Honeys Do: A Casual Rehearsal

After we set up, all my bridesmaids and I went back to our house to get pretty before the rehearsal. I had bought a few new dresses for wedding events and was stoked to finally be putting on the one I had picked out for the rehearsal. After we were all prettified, we piled into BM K's Swagger Wagon, Tecate's in hand, and headed back to the venue for the rehearsal.

Photo by BM Mae
BM Scoot, BM Candace, Me, BM Fawn

Us girls arrived very last to the rehearsal, but you know what? I was a-okay with that because I was the bride! Certainly the rehearsal wasn't going to start without me, assuming anyone even knew what to do at a rehearsal. I was so happy to see my very soon-to-be husband and get the thang started!

Photo by Aunt M

We did the standard reverse walk through, with everyone starting at the altar. The most important part of our rehearsal was working with pairing up our uneven wedding party, and fortunately it worked out perfectly.

Photo by Aunt M

Because there was no real strategy to our rehearsal, there was lots of directing going on, however the lack of formality made it go rather smooth...you know, since we were just casually walking with friends while enjoying a brewski!

Photo by Aunt M

Officiant Mark & Mr. Honey

Photo by Aunt M

I'm explaining something very important, I'm sure

We did a few walk throughs and decided that we had it down, so Mr. Honey and I rehearsed our recessional one last time, beers in hand...

Photo by Aunt M

Our rehearsal took all of about 15 minutes and we didn't plan on dinner until 5, so we had some time to kill. This provided some good catching up and kick back time with our guests.

Photo by Aunt M

Mr. Honey and his aunts from Alabama

Photo by Aunt M

Mr. Honey with Officiant Mark and FIL Honey

This down time also allowed FIL Honey to give us his wedding gift, which was perfect, because it was a rather special gift so we got to open it when it was relatively calm. He handed over a card, giving a sweet sentimental speech:

Photo by Aunt M

We read the card, and my reaction was caught perfectly on camera:

Photo by Aunt M

The card clearly warranted a big hug for my FIL:

Photo by Aunt M

The gift was far more than a card, on the inside of the card was the statement "Good for one sectional couch". You see, Mr. Honey and I have been wanting to replace our couch for far too long and we planned on using wedding money to do so. My very generous FIL decidide he would purchase the couch for us so that we can buy our other dream item with wedding money (which I will share with you, I promise!). I'm so happy we had those few minutes to take in the gift he had gotten us!

Photo by Aunt M

And with that, it was time to head to dinner!

• We had a busy wedding week
• Teamwork made our Dream Work

Honeys Do: Teamwork to Make the Dreamwork

One of the best things about our venue is that it was a blank slate. One of the hardest things about our venue is that it was a blank slate. This meant we had to do all of the setup and decoration, so we called in the troops for help. Our entire wedding party, family and even some super generous friends came to our rescue Friday morning to get the place just perfect.

My dad called in friends to plow out the parking lot. My mom called friends to help with flowers. The groomsmen offered their muscle and the bridesmaids brought their finest decorating skills. It truly was an effort by our nearest and dearest! The four hours of setting up was beyond exciting for me. Putting together all the decor elements that I had envisioned for so many months was surreal...finally getting all those visions from my head to real life so that everyone could actually see what I was seeing? Amazing!

We set up the rows of tables with the white tablecloths and burlap runners:

Photo by BM Mae

BM Kel Bel and BM K assembled the handmade desert plates for our dessert buffet:

Photos by BM Mae

The girls worked together to make my tablescape vision come to life with the glitter and twine jars:

Photos by BM Mae

The dudes were put in charge of hanging the yarn spheres:

Photo by BM Mae

Outside, my Dad's handmade arch was put in place:

Photo by Zak Fleming Photography

And our rock guest book and card mailbox were all ready for the guests:

Photo by Aunt M

It was all coming together! We had set our rehearsal for 3ish. Yes 3-ish. Everyone that was a part of the rehearsal was already at the venue to help set up so we figured we would see how time went throughout the day. By 2:30 I was ready to leave and go put on a pretty new dress for the rehearsal. At 2:45 I walked away. I left my fully capable mom in charge and told her that I trusted any final decisions she had to make. There were certainly some last minute touches that had to be done, but I knew she would make the right calls. I got to the point I didn't care. We had the majority of the decorating done and it looked amazing, I didn't want to worry about whether or not a place mat should be used here or a flower vase should go there. I didn't want to stress, I wanted to be the bride from there on out, no longer the planner and coordinator. I let it all go and when my girls and I left the venue to go freshen up, I smiled because it looked perfect already:

