The shower and bachelorette party the night before had served their purpose. To unwind me from the tightly wound ball of bridezilla-ness the past few days had infused within me.
I was relaxed and happy.
The goal of the day was to get as many people and cars together who would be headed up the mountain to haul stuff with them and drop at the designated sites. Our pianist needed to be picked up at the airport and tuxes needed to be picked up too. The wine we had handpicked needed to be hauled up.
I am sure there was more we needed to ensure was up there, but funny how I look back and remember worrying about the cases of wine we had purchased. We had bought the wine in Napa. Had designated two entire trips to Northern California for the sole purpose of buying wine. One, Vargas Girl came out and went with us to Sonoma. The other AB and I spent a rainy weekend in Napa picking out wine and gifts for our bridal party.
Sure you can get wine in Reno. Probably a whole lot cheaper too than what we spent. But even then wine was important to us and we wanted to score some bottles only found in the wineries. (Excuse me while I go giggle about having the time to go drive 3 hours, spend the night somewhere and 3 hours back for the sole purpose of buying hard to find wine... oh those were the days!)
Finally everyone was headed up the mountain, mostly to stay for the next couple days. We were anxious for our rehearsal.
I was worried about everyone arriving... if they didn't practice, would they know how to walk down the aisle??
Some people were touch and go and walked in nearly last minute, thus pushing me back to the brink of bridezilla-ness. But everyone made it to the church, we relaxed and practiced walking.
Our rehearsal with Pastor Larson was great. Exactly what you would expect of a Lutheran pastor... the Lutherans in the crowd will understand that statement. After a few run throughs of how the ceremony would go the next day and we were good to go!
I am pretty sure I thought we needed to practice at least five more times.
We headed down to The Christmas Tree for our rehearsal dinner where we occupied a large section of the restaurant and were offered a choice of steak from the mahogany grill or shrimp (I think). All of our friends and family were there and so in a sense the rehearsal was very much like the wedding reception would be. It was important to us that we include our immediate family and friends as well as their significant others. Ever go to a wedding where the person in the wedding was included in the events and the date was relegated to hanging out in the hotel? We would have chosen a less expensive dinner locale before we let that happen.
We had the adult's table at our rehearsal dinner. My parents and their spouses and AB's parents at the adult table. My grandmother was also at this table.
We offered up our gifts to our bridal party. AB chose flasks for his groomsmen and he was so pleased with them. I picked out items for each of my girls (my sister, my best friend and AB's sister). Funny, I only remember what Vargas Girl's was.
Dinner was over and a few of us (myself, my mom, my stepdad, my grandmother and my pregnant sister and her fiance) were making our way back down the hill for the night in Reno. For some reason AB and I decided to stick with tradition and spend the night before the wedding apart. This is the one thing that when AB looks back on our wedding he regrets, not spending the night before with me.
AB and his guys and their girls were staying up in a condo at the lake.
It seemed like a long drive down the mountain squished in the back of my mom's rental car. We arrived at my house and were met with an obstacle.
Winny.
Winny, our 10 month old dog, had reached her limit and was not going to let anyone in our apartment but me. This posed a small problem since at minimum I had promised some scotch to my stepdad and my future brother in law. This was the first time Winny decided that if AB wasn't there, that it was her duty to protect me in every way possible.
And certainly these strangers coming home with me meant no good whatsoever. It was up to her and only her, to protect me.
Poor dog barked and growled and barked. I finally got the family back and I went in, calmed her down and put her outside and shut the blinds so she couldn't see.
I let everyone in and we enjoyed our scotch.
My grandmother started easing her way onto my bad side by peeking out the window at the dog. Who would then completely freak out. I lived in an apartment and this was not a good thing. Despite my requests to just leave her alone, she persisted in doing this. If you know my grandmother this comes as no real surprise to you. This was just a taste of the things to come the following day with respect to my grandmother, who I really do love very much... but she wasn't very well behaved at my wedding.
After the scotch the family headed down to Circus Circus for the night, I drew a bath and pampered myself.
I called AB for a goodnight and heard the wild rumpus. They were all having a great time at the condo and I was thrilled he was there and enjoying the time with his friends.
And I was exactly where I wanted to be... at home relaxing and getting ready for my wedding the next day.
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