Trust Your Crazy Ideas (Part 27)

Continued from Part 26.

After the wedding, we were all ushered into the room next to the great hall so the staff at Starved Rock could flip the room for dinner.  We greeted our guests, the bar started serving (the Mai Tais were not good), and I remember feeling elated.  Both that the wedding itself was over and that we were finally married.

While everything was being setup for dinner, Mike and I slipped outside with Mike and Mary Lou for some chilly pictures on the deck at Starved Rock.  Our first photo together was taken there, and I wanted to attempt to recreate the same setting.  These are some of my favorite photos from the day.  At that point, we were both in that magical “we just got married” high and we let our true colors shine. Holy crud, we were married!

When we went back inside, it was time to cut the cake, listen to toasts, and eat dinner.  I don’t remember much about the dinner except for what is on the video – and the sadness that I didn’t get to eat more cake.  Mike and I both wish that we’d had more cake…   We had chocolate with chocolate mousse filling, lemon with lemon filling, and white with raspberry filling.  Mmmm… 

After dinner, we moved back into the next room for the dance portion of our reception.  Mandy sang “A Moment Like This” which was the Kelly Clarkson song that was popular during that time and then we also danced to “My Valentine” by Martina McBride.  Two songs was way too long for a first dance, but I only remember dancing with Mike one other time that night!  Mike danced with his mom and I danced with Grandpa (after retrieving him from his room) and our bridal party danced before everyone else started partying.  This part of the video is very entertaining – both to watch everyone dance (and me with gum in my mouth!) and because this part of the video has interviews with the guests which are, quite frankly, pretty hilarious.  Several of our friends were pretty far gone…

We had discussed paying the DJ extra to stay longer, but by that point both Mike and I were tired of the party and just ready to be done.  We were back in our room at just after 10.  I’ll leave out our wedding night because some memories just aren’t meant to be shared…

The next morning, we opened gifts in Mike’s parents’ room next door and had breakfast with everyone who was still there in the dining room at Starved Rock.  Mom and Grandpa rode home with Mike and Mary Lou (after much cajoling) so Mike and I could enjoy our first few hours of wedded bliss.  We had Monday off for President’s Day, but we were back at work on Tuesday, counting the days until our honeymoon in Maui.

To be continued…

Photos courtesy of Spieth Photography.