You Make My Dreams Come True: Special Dances

After dancing for the first time with my new husband, it was time to dance with the other important man in my life. My dad is my hero, hands down. He’s always supported me, and he’s been the dad that every girl dreams of having. David has so many of the same qualities as my daddy, and I’m so glad – He’ll be an incredible father some day.

When I was thinking about my dance with my dad (way back in December of 2009!) I blogged about our relationship and about the song I’d chosen. I also mentioned the slideshow I planned to make of the pictures of my dad and me. The slideshow was a huge success (although the execution of starting it on time was not so great – again, thanks to the employees of our awful venue) and my dad loved it!

{I have no idea why ‘girl’ isn’t spelled correctly in the beginning or why the text isn’t clear – It was in the one we played!}

The mother-son dance immediately followed our dance. David has always been really close to his mom, so it was nice to have a special time to honor their relationship. We made a slideshow of pictures of David and her as well, and they danced to 'My Wish’ by Rascal Flatts.

With the dances finished, there were only a few ‘important’ moments remaining. Up next is the bouquet and garter toss – And believe me, our guests definitely didn’t hate it! The pictures from the tosses are some of my favorite of the entire night!

*All pictures in this post taken by Becky of Stamp of Life Photography*

Need to catch up?

 

We started on Thursday.

We decorated Friday morning.

We rehearsed.

We got pretty!

I put on my dress. 

We had our first look!

The guys had their turn.

The girls stole the show. 

We got some fun bridal party pictures. 

We took bride & groom portraits.

We took care of the formal portraits.

We took pictures with the kiddos.

We spent time hanging out waiting for the ceremony to start.

The grandparents and parents were seated.

It was finally time for the processional.

A step back to the playing of the slideshow.

The ceremony started. (Part 1)

The ceremony continued. (Part 2)

The ceremony ended. (Part 3)

We had a little fun with our recessional. 

I shared our ceremony details. 

We made our grand exit.

And then made our grand entrance!

We listened to touching toasts.

Then it was time to cut the cake.

We had our first dance!

You Make My Dreams Come True: And So It (The Ceremony) Begins

While we were back in the bridal suite our guests were signing our ‘guestbook’ and being seated.

I loved that my cousins (our guestbook and program attendants) all wore black, white, and pink without me saying anything!

As soon as they were seated the seating of the grandparents began. Unfortunately, all of David’s grandparents have passed away and my grandpa (my dad’s dad) I guess didn’t want to be seated individually (since my grandma has passed away). This left just my mom’s parents to be seated during this time. We/I chose to play ‘Canon in D’ for their seating since it would be a song they would all recognize and appreciate.

Once they were seated it was time for our parents to be seated. We used ‘Love Never Fails’ by Brandon Heath for their seating and the lighting of the unity candle. Click play to get the full effect. :)

David really wanted to be the one to seat his mom, so he did that and then entered again with our officiant after the unity candle was lit.

Both of my older brothers seated my mom. You can finally see the mom’s bouquets – I think they turned out so cute!

I love how happy they look after lighting the candles!

Once they were seated and David and our officiant were in their places, it was time for the bridal party to enter.. Someone looked a little anxious:

You’ll have to wait until next week for that, though. :) Tomorrow I’ve got a pretty awesome giveaway for you, so be sure to check back!

Tip # 10: Make sure you talk with your grandparents (especially if one of them has lost their spouse) and ask if they’re comfortable with being escorted down the aisle. It’d probably be even better if they could be present at the rehearsal.

*All pictures in this post were taken by Brandi Coldwell of Lola Jo Photo Design*

Need to catch up?

We started on Thursday.

We decorated Friday morning.

We rehearsed.

We got pretty!

I put on my dress. 

We had our first look!

The guys had their turn.

The girls stole the show. 

We got some fun bridal party pictures. 

We took bride & groom portraits.

We took care of the formal portraits.

We took pictures with the kiddos.

We spent time hanging out waiting for the ceremony to start.

You Make My Dreams Come True: We're Headed to the Chapel.. For Formal Portraits

Chapel/church - Same difference! After we finished our pictures I hopped back in the car with my wonderful MOH A and was about 10000 times calmer than I had been when we left the hotel. I cannot imagine what the day would've been like had we not done a first look and I hadn't been able to see and talk with David. I was finally just plain HAPPY and excited about the day! I'd totally forgotten about anything that had gone wrong, and I decided I wasn't going to let anything ruin the rest of the day.

I even tweeted a picture of myself (since I had loved when other brides did that!) and you guys were so stinkin sweet. 

I have seriously met some of the BEST people through this blog. I loved seeing all of the little well wishes throughout the day. 

Once we arrived at the church we started with the formal portraits. We took all of our family pictures except for the few large ones of whole sides of the family before the ceremony. I would highly suggest making a list of the formal pictures you want (although I know some photographers carry one) - I've realized since the wedding that we didn't get pictures with only our grandparents, we didn't get one with just my immediate family (parents, younger brother, and David and me), didn't get one with our officiant, etc. I know formal portraits are boring for anyone who doesn't know the people in them, so I'll just share some of my favorites.

David's family

David's siblings (cropped by me)

With his mom

David's parents

Those last two are some of my all-time favorite pictures of him! He looked so good!

Love my dad SO much!

Love my momma SO much too! And that this was unposed.

 My siblings

 Our wonderful ushers!

And lastly, the whole family pictures:

David's extended family

My extended family on my dad's side 

(We're too big to fit in one picture!)

My mom's side - Aren't my grandparents precious?!

The kiddos get their own post tomorrow - They're too darn cute. :)

I know this wasn't one of my more exciting posts, but maybe it'll give you some ideas of groups/pictures that you definitely want and some that you could do without. I wasn't big on doing the formal portraits (and it was a pain in the butt to get everyone in the right place at the right time) but I'm so glad now that we have them. I wish we even had a few more than we got, including one of just David and me at the front of the church. I know at least my grandparents would want a traditional picture to frame. Oh well, hopefully you're able to learn from my mistakes!

Tip # 8: Make a list of the posed portraits you want and the ones that aren't as important to you. Maybe even put them in order of importance so that you're sure to get the ones you really want even if you're running low on time!

*All pictures in this post were taken by Brandi Coldwell of Lola Jo Photo Design*

Need to catch up? 

We started on Thursday.

We decorated Friday morning.

We rehearsed.

We got pretty!

I put on my dress. 

We had our first look!

The guys had their turn. 

The girls stole the show. 

We got some fun bridal party pictures. 

We took bride & groom portraits.