beautiful day: Herig-Wedding part 3

Dear Mitchell and Lynley,

Your Wedding was lovely. Got that?  LOVELY! It was truly perfect.  For so many reasons.  The venue was pure beauty.  The sound of the waves, the amazing sunset, the lanterns, the white sand, the grass, the cool California air… It was peaceful.  It was calming.  It was beauty in its most natural and genuine form.  This, my little ones, is exactly how I felt about the two of you during your wonderful ceremony.  When I tell people about it I say that it was the most genuine sharing of vows I have ever witnessed.  No lie.  So different from the previous day during the Rehearsal toasts when you two were looking all around, taking in the sights and sounds of your friends and family, this day you had eyes only for each other.  I did not see your eyes waver, and in that my heart felt peace and joy in your union.  Thank you from the bottom of my heart for allowing me a front row seat.  I will never forget it.  You two picked and planned a fabulous wedding- each detail so undeniably you two.  I loved it and I am so proud to share it here 🙂

I love you guys.  a lot.

Love, D

It took many to get Lynley in that pretty little number.  See those laces?  They aren’t just for show.  Mama Hardin spent many minutes lacing up her youngest daughter. Extra tight!

3 of our 4.  Everything fit.  We’re ready to walk down the aisle.  (Well, two of us are.)

Some of those views I was mentioning… and the cake.  I waited all night for it and then somehow missed it. Dang!  Maybe Mitch and Lyn will save me a bite of their one year anniversary cake?!?

Me and my gals.  Aren’t they just precious.  I really wish they would have made it down the aisle 😉  Someday.

Bridal look- Head to Toe (you can’t see her feet, but they are bare)!

What a special day for sisters.

Can’t even imagine the day that these two will be in the same pose.

Ava tried to uphold her flower girl duties.  Really hard I think.  But, no go.  Thank goodness for a Joge that saved her.  Thank goodness she looked so cute.

The beautiful bride.  She really did look the most beautiful as she walked toward her groom.  Crazy how that happens.

First kiss as Mr. and Mrs. Herig.  I think I might have cried.

I love love love this picture.

Dad and Daughter.  Mother and Son.

Kev gave a great toast.  He did not cry.

I wish I could give you all some video here of Mitch leading up to the Garter Toss.  He did dance.  We did laugh.  Check out this video for a glimpse into what you missed.

There wasn’t a ton of crying but oddly the two pics I captured of each girl’s face have tears written all over them.  Maybe there was actually more crying than I remember…hmmmm?  Still so cute.

Lyn’s big bro came through big time and had this 1927 Durant Star waiting to take the newlyweds away!

This concludes the Herig Wedding blogs.

Wishing the Herig’s a lifetime of Happy!!!!!

I’ve waited all my life- Herig Wedding part 2

Friday July 15, 2011: Rehearsal Lunch…

Let’s preface this day by reminding everyone that the night before was Bachelorette Night.  Some comments and actions to follow can and should be blamed on this fact alone.  So lets just start by saying, it was hard to be up and presentable (and not to mention- in party planning mode) by ten thirty a.m.  So, when Ryan so graciously agreed to drive us to our Rehearsal Lunch venue and Rochelle again, used her GPS skills, we thought we were good.  We arrived in the general area, Seaport Village, us three ladies unloaded about 50 pounds worth of decorations and we were off (on foot) to Busters.  *sidenote- Jo said it was just up ahead.  So,about ten minutes of walking later, dripping sweat and on the verge of dropping our centerpieces in the middle of the road, I kind of nicely asked Jo, “Do you know where it is?”  to which she replied “Yes Danielle I know where it is, just not from right here.”  Okaaaaay. *We’ll call that bachelorette remnant #1.  Ha Ha!  Though that was funny, the point of the story is this: There are still kind people in the world.  Moments away from meltdown (me) a kind stranger offered to take my box from me… about 10 feet later another group of college students stopped in their tracks and took the rest of our things and we all paraded through Seaport Village.  I couldn’t help from snapping a few pictures to capture my shock and joy!

