Vow Time

I love Cannon in D, but I hate cliche wedding music, so AnnMarie and Sam played a song by Yanni for the first part of the procession.  To Take... To Hold. Here's a video if you would like to listen to it.  You can stare at the cover of his piano book for 4 minutes.  If you'll notice, there is a lot of I and Me talk during this bit.  Chris wasn't going to be terribly helpful in this area.  I picked out the church music, we chose the readings together, it was a lengthy process.  First we crossed off everything that sounded too heterosexual good, homosexual bad.  Then I crossed off everything that had women being subservient to their husbands.  Then we had a few options for each thing.  I crossed off the cliches, then we were left with some interesting choices. Verses below.  All Photos by Angie Gaul at milestoneimages.us

Jason walking Mima down the aisle.

David walking Nanny down the aisle.

When my mom saw this picture she said "She looks like death warmed over."

Which I suppose was true, Nanny passed away four months after this photo was taken.

She was already living with my parents and having strokes at this point.

Nanny made it to all three of her granddaughters' weddings and saw her first great-grandchild be born. 

That was all she wanted, and we're so glad she got it.

In a traditional Jewish wedding ceremony both the bride and groom walk down the aisle flanked by their parents.

We did it this way at Jaclyn's, Elise's, and my wedding.

Nancy thought it sounded cool and went with it.

Bruce looks thrilled as usual.

My Lib and Brendan

Tim & Hannah (so pretty!)

Jim & Morgan

Dan & Jaclyn

Andy & Elise

I walked down the aisle to Magnificat as done by John Michael Talbot.

You can hear a really folky version of it here.

We don't really do it like that, but you get the jist.  

It was sung by the wonderful Christine Solimeno, a friend from the Folk Group.

I wish women had more cause to wear a train.  It really shouldn't have to be a once in a lifetime thing.

My Godparents did the first reading from the Old Testament.  My sister and I chose the same first reading which was the same first reading my parents did.  I really love it, especially the end, and who doesn't love comparing people to animals via Bible readings? They alternated verses, very cool.

Song of Songs 2:8-10, 14, 16a; 8:6-7a

Hark! my lover–here he comes

     springing across the mountains,

     leaping across the hills.

My lover is like a gazelle

     or a young stag.

Here he stands behind our wall,

     gazing through the windows,

     peering through the lattices.

My lover speaks; he says to me,

     “Arise, my beloved, my dove, my beautiful one, and come!

“O my dove in the clefts of the rock,

     in the secret recesses of the cliff,

Let me see you,

     let me hear your voice,

For your voice is sweet,

     and you are lovely.”

My lover belongs to me and I to him.

He says to me:

“Set me as a seal on your heart,

     as a seal on your arm;

For stern as death is love,

     relentless as the nether world is devotion;

     its flames are a blazing fire.

Deep waters cannot quench love,

     nor floods sweep it away.

Stern as death is love.  My favorite line

Andrew, Chris, John, and Matt singing the Psalm - This is the Day

Elise also used this psalm at her and Jason's wedding.

Don't mess with a good thing.

Chris' Uncle Bill did the second reading.

Romans 8:31b-35; 37-39

Brothers and sisters:

If God is for us, who can be against us?

He did not spare his own Son

     but handed him over for us all,

     how will he not also give us everything else along with him?

Who will bring a charge against God’s chosen ones?

It is God who acquits us.

Who will condemn?

It is Christ Jesus who died, rather, was raised,

     who also is at the right hand of God,

     who indeed intercedes for us.

What will separate us from the love of Christ?

Will anguish, or distress, or persecution, or famine,

     or nakedness, or peril, or the sword?

No, in all these things, we conquer overwhelmingly

     through him who loved us.

For I am convinced that neither death, nor life,

     nor angels, nor principalities,

     nor present things, nor future things,

     nor powers, nor height, nor depth,

     nor any other creature will be able to separate us

     from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Bill put on his big lawyer voice and banged that thing out.

Quick and straight to the point.

My husband is so handsome

My sister did me a solid by quietly blowing air onto the back of my neck throughout the entire ceremony.

Chris was terrified.

I looked over at him and whispered, "you look nice," wondering if I could get a compliment out of him.

He looked at me with a solemn face and replied, "There is a microphone up my ass right now."

There is a reason I married this man, ladies and gentleman.

Deacon Rich read the Gospel: John 2:1-11

There was a wedding in Cana in Galilee,

     and the mother of Jesus was there.

Jesus and his disciples were also invited to the wedding.

