Trish and Brock's wedding

On Friday September 28th in an intimate wedding in the shell of their under construction house, Trish and Brock were married.  All of the energy and cooperation that went into every detail, from last minute construction, to decoration, to flowers, to food, to the hundreds of things that are invisible but make an event happen, to each part of the ceremony itself, spoke entirely of one thing: LOVE.

 

Trish and Brock are two people who exude love and caring for each other and their families and their wedding week and the wedding itself were a certain celebration of who they are individually and as a couple.  It was an exhausting honor to be a part of their circle to make it all happen.



Patti and Dwight



Trish and Dwight

 

 

 

Trish and her nieces and nephew

 



My beautiful girls



sisters



Kristi, Michael, Brevan and Makenna

 

Trish and Patti



FAMILY

 



The bride and groom with Brock's family

 

 

It turns out that the flower girls are really the jesters of the the wedding.  These two were all business as they headed up the aisle and they weren't taking any chances with the honor bestowed upon them.  They were rationing the petals like their future depended on it until we told them to go ahead and toss them all on the runner.  Maya started chucking fist fulls much to Makenna's dismay.  She bent right down and collected each and every one of Maya's haphazardly thrown petals and placed it carefully back on the runner.  

In fact, she was so tuckered out she had to take a nap during the ceremony.  Maya kept coming and sitting on my lap and whisper yelling, "WHEN ARE WE GOING TO HAVE THE CAKE?"



I truly don't think I've ever seen such a happy bride.

 

Trish and Brock not only wrote their own vows, they wrote a sort of ode to each other.  Each one filled a page full of love, dedication, history, future and promise.  As they read them aloud to each other, in a deliberate and present manner, I was so touched by the intimacy of their ceremony.  I have never seen a wedding that was so honest and full of real, rather than story-book love.   Their relationship is a gift:  they have been through enough to be certain of their solidarity and to face the world as a team, working together for their common good.  They don't just love each other.  They have created a life togther, one they work to nuture and care for. 

 

 

The small size of the wedding itself was rivaled the night after as we scrambled to pull together the reception for 180 people.  It was astonishing how the house was made into a sweet, romantic venue for a wedding reception.  There weren't any great pictures of it, but the tables were decorated with drift wood that held small floral arrangements.  Kristi's genius.

 

 

 

 

Patti, the amazing, built this mason jar chandelier.  Trish had taken a shine to the one in the remake movie "Footloose" and set her mom to the challenge.  AMAZING. 

 



The flower girls just chillin'

 

Tricia's friend, Donna, took all the pictures (over 1000 in all!) and she graciously let me put them on the blog.  If you find yourself in need of a photographer her number is (207) 570-5662.   She's incredible.

 

 

Patti somehow had the role of catering for the crowd and she created a menu that could put any restaurant out of business: lobster, chicken, honey glazed carrots, steamed corn, homemade yeast rolls along with pasta and potato salad.  Oh and she made 200 homemade needhams.  Brock's mom Dixie and his Aunt Dale made over 150 pumpkin chocolate chip and 100 molasses cookies and something like 5 buckets of potato and pasta salad (we think this means 50 pounds of potato and pasta salad but that seems ridiculous.  Or awesome.)   Dixie and Dale had peeled 50 pounds of potatoes from Brock's Godfather's farm for the potato salad. The cooks had planned on 200 people and no one was going to go hungry.

 

Patti had a plan to cook everything in roasters all afternoon to have it ready by 5 p.m.  However, the electrical having just been hooked up a few days prior, the kinks weren't all worked out.  I am not up on the language of watts and fuses, but suffice it to say that every time she turned a roaster on, the electricity went out.  Patti ended up having to cook 30 pounds of carrots and 30 pounds of corn in giant lobster cooking pots on the outdoor propane stove.  That is a downeaster for you.   And she served dinner at 5:05.  For real.

 

Patti had ordered these snazzy aprons for us to serve in:

 

 

Working the buffet line was the perfect job for me because I got to see/meet everyone- a task that would have been impossible to achieve any other way.  Although I got stuck serving chicken somehow.

Sandi, Brock, Brock's Aunt Dale and his mom Dixie serving the guests

Me and my favorite father-in-love.

My family was invited and we had such fun!

After dinner and the lovely toasts, it was time for the bouquet toss.  Trish has a friend, Brittany, who is like a little sister to her.  Apparently Brittany would really like to be engaged.  I'm not sure what came over me (I blame it on the vote) but when they called all the "single ladies" to the floor, I went up and hunkered down into a squat with my arms up ready to catch that thing.  I have never gone up for a bouquet toss before and I was the grade school basketball player who begged her coach not to put her in the game.  Yet suddenly I knew I was going to get that thing NO MATTER WHAT.  I told Brittany, "No hard feelings but I'm catching that thing."  I knew I would clean her out if I had to. 

Up, up, up it went.  Right into my hands.  Donna snapped the action.  There is Brittany in the left hand corner giving it her all.  (Trish admitted she threw it high knowing I could catch it.)

I was SO proud of myself for catching it (I mean, I have zero successful sports background) that I went and sat smugly in the chair next to Sandi swinging my prize.  Then the garter removal started.  I swallowed hard.  DAMN.  I hadn't considered the inevitable result of my catching the bouquet.

The next thing I knew, Sandi was up by Brock with her dad's wallet handing him a $50 bill for the garter. You heard that right.  She PAID for the garter.

It was like a YES on 1 dream come true.

 

 Once the left-wing politcal posturing was over, it was time to dance!

 

Maya had some moves.



Sandi and Noah

 

 

 

And here you have it...the cake.  It wasn't perfect people but I must admit, it looked like a wedding cake. The presses that I was using to make a template for the scroll work was making holes in my drying fondant so I had to freehand the etching.  This is not a good thing if you're me.  In some places it looked like a first grader had done it.  But hey, it was my first one and I couldn't have made it for two more appreciative and relaxed people.  My most proud accomplishment?  The T & B on the third tier.  Trish had wanted initials and I told her I didn't think I could so I was even a little impressed with that.

 

 

 A week to remember.  A night to remember.  A couple to remember. 

 Love you both with all my heart.