Lesson: Be a kind stranger, you never know just how much you could be blessing someone!

We arrived safe and sound with plenty of time to decorate, set out the amazing starfish cookies (compliments of my uber talented cousin Janelle) and for me to change my entire outfit due to the hot and sweaty walk around Seaport Village.

Mom and  Dad Herig threw a beautiful, special, huge (100 people big) and delicious Rehearsal Lunch to celebrate Mitch and Lyn.

The view would be hard to match.

So would Elle’s antics.  Including getting stuck by her head in the highchair and crying for one hour until she fell asleep in the corner.

With a lot of help from the above lady’s husband, Kurt and I created a slideshow for our Sis and Bro.  We wanted it to be special.  We wanted them to feel loved.  We wanted others to see what a perfect match they are.  Thanks Ryan for your advise and Cheers Mitch and Lyn to a love worth waiting for!

Ava would not let the afternoon go by without a picture with each guest of honor.  Even the little ones could sense that this day was the beginning of a very special weekend.  The afternoon was highlighted by the many kind words offered to the bride and groom on the eve of their Big Day!  It was apparent how much they are loved by their friends and family.  I cried.  I’d like to blame this on the Bachelorette Night (ya know, being tired and overwhelmed) but let’s be honest, I cried every time I rehearsed what I would say.  I had decided to keep it short and sweet- not lose it in front of a room full of people.  Then I got up there and figured, if ever there was a time to cry for these 2 this is it.  So I cried- not the pretty kind.

On a much lighter note.  Evey time I look at this picture I think WTF on many different levels.  So I will briefly explain, for the sake of remembering.  I got sweaty on my walk.  The spankx underwear I was wearing was giving me a stomachache. I asked Kurt to bring me a new outfit (dress, belt, shoes).  I went to the bathroom to change.  I realized that now I didn’t have any undies.  I just went with it, despite feeling very breezy in this flowy dress.  Kev walks up to me and asks how big my purse is? “What? Why?” He said his friend just returned a pair of his underwear to him (why that friend had his underwear and why they were being returned at the Rehearsal Lunch oddly never came up) and he didn’t know what to do with them.  I asked the only pressing question, “Are they clean?”  He said yes.  I asked to wear them.  He said sure. And that, my friends, is Bachelorette Night remnant #2!

I couldn’t resist just one Friends quote for my baby brother who might just love those Friends as much as me 😉

Chandler: You look great. I’m so glad we’re having this rehearsal dinner, you know, I so rarely get to practice my meals before I eat them.

Phoebe: Okay, what did we say was your one gift to us?

Chandler: No stupid jokes. I thought that was for the actual wedding.

Phoebe: Rehearse it!

Following the Lunch we headed to the venue (where we had the pleasure of waking up each morning of wedding  weekend) to rehearse.  Have you ever seen such a view? Or so many handsome dudes? (Dads, Groom, and Groomsmen)

It was just begging for pictures to be taken.

There was even a hot tub on site!  Our girl was loving our home last week!  Kurt too.  I can’t remember the reason for his face in the last picture. Maybe he was remembering that we’d have to come home.

JoJo’s Granola, Roche’s lap, being fed morsel by chocolate morsel- Elle was in heaven!

Oh, the lanterns.  Ava was delighted.  “Mom, it’s like Tangled!”

Everyone sat on this hill for hours- seriously hours the night before the wedding.  Beautiful.

let the good times roll: Herig-Wedding part 1

I’m going to cover this wedding in 3 parts.  We all know I have a hard time focusing and to be honest, I really don’t want to.  This wedding week was fab beginning to end and I want to remember it all!  So here goes with part uno:

Albuquerque International Sunport: Tuesday July 12, 2011…

The wedding we’d been anticipating for 16 months was finally upon us.  WHAT!?!?  Couldn’t believe it was finally here and we were all smiles!