When the wine ran short,

     the mother of Jesus said to him,

     “They have no wine.”

And Jesus said to her,

     “Woman, how does your concern affect me?

My hour has not yet come.”

His mother said to the servers,

     “Do whatever he tells you.”

Now there were six stone water jars there for Jewish ceremonial washings,

     each holding twenty to thirty gallons.

Jesus told them,

     “Fill the jars with water.”

So they filled them to the brim.

Then he told them,

     “Draw some out now and take it to the headwaiter.”

So they took it.

And when the headwaiter tasted the water that had become wine,

     without knowing where it came from

     (although the servants who had drawn the water knew),

     the headwaiter called the bridegroom and said to him,

     “Everyone serves good wine first,

     and then when people have drunk freely, an inferior one;

     but you have kept the good wine until now.”

Jesus did this as the beginning of his signs in Cana in Galilee

     and so revealed his glory,

     and his disciples began to believe in him.

We obviously chose this reading because Jesus knows his wine.

Chris' Uncle Doug read the Prayer of the Faithful.

We chose this text, again for the mention of wine and friends:

The response is “Lord, hear our prayer.”

For leaders of Church and state 

for heads of institutions, 

for heads of homes and households . . . 

that they will lead us and guide us 

in the search for God and the good life, 

in the search for peace and joy, 

in the search for love among us— 

let us pray to the Lord. 

For all married people: 

for those who married yesterday, 

for the new couple Julianne and Christopher, married today, 

for those who will marry tomorrow . . . 

that they may savor 

the joy of being together, 

warm love, and children, 

a long life, wine, and friends, 

and a new day, every day— 

let us pray to the Lord. 

For all young single people 

who look forward to a vocation 

full of life and full of love— 

let us pray to the Lord. 

Mama and Dad holding hands.  I love hand holding pictures.

See how the program folds out from both sides.

Just like the letters from Pride and Prejudice.

The font on all of our wedding paper was called Jane Austen ;)

In a Catholic ceremony you can't write your own vows.

Our vows read:

I Julianne, take you Christopher to be my husband.

I promise to be true to you in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health.

I will love you and honor you, all the days of my life.

And vice versa.

Finally!

Husband and Wife motherfuckers!

Now let's do some shots!

This is the first time Chris cracked a real smile.

His worst nightmare is speaking in front of people or being on stage like this.

I was proud of him for getting his vows out without crapping his pants.

We walked out to Annie's Song by John Denver.

It was not only my parent's wedding song, but Chris' parents' wedding song.

Jaclyn walked down the aisle to a string quartet playing it at her wedding, so we walked out to it with my friend Joe singing it.

The Switch played it at the reception and everyone got up to dance.

You should all know this, but I'll give you a video anyway.

Finally into the limo to have some boos!

Well!  That was the important part!  More tomorrow!

Braces (or Putting Your Suspenders On)

Meanwhile, the men are off in another room getting all fancied up.  I am in cell phone contact with Andy to time when the photographer is switching between the two rooms.  All photos by Angie Gaul at milestoneimages.us

Jason and Dan are wearing the socks Elise gave the men at her wedding.

As Dan says, "sock garters get you laid twice."

The crabby cuff links I gave Chris as a wedding gift.

Chris maintains that this is the worst haircut he has ever had.

This is what happens when you get your hair cut at supercuts all the time, but Chris refuses to spend any money on getting his hair cut.

He has actually not gotten his hair cut anywhere since our wedding.

I have been cutting my husband's hair for this entire first year of marriage.

Our best man, Andy.

Patrick and Brendan, looking super excited.

My dad helping my brother with his buttons.

Tim and Chris being adorable.

Rehearsal Dinner

Some of the ladies and I went to get our nails done, and some of the men folk went off to do whatever.  One needed a new vest because the other one was too small, and I think the rest went to Dave & Buster's to hang out with some kids who were there having a bar mitzvah party.  We actually ran into my high school music teacher, Mr. Ezell, at the nail place.  He was getting a manicure.  Love love love my small town ridiculousness.

I go back to the suite we have for our wedding night.  I was going to share it with my sister the night before the wedding, the same as we did for her and Jason's.  I spent an absurdly long time in the large bathtub shaving my legs, listening to music, and just chilling out.  Then downstairs to dinner!
All photos by Angie Gaul at milestoneimages.us

MomMom and PopPop

Married over 65 years

Still Cranky

My darling Cynthia with Chris

Chris' Uncle Bill with his two boys

Chris cutting into his groom's cake.  

His mother got it in Maryland and traveled the whole way with it on her lap in the car.

