Here Comes the Bride

Those of you reading this have probably heard, but we had a wedding this weekend.  My sister-in-law, Katy, married her sweetheart, Austin and we had the privilege to be a part of their special day.

 

Here is Katy.  The picture doesn't do her justice....she was absolutely gorgeous.  It's hard to believe that this is the same little girl that I met about 16 years ago when she was 12.  I feel like she is, in many ways, a little sister to me.

 

And here is the groom, Austin.  I'm still trying to figure out my newish camera so sometimes the pictures aren't perfect, but the couple definitely was.

 

Katy and Austin make a lovely couple and Ethan has already invited Uncle Austin to play Lego Indiana Jones on the X-Box.  Priorities, people!

 



Here is the full wedding party.  Emily is standing next to Katy and Ethan is in front of Emily.  The two little flower girls are my nieces, Bristol (next to Ethan) and Addie.  The two little ring bearers on the other side were Malachi and Silas, Austin's nephews.

 

There were 6 kids under 10 years of age involved in the wedding.  Katy and Austin were brave!!

 

It definitely made for some fun moments and some fantastic pictures at times.

 

But at the end of the day, they all performed their wedding duties beautifully and it was truly sweet of Katy and Austin to want to include all their nieces and nephews on their most important day.

 



 

Before I go on, I should let you know that I officially took about 313 pictures over the course of two days.  Of course, some of that was trying to rapidly snap the same pose over and over because trying to get 6 little children to look in the same direction, much less smile and not fidget all at the same time was a massive undertaking.  I promise, I won't share all 313 pictures, but I did think I'd share some of the process building up to the wedding.

 

For the ladies of the bridal party, Saturday began quite early.  Katy's mom (hereforth referred to as "Grandma"), Emily and I left the house at 7:30 in the morning to get their hair done.  Emily went first.  She's never had any kind of formal hair styling, so this was a whole new experience for her.  Miss Ginger curled her stick-straight hard all over.  Here she is waiting for the curls to set while Grandma was getting her hair done.  (I'll spare Grandma the picture of her in the process!)

 

 



After a while, Aunt Katy and the rest of the wedding party joined us and started the process of becoming even more beautiful.

 





And here is the finished product....Emily in her dress looking very lovely.  She was a junior bridesmaid, just as her Aunt Katy was for our wedding lo, those many 14 years ago.

 



Grandma and Emily before the wedding.

 



Here are my two nieces, Bristol (in front) and Addie getting ready for their debut as flower girls.

And here is Ethan with Andrew.  His preparation for the wedding was much faster....lucky duck.  Men have no idea how easy they have it on a wedding day!  Ethan was tickled to wear his tux.  He was one handsome dude!

 

 

And here are Katy and Austin, surrounded by their nieces and nephews on our side of the family.  They were so cute.

 

 

I will be adding lots more pictures, but here's just a quick sample for now!

Oh the Weather Outside is Frightful....

You might have heard, but there's a little bit of winter weather happening in our neck of the woods.  Something about a "polar vortex" which I refuse to read about, since I'm actually experiencing it at the moment!

 

Here's a picture from Saturday night.  The relative calm at the beginning.

 

This looks like a typical winter night around these parts.  Cold, but not excessive, some inches of snow, but no big deal.

 

We got up Sunday morning, went to church and out for lunch and then came home to settle in for the "big storm". 

 

This is a picture of Sunday night.  It was getting pretty cold, but still above zero, if I recall.  However at this point, we were officially under a blizzard warning.  I think that was a pretty accurate description.

 



Driving conditions were pretty bad.  Of course, we weren't going anywhere.

 



And then there was this morning.  Approximately 18 inches of snow (in the bit that I dared to measure from the back door).  It was still blowing like crazy, but the sun did come out and stay out all day.  It was very deceptive though. 

 



Somewhere behind that tree is a retaining wall....I promise.

 



Nothing but snow....and cold.....

And this is right now.  I know it's a little hard to read, but the actual temperature is -14 degrees F.  And yes, that does say a windchill of -38 degrees F. 

 

 

A moment of silence please.

 



 

 

And this is why we have all been home all day with no school or work.  There is a state of emergency until noon tomorrow.  No school again tomorrow and Andrew has to go into work at some point, but not sure when. 

 

Fun stuff.

Dining at Be Our Guest, Day 3 Continued Again!

Sorry for the delay, but I've posted so many pictures over the last few days, that I thought I'd give my loyal readers a bit of a break.  But now I'm back!  And we're still only on day 3.  I promise, we'll be done with this post!

 

We dined at Be Our Guest, otherwise known as the new Beasts' Castle in the Magic Kingdom.  Our food was pretty tasty (Andrew and I had the New York Strip with Pomme Frites) and the kids had, well....kid food.  But the real star of dinner was dessert.  We each got to pick from a pastry/cupcake that was brought to our table on a special dessert trolley.  

 

 

 

Ethan chose a strawberry cupcake with strawberry filling...and Mickey drawn on his plate.

 

 Andrew opted for "The Grey Stuff".  (It's name comes from the song "Be Our Guest" from the movie).  It was chocolate brownie-like stuff on the bottom and some sort of grey frosting.  It was good....but mine was better!

 

I had a triple chocolate mousse-filled cupcake with a tiny little chocolate "book" on top.  It was very yummy!

