surprise

We are married! Oh wow. I'm taking a few minutes to rest while my HUSBAND (wow!) takes his mom to the train station. One of my good friends told me to pretend to write a letter to a relative who couldn't make it to the wedding while the night was fresh in your mind, describing everything, so you could read it again in years later and remember all the details. I thought well, that's a great idea, but instead of pretending to write to a relative, I would write to all of you. ;)

I woke up super early from excitement and didn't know what to do with myself for the next four hours, so I baked a simple lemon yogurt cake and bounced around the apartment until my sister arrived.



We went and spent three nice hours getting our hair and makeup done and then came back. During that time the moms and some friends had turned all the flowers floating around our apartment into some GORGEOUS centerpieces of yellow roses, white carnations, greenery, and yellow stock. I was in awe of the amazing creations they put together. The white milk glass vases looked perfect, so sweet & simple!

After my mom left to drive over the centerpieces to our venue, a fire broke out in our apartment building a few stories down! OMG. Because it's a highrise, we were told to not evacuate our floor immediately, so we sat there, wedding dresses at hand, ready to run down thirty some flights of stairs. Thankfully the fire was put out quickly (we believe it was just a kitchen fire) without any serious damage.

After everyone finally got dressed, it was off to the ferry!





We made a small procession through Paulus Hook four blocks over to the ferry dock and caught the little ferry across the canal to Liberty State Park, where we hung out and took pictures.



At this point, my mom called. She had gone back to the apartment to pick up some stuff and locked herself out! Thankfully we have doormen who rescued her.

I had a little point and shoot camera with me, so most of these pictures are from it. During the whole day the camera was in my dress pocket- my photographer kept laughing that I was shooting him back. The pockets were wonderful! I carried around the camera, my cellphone, and a few little things. The skirt on my dress was so poufy that you couldn't tell I'd stuffed the pockets as full as chipmunk cheeks.



We eventually decided to crash the marina and walk right out onto the docks for photos.





After that, we went inside to rest up as guests started arriving.






The sun had miraculously been shining all afternoon, but some clouds blew in for the evening and it got a little bit chilly before the ceremony.

Some of you may recall my mentioning here that the sailor wanted to wear a tux for the wedding. I was a bit sad that he didn't want to wear dress whites, which meant that we wouldn't have a sword arch at our wedding, but there you go.


Well. He certainly knows how to pull one over on me - I thought I'd had this wedding perfectly planned and all sorted out, and super under control, but apparently not. Behind my back he got in touch with the minister, my dad, and our wedding coordinator to pull a HUGE surprise on me!

I'd seen him earlier in the day in a tux, with his groomsman, all spiffed up in tuxes. They had picked them up, got dressed, and took pictures in them, then snuck away to change... at that point, the name of the game became "Keep the bride away from the groom", although I didn't catch on and couldn't figure out why all of a sudden people had pressing things to talk to me about and dragged me off to sit in a little room by the kitchen!

So ceremony time arrived and we assembled our little flower girls, my best friend, my sister, and Tom the ring bearer! Up we went to the deck where the guests were assembled.

So at this point, I thought Dan was up there in his tux. However, when we got upstairs to the deck, and the bagpipe started playing and my dad stepped out with me to walk down our aisle... my sailor was down there with his dress whites on. I don't even remember this, but my dad says I just stood there and said "OH.My.Goodness." for a full second before I (sort of) recovered.

It was incredibly windy during the ceremony and my looooooong veil kept whipping around, so my sister and best friend ended playing "capture the veil before it mummifies the minister" duty the whole time. It went by in a blur- I remember my brother in law doing his reading, our rings went on, and we were married!

At the end of the short ceremony we turned to walk back down the aisle, and all of a sudden out the doors came four of my sailors friends. All also Coast Guard lieutenants, all in perfect formation.

They stopped, drew their swords, and there was my sword arch! I could not believe my eyes that he had really pulled that off without my having ANY idea whatsoever that this would happen. Here I am in a picture taken by my friend, getting the biggest shock of my life!



If you've ever seen a sword arch, you walk up to the first set, and they drop the crossed swords in front of you, and you must kiss to pass. You advance through each set of swords with a kiss and lots of cheering from the crowd, and after the last one, one of the guys taps the new bride with a sword and says "Welcome to the Coast Guard".

I was beaming the rest of the night... it was so magical, all our family and friends gathered together for an incredible dinner, lots of loud irish dancing music, and the NYC skyline sparkling in the background. Wow.

I even got to wear my coat out on the deck when it got chilly!