Our Wedding Day!!!

All we can say is wow we are SO lucky. On our wedding day, we were blessed with great weather (which in Minnesnowta is never likely), food, music, champagne, friendship and love! We have amazing families and friends that drove, flew, walked and even succombed to riding on a school bus to share our amazing wedding celebration with us. It was by far the best time we have ever had!!! What a party! Thank you! We are also thankful to our friends for knowing how to have a really good time and for not being afraid to DANCE!....... a highlight of the evening........a 40-man dance off in which all of guys beat the high school wedding crashers. I have never seen so many moves in such little time...the worm, the backcrawl, the splits, the slide-through and many more that are pending patent. (We promise to post a video of this soon - thanks Sarah and Borgie!) Although kudos must be given to the the wedding crashers for engaging all in a boisterous rendition of You've Lost That Lovin Feelin.

Our AMAZING wedding photographer, Shawna Noel, was dynamite and kindly put together this slide show of our day. WOW! Check it out:

Wedding Slide Show

Here are some of the less professional, but none the less entertaining photos we have collected:

99 plastic cups on the lawn.....

Winners of the dance contest:

Pete with the bow and arrow on the dance floor.

Blue Moose

On Friday we had our ceremony rehearsal. At one point the doors to the church were blowing open like a horror movie and it was pouring rain. We feared the worst with the tent, but within a half hour it was sunny and all was okay. After the rehearsal dinner, all of our family and friends from DC, UVA, St. John's and St. Ben's and Minnneapolis joined in celebrating with us out on the deck of the Blue Moose in East Grand Forks. It turned into a beautiful night. It is also rumored to have gotten wild after Lou and I had departed to get some rest before the big day........lawn furniture in the hotel pool, riding the statue of the blue moose ........but our friends would never do such things.

Bonzers

On the Thursday before the wedding, many of our friends started rolling into town. As a warm up for the weekend, we went to Bonzers, a germanesque pub in Downtown Grand Forks. Every beverage is served in a goblet (see below). For a meer $2.25 your goblet could be filled with rum and coke or the beer of your choice. Needless to say, it was a late night.

Final Countdown

Before posting any photos of our amazing wedding day, we must first admit that it would not have been possible without the hard work and style of my mom and her best friend Star. Not only did my mom take a week of vacation to help out with the wedding, but Star did too, showing up every morning to weed flowers, set up lights and work wherever needed. We couldn't be more appreciative of all of the sweat that went into the yard, flowers and little details that made it such a perfect day. Thank you! We are also very thankful for my mom's brigade of friends and our own who folded napkins, hung lights and chipped in to help so willingly. It was quite a three-ring circus at times in the tent but it definitely all paid off.



We would also like to give a special shout out to those who risked their lives for the sake of a good, well lit party!

San Francisco Treat

Following Zach's wedding, Passenger Le, Erin, and I set path to SF. We decided to take our time on this lazy Sunday and took the majestic Pacific Highway 1 from Santa Barbara to San Francisco. It was brilliant and definitely one of the three best drives I have ever taken.

We spent a night in Menlo Park with Kamie and John on Sunday night. John made some scrumptious pork chops and salad to cap off our journey. We set off for SF proper the following morning, meeting B-Riv for lunch and roaming around the North part of the city (North Beach, Telegraph Hill, Lombard Street, Fisherman's Wharf, and Chinatown). We met up with Brett and his co-worker for an evening in Oakland watching the A's-Toronto game. Outdoor baseball is amazing, can't wait till the Twins stadium opens!

Trolley Rides:

Chinatown:Coit Tower (from Riv's bedroom window believe it or not):The A's game:

The following day Erin and I woke up and walked to a nearby cafe and had a latte and a pain au chocolait, before we hit the bikes for a top-10 day!

Brett and his roomate graciously borrowed their bikes to us to tour the golden gate bridge. Actually, the GGB was only a small portion of our bike marathon. We biked from North Beach (downtown) across the GGB, and another 15 miles to Tiburon, a quaint seaside fishing town on the other side of the bay. The entire ride was so picturesque and we had such an amazing time, even though Erin and I hadn't biked for years! We ate some terrific mexican on the water, walked around the shops and relaxed in the grass before heading back. We hooked up with Tim Burr that night after dinner with John and Kamie to cap off an amazing vacation!! Thanks to all our friends in SF!!!!