Love Under the Moon: First Tears

I'm sorry if it seems like I am dragging this out a bit. I know you guys probably want me to get to the good stuff (and I promise, we will get there soon!), but I really feel that this particular part of the night deserves its own post. It was an incredibly emotional moment for many of us and it really changed the course of the weekend.

After we handed out most of the gifts I turned to give my father his gift. As soon as he slid the box out of the bag he was overwhelmed. He started laughing and yelling, "No. No way!" I started giggling and grinning like a fool, insisting that he open the box. There was silence in the room as his eyes perused the bottle and finally landed on the engraving.

Now, my father is an incredibly strong man. He is smart, he is funny and he is kind. He is many, many things, but overly emotional is not one of them. So even though I had given him an emotionally-charged gift I was completely floored when tears began pooling in his eyes. I could not believe that my gift (or more likely my impending marriage) had affected him so.

His reaction sent me over the edge and soon we were two pathetic, blubbering fools bawling and hugging and bawling and hugging while everyone else looked on in shock -- those who know my father know he is not one for such displays. Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you look at it) I don't have any photos of this exchange, but we did manage to snap a few photos post-tears.

We hadn't told anyone except my mother about the very special gift I had picked out for my father so anyone not close enough to see the writing on the bottle did not quite understand what was going on. In fact, our friends later joked that they appreciated the fact that my gift was a very nice bottle of booze, but was it really worth crying over?! Of course, once I showed off the engraving they teared up a bit too.

These were the first of many tears that weekend. Some were happy tears, some were not-so-happy tears, but it seemed very fitting that the first ones were shared with the first man I loved.

Miss a recap?

• I babble about being married and share our wedding video.
• We finish up some last-minute wedding tasks and I have complete breakdown.
• Pre-wedding jitters set in the day before the wedding.
• We practice getting married and then chow down at our rehearsal dinner.

Love Under the Moon: We Practice

Well hello there Hive! Sorry for the brief respite -- apparently married life isn't any less chaotic than engaged life. I could give you a long list of excuses, but I know you don't want to hear about any of that. You just want to hear about our rehearsal. Right?! Right!

When I arrived at Franklin Plaza for our rehearsal a few members of our wedding party were already milling about, looking clueless.

I knew in advance that our officiant would not be able to attend our rehearsal, so I was a bit nervous about how everything was going to play out. Honestly, my worries were for naught; Joe, our venue coordinator, has been in the wedding biz for a long time and was fantastic at corralling everyone into the right place. We only did the run-through once so the actual rehearsal portion was probably about 10 minutes tops.

 Oh, what a motley crew we were!

Joe did a great job of being our fake officiant.

And now we're fake married! Woo hoo!

We spent the next twenty odd minutes tying up loose ends and answering some last minute logistical questions. What reserved seats did we need? What time were we coming over for family portraits before the ceremony? Where did we want the programs to be? There were so many tiny little details to go over that I hadn't even thought about!

We finished up around 4:30 (way earlier than I thought) and decided to just crash our rehearsal dinner a little early. Remember that time I told you guys about the shady looking restaurant near our venue? Yea, about that. A few weeks after I wrote that post my family and I decided to grab dinner there to see what this place was all about. And I'm here to tell you not to judge a book by its cover! Our dinner that night was hands down one of the best meals I've had in a loooong time and the service was wonderful. Needless to say, we booked right away (although I still think they should really consider cleaning up their storefront!).

Anywho, while our friends and family headed to Lo Porto's, Mr. Coyote and I bopped over to the hotel to pick up all the wedding party gifts. It took us a bit longer than I thought to pack up the car and unload everything, but it filled my heart with joy to walk into the room to see my closest friends and family gathered together to celebrate us.

I didn't have much time to dwell on this (which is probably a good thing!) as Mr. Coyote and I were quickly ushered into the room. We dug into dinner (which was FANtastic) and once everyone had seconds (and thirds!) Mr. Coyote and I stood up to address the room. We thanked everyone near and far for their support not only during our engagement, but throughout our seven years together. Then we asked them to give us a few moments of their time before digging into dessert so we could share our gifts with them.

Married bees, where you surprised by how quickly you ran through your rehearsal?

 Miss a recap?

•  I babble about being married and share our wedding video.
• We finish up some last minute wedding tasks and I have complete breakdown.
• Pre-wedding jitters set in the day before the wedding.

