in to help me with everything.  If it wasn't for her, we wouldn't have had the wedding that we did.  I booked all the big stuff, but she did flowers, decorations, favors, set-up, all of it.  And all that little stuff is a lot harder than the big stuff!  Also difficult: wedding dress shopping.  I dreaded it.  I probably tried on 30+ dresses at 5 different stores, and even left in tears a few times.  My poor mother and future mother-in-law.  They had to endure the search and the let down so many times.  Now that is something I'm glad I don't have to do again.  Don't get me wrong, my dress was very pretty and perfect for our wedding, but I didn't love it.  In fact, it still sits in a closet in the garment bag.  Should probably get that cleaned and preserved, right?

Remember that best friend and sorority sister who was getting married at the beginning of July?  Well, I was in her wedding, so that meant lots of wedding talk.  There were so many times I almost blurted it out.  "Oh you can totally wear pink shoes with your wedding dress.  I'm wearing hot pink with mine!"  It was torture trying to keep this secret from everyone, especially my closest friends.  I know it was even harder for my mom.  But she was such a trooper :)

As you know from Part 1, we got married before our wedding.  It just seemed right for us.  We didn't plan it all along, but it just happened.  We had originally wanted Andrew's brother, Chris, along with my brother, Sam, to perform the ceremony.  They are two of the people who know us best.  However, Chris didn't know about our wedding and we struggled with telling him about it and having him be apart of it and leaving his older brother in the dark.  In the end, Sam already found out (Marc let the cat out of the bag, oops!), so I asked him if he would do it.  It would be our surprise to Mom and Dad because they had no idea.

We invited everyone to our wedding under the guise of an engagement party.  Andrew was going to surprise me with a "proposal."  So people were thinking that they were coming to surprise me, but we surprised them instead :) 

Happy Anniversary part 1

July 7th is our first wedding anniversary for our first wedding.  If we're going to get technical about this, we had two weddings and technically have two anniversaries.  I will probably be the only one who actually remembers these dates and will remind someone else about them, but that's ok.

I thought that for this post, I would tell the story about our "wedding day" and why we chose to go this route.  So here is part one and part two will come when the first anniversary of our second wedding roles around. 

In order for you to fully understand our story, we have to backup to March 2010.  Andrew was still living in Ann Arbor, MI finishing his master's degree in biomedical engineering and I was still living at home with my parents in Geneva, IL subbing.  Much to everyone's surprised, we weren't engaged even though we had been together since like the second grade.  I have to admit, I was a little perturbed that I didn't have a pretty little ring on my left hand.  Now we knew that we were going to get married, we just hadn't hammered out the details yet.  Andrew was actually the first person to suggest a surprise wedding.  The more and more I thought about it, I loved the idea.  I hate being the center of attention and didn't really want to answer constant wedding questions until we actually got married.  I found this blog and got really excited about the idea. 

Sorry, but we have to fast forward a bit, but you'll get the middle part of the story in part two. :)

Our perfect wedding was to have one of our brothers get ordained and marry us.  Neither of us are particularly religious, so the idea of a church wedding was just not us.  After doing some research, it was going to be way too difficult to get one of our brothers ordained for the wedding and I didn't know if IL would even allow it.  So we were back to a church wedding.  The dad of one of my mom's kindergarteners was a pastor, so we got set up to meet with the pastor.  Turns out we just weren't feeling it.  It wasn't part of our dream wedding.

Without telling anyone specifics, we just said that we weren't going with a pastor and we would have it taken care of (our parents were helping us plan the wedding).  All through June we started talking about getting married at the Capitol building in Madison.  It just seemed like the easiest thing for us to do.  How romantic, right?

Now the date.  I had to take a class in Milwaukee for two weeks in July, so for 7 days, I would be driving back and forth.  I asked Andrew when he wanted to get married and he responded with "something easy to remember."  Ok, how about 7/11?  Perfect!  Oh wait, I have class, that's a no go.  So Andrew suggested 7/7/11.  Well, I had to teach summer school in the morning, but my afternoon was free.

We quickly drove downtown so we could get started on our marriage license and I began emailing judges to see who was free.  Soon we had a date, a license, a judge, and a half day off of work.  (Now finding something to wear was another story and a long process).

So July 7, 2011 started off uneventful.  We both went off to work for the morning.  I was done teaching at 11am, so Andrew took a half day and we headed down to the Capitol.  It was the one and only time that we have been in the Capitol.  We found the judge in the rotunda and then set out to find two people to sign our license as witnesses, cue security guard and tour guide.  (side note: did you know that these people don't actually have to witness your wedding, just the declaration that you want to marry each other.  Interesting fact.)  Once that little part was out of the way, he took us to the side of the Capitol that faces Lake Monona. 

The ceremony was pretty quick and didn't seem very real.  I think that because it was just the three of us, the reality didn't really set in for me.  We used the promise ring that I had gotten Andrew back in undergrad and a $10 ring that I found at JCPenny (klassy).

After our quickie ceremony, we headed down to the Henry Vilas Zoo.  Perfect wedding activity, right?  Sorry, no pictures from this.  We walked around for a bit, ate some $1 popcorn, and went home to walk Lucy.

Andrew then surprised me with a beautiful dinner at L'Etoile on Capitol Square.  I'll have to take a picture of the menu because they wrote congratulations on it :)

So why did we get married twice?  Well, we had our little ceremony together, then we had my brother Sam perform our ceremony for all of our friends and family.

Three more weeks and I'll post part two with all the details of our surprise wedding ;)

We're so close!

Dear Family and Friends,
When Andrew and I decided to walk 60 miles in 3 days to help end breast cancer, it seemed like it was so far away and we'd have plenty of time to train and fundraise.  Well, now it's the beginning of July and we have less than 6 weeks left!  Where did all that time go?

After spending a long weekend in Disney World celebrating a friend's wedding and not walking as much as we were planning to because of Tropical Storm Debbie, our 17 and 13 mile walks this weekend were a little challenging.  (Not to mention HOT and HUMID!)  It's not until after mile 8 or 9 that you really start to feel it and my feet begin to hurt.  And we're supposed to walk 20 miles each day for 3 days in a row?  It will definitely be a challenge.  However, every day it gets a little easier.  Our short 3 or 4 mile walks with the dogs are now a breeze.

Andrew's mom, Beth, is doing better and better.  She had her reconstructive surgery on July 2nd and is recovering at home.  She said that she feels much better than she did in January when she got her bilateral mastectomy.  After numerous surgeries and 4 chemotherapy treatments, she is doing pretty well considering (sans some hair, but hey, I wouldn't mind losing some of my hair with this heat!)

Thank you so much for your continued support, encouraging words, and donations.  We are getting so close to our goal of raising $5100 (we're almost to the $4600 minimum that we have to raise!). As of today, we have raised $3480, which is 68% of our goal.  Thanks to you, we can say that we are almost there.  However, we still have a long way to go.  Lots more walking to do and still some fundraising to complete.  We hopet that we will meet the minimum requirements of $2300 each before our first wedding anniversary, July 30.  All fundraising requirements must be met in order to participate in the walk.  We have been training so hard and you have all been such a great support system that I hope we will be able to complete our goal and this journey.

Please keep Beth in your thoughts and prayers and send some cool weather and rain to the Madison area.  We need it!
Lindsey