Photo by BM Mae

• We had a busy wedding week

Honeys Do: Our Wedding Week

When I came across Weddingbee, I loved being inspired by the Bee's in planning and seeing so many different kinds of weddings being created. But what really drew me in was the Recaps. When I was freshly engaged and facing the daunting task of creating our wedding, reading the recaps offered a sense of "I can do this", like seeing so many other brides pulling off all their to-do's and DIY's made me feel more confident when facing my own task list. Seeing a project from creation to implementation was right up my alley and I couldn't wait to recap my own wedding (even before I got the honor of Miss Honey, the followers on my blog would have been reading my recaps!) Needless to say, I'm super excited to be starting the Honey Recaps!! Follow along as all the bullet points on my previous planning list get documented in pictures and trips down memory lane.
There was a lot I feel like I didn't address before the wedding, like my hair trial, and that's because a lot of things fell into place the week before the wedding. So lets start there, our wedding week. We both chose to take off the week before the wedding; knowing that Mr. Honey and I wouldn't be taking the week following off for a honeymoon coupled with the inflow of people from out of town, we really wanted to take the time to enjoy everything. I made it a goal of mine to have everything wedding related (besides of course the actual set up of our wedding) done by Thursday.

My week was filled with last minute DIY projects, pampering, relaxing and a whole lot of visiting. I started my Monday by making the.final.to.do.list. A pretty manageable one at that.

From rocks to signs to gifts, putting these final details together wasss...annoying? Tedious? I'll admit that the last of my tasks became half-assed. When earlier I would have fretted if my food sign wasn't perfectly even, by Monday afternoon I was just in get it done mode. I'm proud to say that 9 of  these 10 tasks were marked scratched off by Thursday. The only one I didn't get done was the programs...I just ran out of steam and creativity to create and print them.

Tuesday I had my hair trial...why did I wait so long? My hair stylist, ED, said that it made more sense to do it close to the wedding so that she actually remembered how to do the style we created. Agreed. I showed her my inspiration pictures and she nailed it. It was perfect, there was nothing I would have changed. Plus, running the last of wedding errands with my hair all did up was far more fun!Wednesday I spent three glorious hours getting a manicure, pedicure and massage as Mr. Honey celebrated his psuedo-bachelor party in the high country of Silverton.

Then it was all the last minute things coming together in a whirlwind. Remember how Mr. Honey was going to be in charge of his own attire? Well the guys shirts literally arrived Wednesday before the wedding. Then he decided he wanted to have his shirt tailored, which wouldn't be ready until Friday morning. We made our final decisions for beer and liquor early that week and so Mr. Honey spent an afternoon running around town putting deposits down on kegs and picking out the perfect rum for our cocktail. We were still trying to find a bartender, practice our first dance moves and remembering to pick up things like hot chocolate and bottles of water for the reception. I even attended a baby shower for MOH Stac Wednesday evening. When I started to feel panicky, I would take a step back and relax. I seriously got some good couch time in that week!

Then,Thursday it got real. All of a sudden our wedding weekend was the next day! I picked up one of my favorite friends, Jo, from the airport and we drank cocktails while her and my friend J.Summers helped me wrap our wedding party gifts. The last thing on my to-do list was done at 3 pm on Thursday. Many Bee's have said it before and I'll say it again: do this. Having that last thing checked off my list before the events started really allowed me to enjoy every single second without being distracted by the last minute things.

Our wonderful officiant, Mark, hosted a "Welcome to Durango" dinner at his house Thursday night where out of town friends and even our close local friends all gathered.

Friend Jo, Me & BM Scoot

Mr. Honey's college friends AP and AL, and Officiant Mark

After some kebabs salad, and an assortment of cheeses (yum. cheese.) we all went downtown Durango for drinks. Mr. Honey and I agreed that we would stay for a couple drinks, we had a lot to do early in the morning. Read my Words: This doesn't happen when you are the couple in the spotlight! Friends, strangers, bartenders...they all like to buy drinks for you when you are getting married in a few short days. We took it all in though, dancing and chatting with those who came from all over the country to be with us.

