A Winter Wedding

What is Elora all so dolled up for? Why is she with Grandma (and Aunt Kiera, who isn't in the picture frame.) Why yes! From the clues in the title you have probably guessed we were going to a wedding! On the 30th of December, 2011 my brother Thain got married in the Mount Timpanogas Temple to his lovely bride, Anne.

And Elora was a flower girl! (Which doesn't mean she threw flowers or anything, but she got to be in all of the pictures.)

And wonder of wonders miracle of miracles, my dad wore a suit for the first time in like 22 years. He hated and loathed every minute of it, but he looked pretty good! Oh yeah, and Thain had a top hat, and tails. 'Cause he's cool like that. (in a side note, is it just me, or does my mom have really skinny ankles?)

After the wedding, we were all outside for the obligatory group pictures, family pictures, etc. I have no idea who this group is supposed to be...all the bride's friends and female cousins? Not sure. But does anyone else think this arrangement is horrible? Yes, this is how they stood as the paid photographer took the photo. And, maybe I don't know what I'm talking about, but isn't it the photographer's job to make sure the groups are standing in a pleasing manner? Maybe her photos turned out amazing, but I have to say I wasn't impressed with the photog's directional skills.



















Here's another one with the brothers. Hi Thorin! That's my youngest brother on the right. I guess the other boys are Anne's brothers. Again, don't you think they should've been told to stand closer or something?

 They took pictures with the parents, and a few other groups, but they never took a big group shot of everyone who was there, which included several of my aunts, uncles, and cousins as well as the bride's extended family. My mom finally requested that they take one with Thain's family (us) because she wanted one. Too bad it was after we'd all been milling around for an hour, the kids were cranky and tired (it was nap-time) and we were all wearing our coats. You'd think the photographer might've told us to even out or something? But again, what do I know. Do you like my coat? My grandma knitted it.

It was a beautiful day, and we did have fun milling about and visiting while the couple got their other pictures done. Look, there's Kiera and her giant baby! I wish the sun had stayed out like this the whole time, then their pictures would have been amazing! But it only peeked out for a few minutes here and there. (psst, there's the photographer, do you see her?)

Ah, my dashing youngest brother, Thorin. Oh yeah, and Joseph. I think his beard needs trimming, what do you think?

It appears there was more than one handsome young man in the crowd that day, especially small guys like this one! (Mommy, when are we going to eat!!??)

After all the photos were done, a limo pulled up to pick up the happy couple and take them to the reception. I thought it was interesting that Anne's mom wanted the two flower girls to get in the limo with them (wouldn't they want some privacy?) but then, Kiera pointed out that the bride's father was the one driving the vehicle. Still, hey a limousine!

So here is Elora and the other girl riding along. She thought it was great!

Now it was time for us all to head to the reception! 

 

It was being held in a Country Club in Provo to which Anne's family belongs. We were driving down during rush hour traffic so it was going to take a while, plus I had to stop at my aunt's house to pick up my camera charger I'd forgotten, so it was almost a two hour break in between...which was good, because my kids took naps in the car so they weren't grumpy at the party!

Plus, I got to see the sunset over the Salt Lake Valley..wait, is the Provo area still considered the Salt Lake Valley? I'm not really sure. Anyway, it was beautiful.

The reception was beautiful, with a dinner for the family and close friends, then lots of treats for the rest of the evening. Thain and Anne did a little dancing, 

 

 

then Thain asked Elora to dance too. She had a great time!

Anne didn't want to be left out, so she asked Josh if he would like to dance with her. But instead of taking her outstretched hands, Josh jumped and did a spin in the air, showing off his mad dance skills!

 

The bride thought that was great, so she jumped and spun around too! Josh was very impressed.

Jonah didn't like the dinner provided, and was soon running around, and it was very hard to keep track of him. at one point he did disapear and my Uncle finally found him downstairs near the giant ungrated fireplace in the Country Club foyer! He kept trying to go back down, but we were finally able to distract him with one of the custom made coloring books provided for all the kids.

They were full of generic wedding drawings and some Beauty and the Beast references (is Thain the Beast?) but also had some pictures that someone had drawn of Anne and Thain themselves! It was pretty cool.

Jonah also had a hard time with meeting Anne for the first time. She was joking around with him that he had to give her a hug or she would tell Uncle Thain, and Jonah thought he was really in trouble! I found him hiding behind a chair about ready to cry because he thought she was mad at him. Poor baby. I explained it to her and I guess she talked to him, because the next time I saw him he was giving her hugs and kisses like she was his best friend.

They had all the fun stuff like cake cutting, flower throwing, and garter tossing (yeah, we didn't do that one at my wedding, just a little too awkward for me). Elora and Josh loved being right in the action during the cake stuff:

I was feeding the baby when they were doing the bouquet and related activities, so I had Joseph take some pictures. When I came to see them later, I saw he'd had it on video the whole time! But because he hadn't realized it, there were a bunch of short random videos, including several of his feet and hands. Luckily, my camera does make a still photo at the beginning of each video (though it's of a lower quality than the other pictures) so we did get some shots of everything.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

All the girls ran away from the bouquet, which seems to be the usual practice these days, and Elora picked it up off the floor so she got to take it home.

At the end, the couple left via the elevator, instead of the nice staircase down to the first level. My mom, Kiera  and I went down to see them leave, and we all found it odd that not only did the bride's family not come down, but there was no kind of send off either, like bubbles or rice or something. Granted, we didn't have that at mine either, but at least you'd think everyone who was left would come out to say goodbye? At least we were there!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here's to a great Eternity together! Yay.