Anniversary Weekend

As you may have guessed (from Friday's and yesterday's post) this weekend was my and Joe's one year anniversary. It is weird to think that it has already been a year since we got married. It's even weirder to think that we are no longer newlyweds. Just an old married couple now :)

To celebrate, we spent the weekend at Joe's parent's place at the Lake of the Ozarks. While I know that doesn't sound all that romantic, the Lake of the Ozarks is very nice and a lot of fun, and it was nice to have a weekend away, just the two of us.

Lake of the Ozarks

Considering that the Lake of the Ozarks is somewhat of a resort region during the summer, with people from Kansas City and St. Louis flocking there during the weekends, a lot of places aren't open until after Memorial  Day. That would include the nearby pool, and, sadly, our favorite restaurant down there, the Blue Heron. The Blue Heron is known for their Fried Lobster (delicious) and has some of the best Lobster Bisque I've ever had. Since we couldn't go there, Saturday night we went to another incredible restaurant down the street, Bentley's.

I wore my rehearsal dinner dress that night, but there was one problem. It was also prom night. So basically, there were other girls wearing sparkly dresses at Bentley's, and they were all in high school. I all of a sudden felt self conscious that others would think that I too was going to prom. But, we ordered a bottle of wine, and I got over it.

For dinner, I ordered the Lobster and Filet. Because why not.

Most of their dessert items included alcohol. Joe ordered a sundae topped with Baileys, and I ordered this milkshake made out of dark chocolate and Amaretto, called the "Brown Betsy". I now prefer my milkshakes spiked.

The next morning, we made our way back to Kansas City. Since it was also Mother's Day, we celebrated with the family Joe's mom and the other mothers, his sisters Stacy, Angie, and sister in law Rebecca at Garozzo's. In my opinion, Garozzo's is the best restaurant in Kansas City. Since I had been eating so decadently all weekend, I decided to forgo having my favorite dish at Garozzo's, the Tortellini Gina, as my main meal and just had a smaller portion of it as a side. Talk about self control :)

That night, we broke out our wedding toasting flutes...

and the top of our wedding cake that we managed to save. For anyone who doesn't know, it is tradition to save the top of your wedding cake, freeze it, and then eat it on your one year anniversary. I will admit, the cake was actually still very good, but I did have a hard time getting over the fact that I was eating one year old cake. In any event, the cake was small and we did manage to finish it.

The perfect end to a perfect weekend :)

One year

One year ago today I married the most amazing man. My best friend. Someone who I feel makes me a better person. Someone who even my friends and family noticed helped me become myself again after a couple of very hard years for my family. I love him so much, and am so excited for our life ahead of us. 

In honor of Joe and my 1 year anniversary, I thought I'd share some of my favorite memories from our wedding weekend. This is going to be a long one.

(1) The family bbq my sister threw for us, complete with a cake featuring the character I dressed up as everyday from age 3-5, and I used to tell people I was...

(2) My bridesmaids tea at The St. Paul Hotel with some amazing women. By the way, in case you can't tell, my sister was super pregnant with those twins I talk about all the time.

(3) My rehearsal dinner. And, most importantly, my rehearsal dinner dress :)

(4) Spending the night with some of my bridesmaids the night before the wedding.

(5) I had a lot of help from friends and family. My sister-in-law Angie did my makeup, my friend Jeana decorated my shoes, my cousin Cortney did my cake, and my mom helped out in a lot of ways. I am so lucky.

Graddy Photography

(6) I wore the necklace my mom wore when she got married.

Graddy Photography

(7) I was adamant about not seeing Joe before the wedding. At one point before the wedding, Joe and the boys walked by the windows of where we were waiting while they were taking pictures. My bridesmaids and mom leaped into action. My mom ran to the windows and closed all the shades, and my bridesmaids all made a wall in front of me so that we wouldn't see each other. It was hilarious. Low and behold, they were one sided windows, so Joe wouldn't have been able to see me anyway...

(8) Joe's reaction when I was coming down the aisle. The kind a girl dreams of.

Graddy Photography

(9) My dad was also emotional. I walked down the aisle to "The Girl With The Flaxen Hair" because my dad always said the song reminded him of me.