Elise & Jason

By the end of the night we had drank like 23 bottles of red wine

The one bottle of white that someone opened was still half full

I may have finished it

Just like old times

Chris pouring us all glasses of wine

My mother really loves to snuggle

My brother doesn't really

This looks so much like old times at RPI it's not even funny

Laughing so hard we're crying

Fancy Nancy and Bruce

The boys checking out the cake

Awkward Bruce hugs are my favorite

He seriously is adorable, he doesn't know where to put his hands

Doesn't know how much he should be hugging me

In my head I hear his internal dialogue going like this

"This is my son's fiancee, I really shouldn't be pressed up against her boobs.

She's kissing my cheek... WTF?"

Wedding Drama 3:  Besides my flipout about the nativity scene, which was entirely pre-wedding week, the rehearsal dinner was by far the biggest problem of the weekend.  The Viana is a Feng Shui crazy place, so their restaurant's menu is Asian/Italian Fusion.  They are so snooty and expensive there it really is ridiculous.  I don't think we would have chosen it, except they were willing to give me a really cheap rate on the rooms.  $99 a night for wedding guests is ridiculously hard to beat on Long Island.  Chris' Mom thought that every other hotel we brought her to was "in the projects," so we tried to up our game a bit, as they were the ones paying.  When they came to visit pre-wedding they stayed at the Holiday Inn by my house.  It was over $150 a night and they didn't sleep at all because they were too near the train.  Sorry guys, it's Long Island, we're in Queens, trains come by.  I can practically see the train station from my bedroom window at my parent's house, that's just how it is.  She even still thought the Viana was ghetto because there was a gas station across the street and we were even in like Garden City... anyway!

It is a really small restaurant, like it barely has a full kitchen, much of the food is made ahead of time as far as we could tell.  We ate there for dinner twice, and neither times was it particularly speedy, but the food was good, and we couldn't beat the convenience of not having to take the grandparents anywhere else in the car with wheelchairs, etc., so we had the dinner there.  The sales person at the Viana had changed like 3 times over the course of when we booked things to when they actually occurred.  The first woman was a complete pain in my ass, the second guy was great, but he didn't last long, then the third person ended up being their assistant who had actually be there all along and had dated one of my friends from high school.  Anyway, I went back and forth with them for a really long time about the menu.  It was an expensive place and I wanted to make sure everything worked out okay if I was going to be spending that much of my in-laws' money.  Their menu is Asian fusion.  Asian usually includes nuts.  My co-matron of honor, my cousin Jaclyn, is deathly allergic to nuts.  I had to be very careful to make sure things went to plan.  We were only using the Italian dishes off the menu, there were to be no nuts anywhere near our food.  Jaclyn wasn't even going to eat any of the food at the dinner, that would have been far too risky, she was going to be bringing her own food, but just had to be able to safely breathe the air in the dining room.  

The hotel guy had even talked to me in person earlier that day to make double sure that my cousin was still coming and that she wouldn't be eating anything.  I said yes, but still NO NUTS.  When we sit down to dinner our first course, a caesar salad is sitting at each place setting.  There are nuts on top.  Not only are there nuts on top, but it's not even a real caesar dressing, it's a nut based caesar dressing, like sesame or something along those lines.  Thankfully, Jaclyn hasn't arrived yet, but my best friend Libby's wife is also allergic to nuts, not to Jaclyn's extent, but enough to be very harmful.  I run over to him and all but smack the salad out of his hands.  I am PISSED.  The chef is literally right in front of me because they have no real kitchen, just a buffet window type thing, and I try to calmly explain what the problem is.  He says no one told him about the nuts, and that's just how their caesar salad always is.  So I run over to the hotel guy.  He says oh my fucking god wtf, basically, and I hurry to call Jaclyn, hopefully catching her before she gets there.  I ask her if she can even come to dinner now that there were nuts in the room.  She says she should be fine as long as they're not peanuts.  What kind of nuts are they?  Peanuts.  She is in the parking lot in the car with her husband and baby.  She can't come inside.  My matron of honor who was supposed to be giving a toast at dinner has to turn her car around and drive back home.  I cry.  We try to laugh it off, but my boss and his wife, who were not invited to dinner but were staying there that night are having a cocktail at the bar and are seeing me lose my shit.  I am horrifically embarrassed, and sad, AND mad.  Angie, who knows Jaclyn and my sister already from having photographed them for other occasions understands.  Takes a photo of the offending salad and sends it to Jaclyn.  We try to laugh about it.  Dinner goes on, and it is pretty damn good, but still.  The hotel guy comes up to me after, holding a copy of the menu we had agreed on.  He is so flustered trying to save his ass that he points to the salad description and tries to tell me that it says cashews.  I'm about to tell him that even if it did say cashews, that would have been passable, but they are peanuts, when I take a closer look at the menu.  It says croutons.  Idiot.  

