The Wedding Part 1

***WARNING*** I am indulging myself in the memories of last year. If you can't make it through the entire post, that's okay. I am breaking it up a little bit. :)
Before Kent and I got engaged, we had talked about getting hitched on the beach. His mom had a beach wedding the year before, and we thought that it would be perfect for us. I decided that I didn't want to do it behind a condo. I wanted to rent a house that we could do everything at so it would be a little more personal and not a bunch of random strangers standing on their balconies staring at us. I ended up finding a house for rent by the owner that was one house back from beachfront. It was located in Fort Morgan and since it was the same weekend as the Shrimp Festival, we thought that location would be less crowded. The house directly in front of it was through a company that would not allow weddings there. We just decided that we would do everything from the second house and all of the tables for the reception could be more to the side since beside them was essentially an empty lot. We did however do the actual ceremony smack in front of the first house. It's the beach, not the house, right!?!

We decided on Oct 13th since we wanted to wait until after Labor Day for the rental rates to go down and it was more toward the end of hurricane season. Somehow, Kent found a lyric in a Widespread Panic song that said something like "I woke up on 10-13." Apparently he saw it as a sign. Whatever!!! Anyway, my family had the house directly on the beach and Kent's family had the one right behind it. I basically did everything. From the invitations, to the decorations, party favors, to shopping for most of the food. I am ADD when it comes to what I want and I knew what I wanted and how I wanted it done. Control freak-maybe a little. I had made the drive a couple of times to see the house, order my cake, photographer, flowers, etc. Everything else, we were bringing with us. Heather rode down with me since Kent was going to be late getting out of work and he was riding with his friend who catered our rehearsal dinner. They were going to be traveling with the smoker-BBQ and trailer. When we got to our house, it looked like no one had been there in a couple of months. Dusty, dead flies in the window sill. We won't mention everything, but that was the first disappointment. My mom called the rental company who explained that no one had rented that house in a while and the maid service was suppose to clean before we got there, but apparently hadn't-DUH!! What were we to do though? My wedding was planned for in front of that house so we just had to deal. While the cleaning lady was there, she heard talk of a wedding, told the company who then called me to reprimand me. I informed them that I had spoken with the owner of the house behind ours and everything was going to be centered from that house. They were okay with that, but I was still a little nervous as to whether I was going to get my deposit back. Anyway, the second house was wonderful, nicely decorated, clean, Great!! So Thurs night, my family went to eat at Lulu's. Then Fri morning, Heather and I went and got our nails done. $8 for a french manicure. Cheap and it looked good! Then we had the rehearsal. Everything was great only it was quite windy. We had a feast! BBQ, corn on the cob, potato salad, baked beans, boiled shrimp, key lime cups, banana pudding, ...etc. I am sure I am missing something but it was fabulous! I ate until I was miserable!

I also had most of my BFF from high school there who came to the dinner and hung out for a while afterward. We took some good pics at sunset on the bottom level of the house.

And here's my sis & bro in law. I told you that it was windy. They decided to hoard up by the smoke pit to attempt to warm up.