Graddy Photography

Graddy Photography

(10) Unlike the boys, I did not cry, and instead was smiling like a crazy person.

Graddy Photography

(11) We had the cutest flower girl and ring bearer. While I was waiting to come down the aisle, I was wondering why it was taking so long for the music to change. Found out they both took the direction "walk down the aisle slowly" very seriously. I guess my ring bearer also argued with the best man that he was forgetting some twine at the bottom of his ring box. Wish I could have heard that conversation.

Graddy Photography

(12) When I was little, I got to walk down the aisle with my sister and a few of my cousins and my cousin Joel's wedding. We weren't the official flower girls, but we still felt like part of the wedding. Because both Joe and I have a number of girls in our wedding that we wanted to involve somehow, we stole Joel and Joanne's idea and had the girl's (including Joel and Joanne's daughter) walk down the aisle at our wedding as "junior flower girls".

Graddy Photography

(13) Our wedding site (we had the ceremony at the same place as the reception) handed out champagne for the adults and sparkling grape juice for the kids. The girls really enjoyed it.

Graddy Photography

Graddy Photography

(14) My cousin, Cortney, did our wedding cake and grooms cake out of the kitchen at the hotel everyone was staying at. She had to do so because she works out of Nebraska. They turned out incredible.

Groom's Cake (Graddy Photography)

Graddy Photography

(15) Like I mentioned above, I was obsessed with "The Little Mermaid" when I was little. The DJ at one point played "Kiss the Girl", and, when me and Joe were slow dancing, our friends started dancing around us like the animals in the movie. While I think the drinks they were consuming had something to do with this, I absolutely loved it.

(16) This one I don't have a picture of, but apparently while the ceremony was going on, there was a rainbow. I like to think it was my brother, Eric, who died a few years ago, showing us that he was there. If anyone has any pictures of it, I really would appreciate it if you sent them to me.

Graddy Photography

(17) And, of course, the best part, marrying Joe.

Graddy Photography

And in case you haven't had enough, here are some more wedding pictures.

Graddy Photography

Graddy Photography

Graddy Photography

Graddy Photography

Graddy Phtography. Flowers by Ashley Fox Designs

Graddy Photography

Graddy Photography

Graddy Photography

Graddy Photography

Making sure the ring bearer makes it to pictures

Graddy Photography

Graddy Photography

Graddy Photography

Graddy Photography

Graddy Photography

Our ring bearer crashed the father daughter dance

Graddy Photography

Graddy Photography

Credits: 

Ceremony and Reception site: Carlson Center Rotunda, Photography: Graddy Photography, Cakes: Cortney Kotzien of Jones Bros. Cupcakes in Omaha NE, Makeup: Angie Vesey of Hollyday Salon in Kansas City MO. Flowers: Ashley Fox Designs, Hair: Emily J. Hair and Makeup, Dress: Priscilla of Boston, Bridesmaids Dresses: Posh Bridal, Rehearsal Dinner Dress: Alice and Olivia

Friday Favorites

(1) I learned on Bar Rescue (great show) that you stir martinis instead of shake them. I guess that is part of what made James Bond so rebellious.

(2) Celebrated Cinco De Mayo with some strawberry margaritas and Mexican food.

(3) Watched "Queen of Versailles" on Bravo last weekend. It is a documentary following an incredibly rich family who was building the largest home in America until the crash of 2008 in which they lost a lot of money. But, really, were still very rich. Very interesting, and one of those movies you can't stop watching no matter how much you want to.

(4) I tried a juicing cleanse. Well kinda. I used my juicer for the first time and had juice every morning for breakfast and most dinners. I like to think of it as a juice cleanse lite.

(5) I joined a new gym last week. It reminds me of my old one in Minneapolis that I LOVED, complete with an outside pool that has drink service for when it finally gets warm. Also so happy to have a steam room to go to. Oh, and I guess you work out there too....

(6) Going to the Lake of the Ozarks for our anniversary this weekend (a truly romantic destination right? :))! I figured since it was our anniversary, I could pack the big suitcase for the weekend and Joe couldn't say anything...

Have a good weekend!