The Wedding Post

Guess what arrived this weekend?? The wedding photos!!!!! All 1800 of them. Safe to say I spent half of my Saturday oogling at them. I'm so, so pleased at how they came out and I feel like I got to relive the whole wonderful day all over again.

Getting Ready

Wedding Choos!

My beautiful sister

First Look & Bridal Party

Mike and I opted to see each other before the ceremony in order to save ourselves from too many photos during cocktail hour.

Who's that handsome fellow?

I went with my instincts for the bridal party and picked black. Boring maybe, but I'm so happy I went with something I knew I wouldn't get tired with by the time the wedding rolled around. I think everyone looked pretty sharp!

Ceremony

We had a self-uniting ceremony, which means that we didn't need to have a priest or judge or any sort of official there to marry us. My aunt kindly agreed to be the "MC" and we wrote the entire ceremony ourselves from scratch. We picked out three readings that were special to us (The Romance by Shel Silverstein, the Apache Wedding Blessing, and selection from The Velveteen Rabbit) and also wrote our own vows. I was extremely nervous about my vows and I sobbed through the whole thing, but I would have totally regretted not doing them. Best decision ever.

I walked down the aisle to "Lovesong" by Adele. It had a little caribbean feel, which matched the perfectly sunny, cool weather

Cried like a baby through the whole thing

Groom's family

My family

Reception

We had our reception at the same location as the ceremony. It was a historic mansion that I fell in love with the moment I first saw it. The best part about the venue is that it was so beautiful that we didn't need to add a lot of details to make it special (which was a lot less stressful for me!)

I made the table numbers myself and I think they turned out pretty decent. Since most of our 100 guests came from DC or NY we decided to name the tables after popular Philadelphia streets. My aunt (the same one who was our ceremony MC) did all of the flowers. She is amazing!



The flower of the cake was meant to reflect the one on my dress and I picked square tiers to match my engagement ring, which is square as well.

For the actual dinner and dancing we moved into the Conservatory. It felt like we were playing Clue without the whole murder thing.

First dance to "La Vie en Rose" by Louis Armstrong (aka WALL-E, the best movie ever)

He asked for it...seriously he did

He got me back when he kissed me and rubbed his cake face all over my cheek. Touche sir.

We snuck out of the reception at sunset to grab some good photos

There are at least 10 photos of my hovering over the dessert table with this face. Don't mess with the bride's dessert!

Dance Party

I'm sure I'm a little biased, but this was seriously the best dance party I'd ever been too.

And the suit begins to unravel

I wish I could relive the day over and over again!

The Honeymoon Post

Be prepared for the longest picture post ever. You've been warned!

Our Costa Rican Honeymoon

Around the resort and beach:

Beach at our resort in Guanacaste, on the Pacific side of the country

So ready to get in that water!

View from hotel

Hotel bar/pool

Mmm rainforest water

If you got tired of water, chilled coconuts were readily available

The sunsets were among the best I've seen

The last three days of the trip we ran on the beach. Super humid, but super pretty!

Hiking at Rincon de la Vieja National Park:

The rainforests are full of mysterious looking trees....and massive flying/crawling bugs

Costa Rica has over 100 volcanos. At Rincon there were many places where you could see steam coming straight from the ground

We were trying to get to a waterfall, but we took a wrong turn and ended up hiking 2km straight up the mountain

Totally worth the arduous climb. Freaking awesome

Monteverde Cloud Forest:

Tip #1: Get four-wheel drive if you rent a car (the roads are awful!).
Tip #2: If you drive to Monteverde and you are scared of heights I don't recommend looking out the window on the drive up!

We took a guided walk through the Cloud Forest on some very shaky hanging bridges

After the hike we went zip lining over the forest. I don't have pics, but it was the best part of the trip!!!

We saw a variety of wildlife including these flashy guys

Arenal and La Fortuna:

After visiting the Cloud Forest we drove straight to La Fortuna where we got a hotel and woke up early the next morning for a hike

La Fortuna is the closest town to the Arenal Volcano, the 3rd most active in the world (and well known for it's iconic volcano shape!). It literally towers over the town.

We hiked through Arenal National Park and got to see some of the old 1968 eruption lava flows (PS. walking sticks make ALL the difference!)

Mike conquers old lava flows

That's one big ol' butt of a volcano!

La Fortuna is so volcano crazed that they even theme their rice

After our hike we headed to Lake Arenal next to the volcano for some kayaking

That volcano is really bad at hiding

You know what feels good after an hour of kayaking on the lake? Jumping in the lake!

Sunset Cruise:

Our last night we headed out for a sunset cruise on the Pacific

Waiting for the boat to pick us up

It was a seriously awesome honeymoon, with the perfect mix of hiking and adventure, water sports, and just laying around the beach and pool. I hope to return to Costa Rica again one day!