I AM A MARRIED WOMAN
(Posting this almost a year late lol)
Uh. What is going on???
I’m married????? How is that real?
I am so excited but also lowkey embarrassed.
Okay, I’m not embarrassed to be married but I’m embarrassed to introduce Sam as my HUSBAND. MY HUSBAND, like that’s so weird. I only feel weird saying that to my college aged friends. I feel like I’m bragging.
I’m actually not sure if I’ve ever introduced him as my husband yet, usually I’ll just let him introduce himself as Sam lol. I also never introduced him as my fiancé because it felt so cringey so I would just say boyfriend but now I cannot get away with that.
I should just be proud and I am proud but like I don’t want people to be like “OMG HUSBAND????” and then I have to answer a ton of questions.
Anyways now to the actual wedding day.
First of all, it really was one of the best days of my life. I’ve always heard people say that but never believed it. BUT I will say I think it was one of my best days because of the way I planned it.
Our venue was at Hawthorne House in Parkville, Missouri and our reception was at our Airbnb in Olathe, Kansas.
We didn’t have a traditional wedding.
no wedding party
no wedding planner
we bought/rented everything
had no vendors
etc.
Let me walk you through the weekend.
Thursday September 18th
Sam and I drove from Papa’s (we spent the night Wednesday night) up to Parkville Missouri. We needed to get our wedding license. It literally only took 10 minutes and $50.
Marriage License!!
We then met up with Sam’s mom and grandparents and went grocery shopping and got a bite to eat. At 3 we met everyone at the wedding venue for the rehearsal. We didn’t have a wedding party but since we did everything ourselves we needed to practice.
Julia (my sister in laws sister) was our officiant
Audrey and Ryan (my brother and sister in law) opened the doors for me
Sam’s family walked down in the procession
Brian (Sam’s brother) ran our music
My grandma was my flower girl
Thank goodness we had the rehearsal. I seriously don’t know what we would have done without it.
We had 3 songs during our ceremony. You and Me by Lifehouse when Sam and everyone else walked down the aisle. An instrumental version of Love Story by Taylor Swift started at 18 seconds. https://open.spotify.com/track/6rJuJ3UZgbcifNnQJHp4Q6?si=83845fd42877479d and September by Earth, Wind and Fire started at 10 seconds.
If we had not practiced the day before I don’t even want to know what would’ve happen. All of the songs needed to be played at different levels of sound and we had to practice switching the songs quickly. It doesn’t sound like a lot when I say it but getting everything to run smoothly was a little bit hard.
After the rehearsal Sam and I went back to our 16 person Airbnb. We decided to get an Airbnb for all of our friends to stay with us. I think this is what made the wedding.
Ryan was already there because he had picked up the tables and chairs and had dropped them off at the Airbnb (our reception location too). A couple of our friends were also there by that time. We had about 2 hours to relax before dinner. I just started setting up things for the next day and hungout with our friends.
We had dinner at 6:30 at a J’s BBQ in Olathe. Usually the night before the wedding there is a rehearsal dinner for everyone that was in the rehearsal. However, since there were only 45 people coming to the wedding in total we decided to invite everyone to the dinner since they all traveled for us. Dinner was super fun and it was so crazy that I knew everyone there. Like I was the connection between everyone. I’ve never been in a position like that.
The rest of that night I just had to set up everything. Our whole wedding was DIY, so I had to finish everything up. I bought all of our wedding florals from China (faux florals) so we had to put all of the arrangements together and I decided to make 5 wedding cakes so I had to frost all of them. I had baked and frozen the layers the week before and pre-made the frosting, that way all I had to do when I got there was rewhip the frosting and frost them. I honestly wouldn’t have done it any other way though. I was up until 2 frosting the cakes and then went to bed.
Friday September 19th
I woke up at like 9. Went to check on the cakes and guess what. The wine bags we had put in the fridge leaked. LEAKED. Okay just one, but it leaked down on 3 of the cakes. THREE OF THE CAKES. I almost lost it. Seriously so proud of myself for not.
I had to think really quickly (after I cried in my room lol). The cake boards the cakes were sitting on were sopping and warped so we had to get them onto new ones. However, we only had one more. The frostings were pooling wine and some of the frosting had some off so I needed to make more frosting. Once I got my head on straight I sent 1 person to Walmart to get me more cocoa powder, a chocolate bar, and gel food coloring and I sent Sam to Hobby Lobby to get more cake boards and a cake transferring tool. Luckily we fixed everything with enough time to get ready.