When I return from our honeymoon I try to get some recourse from the hotel people.  They take off the two meals that our guests were unable to come and eat, but that's it.  My mother-in-law is pissed and lists off a bunch of other things that went wrong, trying to give me some ammunition to fight with them about.  It just makes me feel worse that the dinner was so sucky, that things were cold, and they spilled meat juice all over her dress.  I could have lived my life without hearing those important details.  I get sick of arguing with them on the phone.  I stop trying.  Life goes on.

Jaclyn understands that it's not my fault, but I'm still sad about it.  I try to get her to give her toast at the actual reception.  She refuses, but gives me the paper copy to keep.  All in all, still an enjoyable evening, but still quite the disaster.

Wedding Rehearsal

So we packed up our car and drove to my homeland, Long Island.  For the rehearsal dinner, hair/makeup, and wedding hotel we chose the Viana in Westbury, NY.  It is definitely beautiful, definitely small and classy, definitely expensive, but it suited our needs well and the sales manager had slept with one of my friends from High School, so we went with it.  Everyone piles into town and we meet at the church for our rehearsal.
Photos one and five stolen off of Kristen's facebook, the others by Angie Gaul at Milestone Images.

Andy and Elise

At the altar with Deacon Rich

Patrick and Cynthia

Dan and Jaclyn

Jim and Morgan

Jim Scott

PC Men in the Choir Loft

My beautiful church

Dadoo

This go pretty well except I forget what order the bridal party is supposed to go in and end up having to search through my email on my phone to find a pdf of the program so I can tell them what to do.  My lovely Folk Group friends take time out of their day to serve as our musicians, and some of the boys from my a cappella group do me the grand favor of lending me their voices for the psalm.  As we go through the wedding saga, I'm going to label the wedding dramas, because really, everyone loves to hear about the things that went wrong.  These are in no way big problems.  We had a wonderful, beautiful, memorable day.  Only little hiccups happened along the way, largely thanks to our photographer Angie who knew when to herd the masses and when to kap a bitch.

Wedding Drama 1:  We were getting married two weeks after Christmas.  We had always wanted a winter wedding because we really hate to be hot, and there was no way we were doing spring or summer.  We chose the winter break because we knew at least one of us would be in grad school and wouldn't be able to miss class.  My church, St. Raymond's in East Rockaway, NY, is beautiful at Christmas.  The wreaths and trees are lovely, BUT, I hate poinsettias   I was hoping that some of them would have died off by then, but they hadn't.  I asked the deacon and pastor to let me move them for the ceremony and them move them back, but they wouldn't hear of it, not even after I tried to convinced them that Jaclyn was allergic to them, which is true, but not to the extent I was making it out to be.  The poinsettias stayed, they didn't look bad, I didn't fuss, and life went on.

Wedding Drama 2:  Our new church pastor put up this gigantic nativity scene the Christmas before.  As I It was about 3 feet tall and 5 feet wide (see picture above), had straw all over it, and had spotlights lighting it up with their wires taped down to the floor in front of the altar.  I hated it.  I seriously BEGGED the church to let me move it off the altar.  It was seriously huge, we couldn't stand in front of it at all.  My mom and I had noticed it the year before and had already been worked up about how it would look for the wedding.  I don't know what it was about this nativity scene, I guess I just thought it was ugly and gigantic and was getting straw all over the floor, but that added with poinsettias just made me snap.  I am not proud of it.  This was by far my biggest bitch moment of the entire wedding proceedings.  I begged Deacon Tom, my mother begged him, I explained that half my family was Jewish and having the wedding in a Catholic church at Christmas was already a sacrifice for them and I didn't want to shove it in their faces.  I actually CRIED.  In the Deacon's office with my mom and my fiance there, discussing our ceremony.  Something broke in me and the floodgates opened.  I was sobbing over this stupid fucking nativity scene.  The nativity scene stayed, life went on, the world continued to turn, but I seriously flipped a shit over that one.  My apologies to the church for being a total crybaby psycho.

Our photographer Angie came to the entire rehearsal the day before the wedding to check out the lighting and such, so I even have awesome pictures of the rehearsal and the rehearsal dinner... coming up!