John and Laura's Wedding, March 30 2008

Yes, I have my Scottie back. He came back last night and not a minute too soon. We stayed up to 1:30 am because he had so much he wanted to share about his trip and I had so much to talk about my weekend. Yesterday was a very full day. I've been working nights and then running crazy in the mornings. I canceled on a baby birthday party and stayed home just to catch a quick nap before heading off to Hale Koa hotel for John and Laura's wedding.

I always attend the friday night church service so I hadn't met laura before she started asking about wedding services. But, now that I have met her, I just think she is the most adorable thing. She's sweet and so easygoing. Her fiance (ahem...I mean husband) John, looks so serious and then he opens his mouth and it is wisecrack after wisecrack. He's really funny (and I'm married to Scott so I just everyone by his humor). And she just laughs and laughs.

I volunteered to help with their ceremony, because (1) I've been too busy to feel like I was really devoting enough time to helping them plan it and (2) I've never really seen Ralph perform a wedding. I mean, he did mine, but it was all kind of a blur and I don't remember much of it.

The only hitch I could see was they were really on the fence about having a communion. Not a big deal, unless they decided at the last second they wanted communion and I wasn't ready. Second hitch in the plans is that the parking lot is far away from the ceremony site. So, a tired me had to improvise...with a collapsible wood dinner tray and I needed a solid clean fabric to cover it, so I pulled down my curtain. Oh, if they only knew. There was a bottle of wine in our wine chiller, it could have been ours, it have been Stanton's, but, whatever, I opened it. Never opened a bottle of wine before in my life. Didn't know that you were supposed to unwrap label at the top before you try to remove the cork. Kept trying to pull that wine opener out and it would just rip through the cork. Thankful that there were not little pieces of cork floating in the wine.

I'm not supposed to make recommendations to people under my position as the wedding coordinator for the church. But, personally, I loved the Hale Koa as a wedding venue. Mind you, the last wedding I helped at was at Ko Olina and my standards are pretty low after that one. But they were unbelievable attentive and gracious. John left the wedding CD in his car and I really should have known to just bring my back up but I didn't think of it until I was halfway to Waikiki. He's trying to figure out how to get his brother to go look for it...and bam...the hotel staff is stepping in...they have wedding music...and it's the same songs that Laura wanted. The sound system was excellent. The best I've heard in an outdoor ceremony.

The wedding photographer was also really nice. What really struck me about the photographer, Alyssa, was that she was very personable and melded right in. She was calling everyone by name (not just the bride and groom) and she didn't draw attention to herself during the ceremony.

Ralph has a policy about starting weddings a little late. To give everyone a chance to be there. 15 minutes before the schedule ceremony start, the bride was itching to go. She wanted to start. She looked at all the seats that were filled and said "let's start, everyone is here." Laura laura, let's wait a little, you're still early. Five minutes later and 20 more guests have filtered in. "Let's go, that's everybody." Are you sure, Laura...let's just give it a little more time...now there is a whole crowd of guests. She was so excited that we just had to cue Ralph and start it. It was really cute and funny.

If I was to get married again (to the same guy), I would consider getting married at the exact same place. I was really glad when it was over, because I had a long day and just wanted to get in my pajamas and lie in bed...but I was also happy because Scott was coming home. *sigh*

(this post is in homage to my sister who say I write too much. pbttt :)~

(this is from my prime lens...No PS editing at all)

(my classic blur pose, that's gina's shoulder in the corner)

(the videographers had crazy crazy equipment everywhere...I barely managed to catch a glimpse of the flower girl, Laura's grand-daughter, peeking at her)

(Laura also sewed her own dress...whoa, nelly)