 



 

Emily had the Grey Stuff too, plus an extra helping of the frosting with a candle, since we were celebrating her 9th birthday on this trip.

 

Here's a bit of the grand ballroom dining room.  If you look closely at the windows, you can see that it is "snowing" outside.  It's really very pretty.

 



 

 

This is the very intricate ceiling with cherubs and crystal chandeliers.

 

And here are the children with the Beast.  He is much nicer in person!

 



Some scenery in the castle.

 



 

A very intricate tile mosaic of Belle and the Prince.

 

 

 

The entrance to the ballroom.

 

 

The ballroom, obviously.

 

Beauty and the Beast....I mean, Emily and Ethan and a gargoyle.

 



 

Emily wearing her princess Mickey ears.

 



 

 

And that was day and night on the third day....and it was good!

Day 3: Be Our Guest

After an hour or two back at the hotel after leaving the Animal Kingdom, we got ourselves back together and headed over to the Magic Kingdom for dinner at Be Our Guest and Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween party.

 

(As always, if you want to see bigger pictures, just click on the pictures!) 

As you can see, the park is completely decked-out in fall/Halloween decor, with carved pumpkins and scarecrow pumpkin people everywhere. 

 



 

 

We headed over to Fantasy Land and checked out the newest addition, Beauty and the Beast town.  Ok ,I'm sure that's not the official name, but you get the point....it's a re-creation of the French town in which Belle (and Gaston) lived and then a beautiful castle high on a hill where the Beast resides.  Above is the fountain of Gaston in front of his tavern. 

 

 

 

A little gift shop in the town square...everything is so quaint!

 

And here is a glimpse of the Beasts' castle...where we had much-anticipated (and very hard-to-get) reservations for dinner.

 



Be Our Guest is the name of the restaurant and has been open a little less than a year.  We called exactly 180 days before our trip, which is the soonest you can make a reservation, and still barely managed to secure a table, and then not on the day we originally planned.  Either way, I think this is the place I was most excited to see and it didn't disappoint.

 



 

 

Some of the scenery on the way up to the castle.  Disney really does a great job of immersing you in whatever you are doing.  I mean, those mountains look real...don't they?

 

 

The details here are fantastic.  Each lamppost had a gargoyle.

 



Here is the entrance to the castle.  No idea who those people are!

 



Once inside the castle, there are two dining rooms.  The first is very large and is the royal ball room that you see in the picture above.  This picture doesn't even come close to doing it justice....it is truly beautiful and there will be better pictures to come.

 



The second dining room is themed as the Beasts' study.  It is, how shall we say?  A little more beastly and ripped to shreds.  It is also much smaller, and probably more dramatic as there are things that happen as you dine. 

 

Allow me to explain....

If you've seen the movie, you know that the Beast has a magic rose in his study.  When the last petal falls from the rose, if the Beast hasn't learned to truly love, he will remain a Beast forever.  Here's the rose.  In person, you can see the petals slowly falling.

 



This is not a great picture, but notice the picture over the fireplace.  It's a portrait of the Beast when he was just a normal prince.

 



Several times throughout the dinner, the lights would flicker and it would thunder and the portrait would change..from a prince to the Beast.  (You have no idea how many times I tried to catch this super fast transformation for documenting purposes....but I succeeded!)

 



And here are your's truly and Emily.  Ignore the princess crown on my head.  It was going to be my Halloween "costume" for later.  Emily and Ethan had headware of their own and Andrew was going to buy something to wear, but in the end, the only one who even tried was me.  It's ok, it was helping to keep my bangs out of my face!

 



 

And here are my two favorite guys....Andrew and Ethan, who apparently was showing us the beast with his face!

 

I have a ton more pictures from our dinner, but since I've already posted around 30+ today alone, I think I'll save some for tomorrow.  Check back and scroll down so you don't miss anything!

Day 3: Animal Kingdom (continued)

I had a ton of pictures from the Animal Kingdom (and day 3 in general), so I thought I'd split up day three into several posts.  You can thank me later.

 

The general consensus on the Animal Kingdom from our little family is this:  It's usually the hottest/most humid park.  It only takes a day to see everything and seeing the animals can be somewhat hit or miss.  It's definitely easier to see more on a cooler day.  It's also a very lush tropical-feeling park.

 

 

 

 Above and below are just some scenic water falls from around the park.

 

 

 

 

The Animal Kingdom is an African-themed park (with a little Asian flair mixed in).  Here were some pretty cool "tribal" musicians.  They played all sorts of rhythm instruments along with singing and dancing.

 

 

 

Later in the day, Andrew and the kids opted to do a little playing in the kids play area.  I went back and took another safari ride.

 

 

 

I think this is a black rhino...and some large birds.

 

And if I recall, this is a white rhino.  It was as close to us as it looks.

 



 A momma giraffe and her baby and some deer-like creatures.

 

 

 

Crocodiles....lots of crocs!

 

 

 

I don't know what these guys are called, but their horns were pretty cool.

 

 

A big group of hippos.  Hippos are weird. 

 

 

Another cool waterfall on the safari ride.

 

 

 

A view of Mt. Everest (which is actually a large roller coaster).

 

Some very vibrant tropical flowers.

 



 

 

Some very vibrant kiddos in the play area.

 

A closer view of Mt. Everest. 

 

And that friends, was just a sampling of the morning and afternoon on day three.  We still have A LOT more to come.