Looking through Amber and Ryan's wedding pictures gave me just the inspiration I needed to write the entry about the trip we made home to celebrate their wedding in October. Sometimes, keeping up with this blog begins to feel like a drag, but the pictures reminded me just how fun that weekend actually was...
To get home in October, Eric and I took the same early flight out of OKC that we'd taken for our trip home the previous month. This time, however, we decided to spend Thursday night in a hotel in the city so that we didn't have to experience any more 2am wake up calls. I was one of Amber's bridesmaids and had been asked to pick out a black cocktail dress (of my choice) for the wedding. As you might have guessed, there are slim pickins for black cocktail dresses in Altus, and by that Thursday night, I still had not found a dress...nor had I looked. Eric picked me up after work in Lawton on Thursday, and we drove directly to the mall in OKC for a "please let me find a dress" shopping extravaganza. We power slid into a parking spot exactly 40 minutes before the mall closed its doors for the night. I ran into Macy's and straight to the cocktail dress section. I picked out 4 black dresses. The first three I tried on were disasters, but the fourth was perfect! I left Macy's that night with time to spare. Sometimes I really do have luck on my side. Eric and I had dinner at a micro brewery in the city that night, which was a nice treat. After dinner, we went back to the hotel and tried to get some sleep in preparation for another fun-filled weekend at home.
This time our alarm went off at 5am, and thinking we didn't have to be at the airport until around 5:45 for our 6:45 flight, we got ready at a leisurely pace. Our hotel was right next to the airport (and remember, it is a small airport). At 5:40, we were loading the car and checking out of the hotel, when I realized it was actually at 6:30 flight and that we were already supposed to be at the airport. Eric panicked. He pulled out of the hotel parking lot and turned the wrong way down a one way street. Then, instead of pulling into long-term parking, he pulled into rental car return. At this point it was 10 till 6. He jumped out of the car with the bag and ran to check in. I jumped into the drivers seat on a mission to get the heck out of rental car return and find parking. Once I finally made it to the parking garage, I had to drive all the way up to the 5th floor to find a spot. This doesn't sound difficult, but I was behind a car going 2 mph the entire way. I ran from the parking garage to the terminal where I met up with Eric. We then discovered that, for the first time in our history of flying out of Will Rogers, there was a long line to get through security. By this point, I was sweating profusely and we were both feeling quite anxious. As we went through security, we could hear our names being paged from the gate. We begged some fellow travelers to let us pass, and they graciously obliged. We were the last two passengers to get on the plane. Eric requested I make the following admission: All of the above was my (Ninoosh's) fault, because I am the one who got the time of our flight confused to begin with.
Good thing we got that hotel room to avoid the stress of the the trip to the airport...
My mom greeted us at BWI and took us home where we found my dad heating up leftover Persian food for a noonday feast. Welcome homes don't really get better than that. We had a little time to visit before we had to get to the rehearsal for the wedding of the weekend.
Amber and Ryan got married on the grounds of the Crofton Country Club, which was where we met for the rehearsal. This was the first of a lot of time we got to spend with our friends that weekend. The rehearsal went smoothly and we made our way to the home of a friend of Amber's family, who hosted the rehearsal dinner. A friend of Ryan's family was the chef of the delicious dinner we ate there. That night, Amber and all the girls went back to Ryan's dad and stepmom's house to spend the night. They went out of their way to make us comfortable. We were treated to neverending snacks and many other creature comforts. The girls stayed up for a while snacking and chatting. Those of us who have been through "the night before the wedding" jitters as the bride to be, did our best to encourage Amber to enjoy the ride and let the small things go. She said she was nervous, but she appeared every bit as happy and relaxed to the rest of us.
The morning of the wedding, we started getting ready pretty early. Amber's hair and makeup people came to the house to help us get pretty. We sipped mimosas, chatted, and had snacks. The day went off without a hitch, and before we knew it, the limo was waiting in the driveway to take us to the ceremony.
During the few hours after the ceremony we jumped through the wedding hoops: we took pictures, did the entry of the bridal party, enjoyed some lovely toasts (which included a very touching video toast from Ryan's brother-in-law who was deployed), and chowed down on dinner. Then, the party got started. The dance floor was packed and the deejay kept the party rocking. As is typical of awesome weddings, the time flew by and we were being kicked out of the venue before any of us were ready. Luckily though, Eric & Kelley lifted all our spirits with an impeccable rendition of Gangnam Style. After that treat, we scrambled to figure out a way to keep the party going. We piled into vans and headed to downtown Annapolis to our favorite post-wedding hot spot, Fado.
There really aren't words for the type of partying that went down at Fado's that night; only pictures. Unfortunately, I am not willing to post most of the pictures, so you are just going to have to use your imagination on this one. But trust me, fun times were had, indeed. Here are the few that passed inspection...barely...
We have a slogan (a vow, if you will) among our group of friends that we use when we plan to have a really kick a** time together, "up all night!" Usually what happens when we plan a night of epic proportions worthy of "up all night!" is that we fall asleep early and lament what went wrong the next morning. On this particular night; however, a handful of us really were UP ALL NIGHT. The best part of all was that the handful included our party-hardy bride & groom.
After we got the boot at Fado circa 2am, that handful of us piled into cabs and directed the drivers to our favorite late-night dive...the Double T Diner. Can I get a what, what? There, we ate far too much and partook in what was very likely loud and inappropriate conversation. Luckily, all around us were the rest of the 4am crowd, so they didn't seem to mind too much. Either that or we didn't notice. We finally made our way back to the hotel around 5am. You're welcome to the cab driver we entertained along the way. Amber and Ryan went their way, Teri, Matt, Meg, Eric and I went ours. Sleep was welcome, but over far too soon. Before we knew it, we in the parking lot saying our goodbyes, but this time we were not lamenting our "up all night!" failures or mourning the loss of our ability to party. Instead, we slapping high-fives and recounting tales of our general awesomeness. We still got it, folks!
Eric and I drove directly to Wendy's to partake in our requisite post-party spicy chicken sandwiches. We had just sat down when our phone rang. It was our party-hardy bride & groom. Somehow, in all the chaos of rides to and from receptions, after party, and after-after party, they had ended up at the hotel without a ride away from the hotel. Eric and I went back to retrieve them and take them to the last place they'd seen their car.
I'd call that a wedding success. Well done, you two! And a life full of happiness!
The rest of the weekend was pretty awesome as well. Eric's mom & dad hosted a crab feast where we got to visit with a lot of family we hadn't seen in quite some time. We even got to visit with Kelly and Mason because Kelly was in town that same weekend for her high school reunion! What are the chances? We thoroughly enjoyed visiting and catching up, but it reminded us of how much we miss doing that on a regular basis. We spent that Sunday night at my mom & dad's house where we squeezed in one more Persian meal. Eric and I slept with full bellies and happy hearts that night!
On Monday morning, we flew back to OKC, and then made the trek back to good ole' Altus. Home sweet home and another weekend for the memory books. We are so fortunate to have been able to go back so many times for all our dear friends' weddings. We will never take that for granted. Peace & love.
Annnnnnd, I'm all caught up! <pause> NOT.
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