Answered prayer number one:  A not full flight allowing us to bring on our car-seat and strap our baby down.  Though the plan to keep her strapped in lasted about as long as it takes to unwrap a stick of gum, we felt heard nonetheless.  Flying is not fun with our girl, Elle.  That flight was bad.  But it wasn’t until the return flight that Kurt and I committed to staying grounded for at least one full year.  It was straight crying take off to landing with plenty of thrashing and throwing along the way.  People hated us. Wouldn’t make eye contact after.  It was bad.  But I didn’t cry and I’m proud of that.

Fast forward to day 2, aka Bachelor Party in Vegas.

Ava-“Bye Dad!  Drink lots of water!” (yes she really said this, I’d probably said it about 15 times in the previous two days)

Heading out.  Ready to party. great.

Sorenson and Turri boys going off duty for 24 hours (well, it ended up being more like 30- but who’s counting?)

The before picture.  Nobody looked quite so peppy when we saw them again.  There are quite a lot of holes in our photo library regarding the Bachelor Party, but the verbal commentary has been quite amusing.  Especially trying to get 17 versions to add up!

Though we don’t know much about the happenings on the car ride we do know that somehow the father of the groom got talked into completing the “Hangover” vision by upgrading to this ↑ suite at Planet Hollywood.  We also know that only one dude ended up sleeping in those 500 square feet…

Pool time.  Mitch canon-balled into a group of young ladies.  A Herig brother swim race- butterfly no less. Couldn’t get an overwhelming majority on who won.

These pool pics are the last visuals I have been provided.  They did have fun.  They did some drinking.  That’s all I know.

While the boys were away we had some fun of our own!  Swimming.

Walking that led to shopping that that led to crying that led to ice cream cones at 10:30 am.  At Ghirardelli. And the girls weren’t the only ones who indulged.

These are my sweet cousins who swooped in to man the girls when the  ‘Hangover” Bachelor Party ran a little longer than anticipated…

My grandpa and the babies.

Elle and Joge.

Ava and cousin Oliver.

Us girls.  Roche was our lifesaver over the course of this weekend.  This particular night she was solely responsible for us finding our family BBQ.  GPS-ing is one of her many gifts.  I will also be mentioning  repeatedly how she cared for the girls day and nights throughout the wedding festivities to come.  Our Turri family was priceless in getting our Sorenson family where we needed to be, loving our girls and making us laugh through it all.

And then it was our turn.  HELLOOOOO Bachelorette!

Dang Bachelorette Party crasher.  Jk- I loved the moment for a picture with my little bro.

Lynley and her big sis (Maid of Honor) Kelsey.

Some Lyn Lovin’.

Mitch and his Mama.

My girl and I enjoying a baby free evening.  At this point though I was still hoping that Kurt had made it home from his wild night to our babies and oh so curious what went down 😉

No bachelorette evening would be complete without some ‘goodies’ .  There was lingerie, things that smelled good, things that vibrated, things that burned,things that tingled,  a candle with a tiny spoon inside (?!), some 5-hour energy drink, and much much more.  Our grandmas were there.  Our mom’s were there.  Some out of that select group were responsible for the craziest treats.  Alene’s (Lyn’s Mom) laugh in that pic is priceless!

Have you ever seen so much Bachelorette Love?  Our group of hot women just kept filing in!

Stop #2 after our 2 hour cocktail hour was the Shout House in downtown San Diego.  A dueling piano bar that offered us much more fun than we anticipated! We had reserved front row seats…

…and plenty of drinks to go around!

This lady in black was NOT from our group but another bachelorette celebrating at the next table over with her girlfriends.

The looks of sheer ‘OMG’ and shock coming from the ladies at this table are in response to the “Bachelorette Dance” that the 2 above bachelorettes put on for us.  I will not be sharing the video.  But I will say: Lyn, you’ve got some moves! 😉

In true Lyn form she smiled the night away.

We all danced and sang.

Made Lyn take shots with raunchy names.

I think that I will keep a few things that happened on our girls night under wraps… let those Bachelors sweat it out.

And that concludes Herig-Wedding part ONE! Oh and Elle learned how to get that little pointer finger up in response to our , “Elle, how old are you?”

She even made a sound that I’m just sure in her little head means ONE!