I had 20 minutes to do my makeup and my friend did my hair. Sam and I left separately from the Airbnb to the venue at 1:15. I got changed, took some pictures and then did our first look. Sam didn’t cry. How rude.
We did a couple of portraits and then at 3 our families arrived and we took family pictures.
We hid while our friends showed up and then our ceremony started at 4.
I told Sam he BETTER cry when I’m walking down the aisle since he didn’t at our first look.
Everyone walked and then it was time for me and Papa to walk. We almost weren’t on time because my veil was messed up and Papa had to fix his jacket. When we walked down all eyes were on us. It felt kind of strange. I was looking at Sam and our family and friends and trying to focus on walking slow.
Sam met my dad down at the end of the aisle and Sam’s parents met us there too. My dad prayed over me and Sam and I started crying.
Our ceremony was amazing. Julia talked about us and then we did our vows and then left. Super quick maybe 15 mins total. After that we did a big group photo with everyone and then our families left to go set up the reception and we took pictures with friends and did a couple more couple photos.
We arrived to our Airbnb/reception and had to “hide”. Apparently no one is supposed to see you until you’re announced. We came out and did our first dance, SO AWKWARD and then ate. We catered Olive Garden which is a bit untraditional but it was so good. My dad and I had a dance while Sam and his mom danced, then it was cake time!!! I was super excited about my cakes. I made chocolate, vanilla, strawberry, red velvet, and carrot.
The rest of the night everyone talked and then slowly left. Everyone did help tear everything down thank goodness.
After 10 it was just the 15 or 16 of us (I can’t remember) at the Airbnb. We decided to get into the pool (for maybe 2 minutes) it was sooooo cold and then 11 of us decided to get into the hottub. Water was SPEWING out the sides. We all hung out in there for hours and it was so fun. A couple of us went down to the firepit and made smores and then I was so pooped. I showered and went to bed around 2.
Saturday September 20th
I wake up around 8 because Brian (Sam’s brother) came to pick up the speakers and iPad that we used and my brother Ryan came to pick up the table and chair rentals. Around 9 everyone else started getting up (we had to checkout by 11) and we cleaned everything up.
At 11 we said goodbye to everyone and headed to the Kansas City Zoo. My Auntie had flown out from Denver with her husband and two kids. They decided to go to the zoo on Saturday so we decided to go with them. It was sooooooooo fun.
Around 3 we decided to head towards our hotel in Tulsa. I slept THE WHOLE WAY. Like legit the whole time, I’m not sure how I’m so good at sleeping.
We got to our hotel (only option was $28 parking garage parking, which is so rude btw) and tried to check in. I pulled the “we just got married could we get upgraded” card and she said yes. She said give me 10 minutes. So we sat down and waited but the line was getting longer. We sat there for prob 30 minutes before I went back up to the desk and she said “Omg, I’m so sorry, I forgot about you.” We got upgraded to a suite though so that was cool. It was 8:20 by the time we got into our room and we were so hungry. We initially planned on going to dinner in the city but we decided to get room service!!!!
Honestly, room service isn’t that expensive. We got soup, cake, pasta and a burger meal for $55. Like its obviously on the higher side but not bad. We watched One Tree Hill and then went to bed.
Sunday September 21
We had to wake up early because there was a Steelers game at noon and Sam wanted to be back in Norman to watch it with his dad. We got up and went to this breakfast place called Chimera Cafe and I got a super delicious breakfast taco (no eggs ofc) and a cappuccino. We left for home with little gas. We decided to just get it on the way.
I found a gas station right off the turnpike but we missed the exit. The next exit was in 17 miles and we only had 15 miles to empty. Not good. Sam was freaking out and I was praying. I knew that the range probably was off a little and we probably had a couple miles after 0. We are getting off on the exit but were behind this super slow car and while we were pulling into the station (been on 0 for 3 miles at this point) Sam’s car made a horrible sound and lunged forward a little bit. However, we made it.
After that we just rode home, Sam dropped me off and then he went to his parents house. All went well.
All of that to say, we had some hiccups but it was such a fun weekend. This is your sign to make your wedding the way you want. I think if we did a “traditional” wedding I wouldn’t have nearly as much fun as I did.
Anyways. That is all.
Bye,
Emma