BM Scoot & I

The Honeys.

Mr. Honey clearly didn't wear sunscreen while snowboarding the day before!

We walked home right about midnight, a couple hours later than I had wanted. BUT, that night was a blast! I got home took one last look around the house for things I couldn't forget, passed by the boxes of all our wedding decor one last time and hit the hay for a good nights sleep.

Wedding Week Weather

I think it's safe to say that majority of brides imagine their wedding day with blue skies and the sun shining, a picture perfect weather day. I'm going to share the story of our wedding week weather with you because I was not in that weather camp and also because when I share our pictures with you in the recaps, I want you all to know how perfect the weather was for us.

We planned our outside winter wedding in anticipation of the weather being winter-y. We had outside heaters, we passed along wise words to dress warm, and my mom even bought 30 fleece blankets at After-Christmas sales. What we didn't plan on was unusually warm weather. By January 10th, Durango had not even a flake of snow since the first week in December, and the highs were nearing the mid-50's. When trees are dormant and all that remains from the last snow storm is brown ice and brown dirt, the landscape is far from pretty.

On January 11th, the day our 10-day forecast was available, it predicted sun, sun and more sun all the way through our wedding day. What is the problem you may wonder, with all the sunny predictions? Both Mr. Honey and I just wanted one damn snow storm. We wanted a fluffy white ground, a frozen lake, snow-tipped trees. Keeping in mind that a Colorado blue-bird day would not be that awful and that we cannot as brides control the weather, I tried my damndest to just accept it. I honestly did. But I prayed to Ullr anyway and requested everyone I know do the same to help this winter bride out. In case you aren't familiar with Ullr, he his believed by many mountain towns to be the God of Snow and he his summoned when the winter is looking rather bleak. I have no idea the authenticity of the legend, but I do know I had nothing to loose by requesting a little precipitation.

On January 16th, the Monday of our wedding week, we got snow. Whether it was Ullr or just a change in the forecast, the once brown ground was finally covered with the white stuff! We even got enough snow for our flower girls to build this giant snowman:

We got our one snow storm, and I'll admit half of me was content with whatever the weather presented come Saturday. The other half of me? I got greedy, I wanted more snow. Throughout the year and a half of us planning, the possibility of a snow storm was there but I didn't realize just how much I wanted that snow storm until the reality of it not being there was in front of me. Deep down I wanted a snow storm on our wedding day. There I said it. Call us crazy, it's okay, I realize how few people would actually say those words.

As the week wore on, the chance of snow on our Saturday grew more and more. It started with something like 10% chance after 10 pm and by Friday the chances were up around 60 or 70%. I didn't believe it though...Friday was a beautiful day with clear skies and warm weather. Saturday morning I woke up to pretty thin clouds, not typical snow clouds. The forecast had something else in mind though. 100% chance of snow accumulation of up to 10 inches. The flakes started falling around 10 am and did.not.stop. We had the most perfect Colorado snow storm: fluffy snowflakes, a mild temperature, no wind and a serenity that is only felt when a storm like that is happening.
My girls rocked their short dresses. Our photographer did have to run around with a pink fleece over his camera. Sure guests got a little wet. And yes it did cause a little bit of chaos. BUT it was the way our wedding weather turned out and it was amazing. We keep saying that if we could have in fact had control of the weather, a snow storm would have been our number one choice.

What started out as a less-than desired weather forecast turned into our weather wish. While no one can tell a bride to avoid looking at the forecast, it is safe to say that no matter how many times we do look at it, there's no telling how quickly that forecast will change. Whether it's my case of hoping for sun to change to snow or the normal situation of rain to shine, I hope you all have your version of perfect wedding weather.  I'll leave you with this one last teaser picture of the Honeys happily walking around in the perfect snow storm:

Photo by Zak Fleming Photography

Now, hopefully you are ready to see the snow filled goodness from our wedding because the Honey recaps are about to start!

Did anyone else have crazy weather on their wedding day? Any other brides hoping for something other than a sunny day?