Dining in Style

Edit - I wrote this post a YEAR ago and never posted it. Here we go friends.

Here I am, back from my hiatus! but I have had a good excuse. Seriously, look:

Anywho, onto the Rehearsal Dinner!

After our lovely stop in at the View, we headed to our RD location - High Shores! The food was delicious and the weather was divine. The music played and all of our closest friends and family members surrounded us. At one point we looked at each other and my FH said. "This is it, this is our wedding."

We were so overwhelmed.

Little did we know that open mic night was about to begin.

First, the host and hostess (FH's mom and dad) each spoke. Then my mom. And then, well, everyone.

{these may or may not have been pregnancy tears ;) }

As if we did not know before how lucky we are to be surrounded by such amazing friends, we were assured that night. Some tears were shed, hugs were shared, and then it was time for presents!

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Leinie's Tour and The View

Since we had such an early rehearsal, and a bunch of time in between the actual rehearsal and the dinner, the FH and I decided to make good on our longtime promise to friends who would come to Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin...the Leinenkugel's Brewery Tour!

Leinenkugal's has been distributed more widely in the last few years since they signed on to being distributed by a larger national company - but all of the Leinenkugal's beer you have ever enjoyed was made right in Chippewa Falls.

We signed everyone up for the free tour, and everyone that was of age could enjoy some of the free samples ;)

      

   

     

{the hubby and his dad - you wouldn't know it. ha!}
   

After enjoying our freebies, we headed on the tour.
   

After the tour, we headed towards the Rehearsal Dinner location with a small stop over at a local bar on Lake Wissota, The View. And what a view it has.

but in reality...in between the tours and The View, some of the party sneaked away on a secret mission to buy a little gift for my Packers fan of a husband.

and then we had a toast.
    

With the Cheesehead.
  

On to Dinner!

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A little layout change...

I have futzed with the layout a bit to bring you bigger photos for the recaps!

Enjoy.

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Let's Rehearse

And now for the coverage of the most efficient rehearsal ever. Seriously.

Deacon Kinnick, from St. Charles was not playing around. He knew that we had places to be and so did he. (He had about 50 teenagers arriving shortly for Youth Group evening camp.)

To be honest, we felt lucky to have a rehearsal at all. When we had to do the "hey let's move the wedding up a month," the only possible problem was that we wouldn't be able to do a rehearsal, as the church was being taken over by teenagers the night before the wedding. So our rehearsal was at 3:00pm.

Unusual? Yes. End of the world? No.

We found some fun ways to fill the time (read: Brewery Tour).

In any case, upon our prompt arrival (after a costume change) we got started right away! Austin yelled out the orders of our guys and gals, and we all lined up for a quick photo.

My mom and I may or may not have been running in to make the shot. 

Look at all those lovely ladies in their lovely dresses.

As we ladies were lining up, the deacon directed the boys down to the front of the church, where my FH stood waiting to see this whole thing get started.

We made it down the aisle and got started with the whole she-bang. These were probably the most surreal moment of the entire weekend. I was grinning like an idiot and barely paid attention to anything going on. Apparently neither were my maids, since they were able to snap this shot.

Excited girls at the altar!

  
  

Deacon Kinnick showing the FH how to escort me to my seat. 
There I am pretending to pay attention and grinning.

   
  

My parents looking on...
 
 

We're all laughing at something that none of us can remember.
 
 

And then it was done! We had the marriage certificate - signed, sealed and delivered, and we had rehearsed. Our deacon may or may not have taken on the personality of a drill instructor, but we were in and out in around 40 minutes! We even had enough time to grab some photos after the fact before heading to our reservations at Leinenkugels. 

 

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We interrupt

your regularly scheduled blogging to bring you a discovery that has me tickled.

Not only did we love, love, love our engagement photo shoot with Alyssa Alig in Athens, but it seems the feeling was mutual!

We are now the engagement portfolio couple. How fun is that?

Check it out here.

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And I digress...

So soon, you ask?

Why yes! Because, when she saw that I had not photos of the set up process, my new father-in-law's lovely girlfriend sent me some!
  

 

Loading up the vehicles...I believe I am in there 

conferring with my brother about a checklist.

 

 

 Look at my hot husband hanging curtains for me.

  

 

 

Look at how much fun my lovely maids were having! haha. right.

  

   
 

The siblings, helping out. While others were nice enough to not make 

comments along the lines of, "she is insane," these two had no qualms. 

Ah, sibling love.

 

 
 

 "Here dads, let me show you how I want it..." 

I may or may not have walked around apologizing to everyone and 

thanking them profusely throughout this entire process.

  

And with that, a few hours minutes later, we were good to go!

  

Again, thank you so much to everyone who was willing to climb ladders, get ceiling dust in their eyes, tie pretty bows and sting lanterns ad curtains that night. It all came out fabulously.

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Impromptu Welcome Lunch

While a few of my lovely bridesmaids arrived on Wednesday {and then we got to hang out and get manicures and pedicures and set up the wedding reception decor [read: my friends and family love me enough to be slave labor...thanks guys!] - no photos though, sad day!} the majority of the wedding party and family arrived on late Wednesday night, or early Thursday morning, so we will start recaps there.

{Are you impressed by the length on that last sentence? I am.}

As everyone rolled in to my parents' house, my mom and I were running errands early - picking up some flowers for the house, picking up linens and tables, all sorts of last minute details.

We headed back to the house, and some of the people had arrived to stay! I immediately went into chill mood and was ready to have some fun. My fiance, on the other hand, went into "let's get things done" mode, which made me laugh. But, he assigned duties to everyone hanging out and they hopped to! He and I ran to drop off linens at Lake Wissota and check in with Karen, our event manager, to make sure everything was good to go!

We were so excited and giddy the whole way there and back, and we were ready to roll when it came time to meet everyone up at Noodles & Co. for a quick bite to eat!

Don't you just love when those big, loud, annoying groups steal

all the tables in the restaurant to create a large one? Ha!

We were just so excited to see everyone all in one place! This is the moment where I looked around me and said "it's here!" And then, just like that we all had to run and change to make the 3:00 rehearsal on time!

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