Sadly, we decided on that trip back to change our plans the next night and stay in Chapel Hill to avoid another late-night drive.
Thursday evening, we drove to Durham--I dropped Ian off with the guys for pre-wedding drinks (I think in some cultures it's called a bachelor party, but I think they just hit up the QShack and James Joyce), and I picked up Quinney (you may remember Quinney from her visit to SF) and we drove to Raleigh for Marianna's bridal shower.
The weather is something that I just can't get over (mainly the weather difference). I felt naked leaving the house with sleeveless shirts and sandals, and not bringing along some heavy back-up. I mean, we've been back in SF for a week now, and Friday night--heck if I wasn't wearing boots, jeans, a scarf and jacket, and STILL was cold.
Anyway, we go to Marianna's mom's house and there are more friends to see--mainly from McKinney (and of COURSE the glowing bride-to-be), but also the wonderful Rebecca Sketch who I was so excited to see is expecting. And met a new friend, Kelly, who work(ed/s) with the M's at Arnold.
After the shower, I drove Quinney home and picked up Ian from the James Joyce where we headed to our hotel to check in. The lovely Holiday Inn Express. Alas.
Next morning, Ian and I headed to Southpoint mall---I just had to visit the old girls at Avalon for all things "cure" (mani and pedi) pre-wedding. We soon found ourselves getting ready for our respective activities--can't speak for Ian (again, I encourage him to speak for himself in this blog...Ian? Ian? Are you there?)....but, I was off to a bridal luncheon at the Old Granary at Fearrington Village.
In fact, that's where the wedding and reception were. I'm just going to go ahead and put a fatty link here to the Fearrington Village. It is a wonderful, charming place and you should just explore that site and drool a little.
So, the luncheon was great. Got to know the bridesmaids a bit better, and Kelly from Arnold was also there....just love her.
Immediately following was the rehearsal. Can I now just prompt you to again visit the website? Gorgeous! Kind of ridiculous. It was raining a bit, so we rehearsed under a roof, but I just love the space, and I was so happy to see some old friends of the M's that had been to our house way back when, Hal and Jenn.
Can I just stop and say how much we really love Micah and Marianna (who we affectionately dubbed m&m, or the M's back in the day)? If you don't believe us, find them here and you'll have to agree.
OK, then we had a break where we all went back to our hotels and rested, got dressed again and headed to the Weathervane for the rehearsal dinner.
Delicious bbq buffet with the most amazing sweet potato mash on the side--which reminds me--I emailed them for the recipe and they haven't responded.
The bestworse part of the dinner was the procession of toasts to the bride and groom---man, I tried so hard to contain the waterworks, but was a bit hard to control with all the crazy love and support flowing around that room. Just insane.
Afterwards, we all headed to the West End Wine Bar (the Cellar, to be exact), where we met with tons of friends from McKinney.
AND my Hippos were all in town and also came to the bar.
It was a good: friend / happy to see everyone / I just love you all overdose. In a really lovely way.
I had a hard time saying no to hopping across the street to The Lantern bar with my Hippos, but alas I knew that I had a long day Saturday, and being hung over and tired was not the right answer.
Saturday morning, Ian went to meet the boys at McKinney bright and early for a little traditional golf--OK, not traditional golf, but they Tiger Woods it on the Wii.
I myself met the Hippos again at Weathervane (hey, the food's good and Hippo Kirsten had to meet her mom there at 11 anyway) for brunch.
Super fun. Miss those girls. Delicious. We laughed so hard at the silliest things and dished about the latest. We all live in different cities, in 3 different states. Ah, such luck they were all there.
Ian and I transferred stuff from Holiday Inn Express to stay at the Fearrington Saturday night. Can i just say shucks? I really wish we'd stayed there all along. It's gorgeous. I said that before. But the stay was so lovely, and the included breakfast Sunday was also lovely. I jump ahead...
Got my hair done at the Fearrington. I'm not sure how "just something kind of low...like a low knot at the nape of my neck....something loose"....translated to the bouffant I received. I knew I was in trouble when before they asked what I wanted, they yelled out--"She's got straight hair! I'll go ahead and get'er in curlers!" Or maybe a warning sign could have been: "Our usual clientele is the elderly, so it's so much fun when a young person comes in!" Plus they were running late. In fact, I had less than 15 minutes to make it back to my hotel room, put on makeup, and get dressed for the wedding before I had to meet everyone for pictures.
Marianna was beautiful. The flowers were beautiful.
Micah and the groomsmen were beautiful. I just realized that I've neglected to say both Ian and I had the honor of being in the wedding. Hope you guessed by now.
We took a few pictures, and soon it was ceremony time. Although rain had been a semi-permanent part of the landscape up until that day, the day turned out to be lovely. The ceremony was just lovely. Everything about it. Just such an honor to participate, and so happy to witness something so wonderful, and something I have such strong belief in. An added bonus is that I get to look across everyone at Ian and feel all of the love between us and know how happy I am that we decided on the very same thing a couple of years before.
Immediately following the wedding, and we had champagne and hors d'oeurves waiting for us. What a well-planned, well-executed event. Start to finish.
The reception was in the barn.
Us bridesmaids changed into the flip flops M got us for our bmaids gifts, and we headed that way. The food was outstanding.
Our biggest regret (and Ian is actually angry about this) is that we didn't eat enough.
But again, it was friends and more friends and more reunions. Here I want to interject that our experience at McKinney was priceless, and I have wonderful feelings and appreciation for our time there and the friends we made. In some ways, it made things harder to come back to knowing that elsewhere in the world were groups of people we loved and trusted and felt totally ourselves with. It's more rare than we care to admit, and I'm a little sad we've never found that here in SF.
By trust, maybe I mean that we proceeded to bust a move the rest of the night. Hadn't been dancing in forever, and we all went nuts. Haven't mentioned her yet, but I love Micah's younger sister Labryth, who is fun, smart, and lovely. We had a blast. It was such a fun, fun wedding.
After all was said and done, I escorted the extremely.....tipsy(?) Ian back to our hotel room, where I proceeded to take out about 100 bobby pins from my southern hairstyle, and we crashed in bed (not getting to enjoy fully the turn-down service that happened in our absence).
The next morning we had breakfast, then went back to our hotel for an additional nap in the bed. Ian's parents met us there, and we wandered around the village waiting on my bff Steph and her daughter Riley (almost 5, and completely precious). We all had lunch at the Old Granary, visited the famous belties (goats and cows), then shortly thereafter headed to the airport.
Lucky enough to run into Dave and Sara (from the wedding), and my Hippo Kirsten. Had a delay...basically, we were home in SF about 1 am (that would make it 4 am EST).
Back to work and the cold Monday. Had a great time. That's maybe why this post was so long, and I didn't even get in all I wanted to say about how much we lovelovelove Ian's family, the dogs (ah, Howard...you love your new home), our dear, dear friends from all walks of life.
Can you guys just come back with us?
If I were a wildflower, my name would be Gerald.
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