Love Under the Moon: It's Go Time!

I woke up Friday morning with adrenaline coursing through my body. Pre-wedding jitters had officially kicked in and I was ready to go-go-go. I packed up all my things since I was staying at the hotel for the next two nights and then leaving directly for Westchester on Sunday morning. It was a strange feeling leaving my parents' house that morning. Even though I technically hadn't lived there since I was 18 it was still very surreal knowing that the next time I walked through the door I would be a married lady.

The rehearsal wasn't until 4 PM so everyone split up. Momma Coyote, MOH D and I had to pick up a few things and then had an appointment for mani-pedis. Mr. Coyote was in charge of checking into the hotel and transporting the gifts for our wedding party as well as some last minute items like our guestbook, wine box and marriage certificate. Then he was meeting our out-of-town groomsmen so they could pick up their tuxedos.

All day I was on high alert. I was certain that whatever went wrong that day was going to be a sign of things to come. I was so worried about forgetting something or being late that I just could not relax. Instead of just enjoying the moment I was constantly checking the clock and thinking about the next thing that needed to be done. After a while I'm pretty sure my attitude started to rub off on my companions (sorry Mom!).

After all that worrying we did in fact make it to the hotel with plenty of time to get ready – meanwhile Mr. Coyote and the guys were still at the tux shop! After Thursday's shenanigans I kinda saw this coming, but there was nothing that could be done. The guys arrived back at the hotel around 3:45 which would have been perfect... If everyone was dressed. Instead, all the guys scurried back to their hotel rooms to change while the handful of people who were ready headed across the street to Franklin Plaza. Ready or not, it was time to start our rehearsal.

Unfortunately I don't have any photos of this part of the day because I was too wigged out to break out the camera... That was going to slow us down! Fortunately, I did manage to relax enough to snap some photos during the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner, so stick with me!

Miss a recap?

•  I babble about being married and share our wedding video.
• We finish up some last minute wedding tasks and I have complete breakdown.

Love Under the Moon: Chaos Ensues

The week before our wedding was complete insanity. It all started Tuesday night when we loaded up the car and prepared for our three hour trip upstate. Mr. Coyote was having unexplainable back pains, I hadn't slept in two days due to nerves and we left way later than expected. We spent most of the car ride arguing over things that I can't even remember now and didn't get to my parents' house until 1 AM. Ouch. On Wednesday we were still a bit huffy with each other, but there was no time for bickering. I had a dentist appointment and we still had to purchase the gifts for our wedding party. In between all that we also managed to squeeze in our first (and only) dance lesson!

Honestly, the day wasn't too crazy and the dance lesson helped loosen us up and forget about our early arguments. But our to-do list for Thursday kept growing and I was starting to feel the pressure. I was looking forward to getting everything over with early in the day so I could relax in the afternoon with Mr. Coyote and MOH D.

Right. Thursday morning we headed out to pick up our marriage license. Also a disaster. The woman entered everything into the computer sooooo slooooowly and messed up the form like three times and had to start allllll over again. It was excruciating.

No, seriously. Are we done here yet?!

We finally finished up and booked it to the tux shop so Mr. Coyote could pick up his tux. I didn't really start to freak out until about halfway through the tux appointment. What I thought was going to be a 30 minute fitting turned into an hour and a half ordeal. While I appreciate that they were so thorough with us I still do not understand what the fuck they were doing back there. Did they sew him an entirely new tuxedo?! To this day, I am not completely sure what happened. All I know is that we were way behind whatever arbitrary schedule I made up in my head and had reached my limit for the day.

And that was when Mr. Coyote informed me that he had no clothes for the honeymoon. Now, I know my darling husband is a procrastinator. Most of the time it is quite endearing and I just roll my eyes at him like any loving wife would do. But seriously?! It was two days before the wedding and my patience was spent. I wanted to be at home, relaxing and basking in my last few days as a bride. (Spoiler alert: That didn't happen.)

Instead we spent the next two hours clothes shopping for Mr. Coyote. Meanwhile my maid of honor (who was oblivious to the chaos that was my life) was texting me every half hour asking why I wasn't hanging out in the pool with her. And with every text that came in I became more and more stressed out and eventually took it all out on Mr. Coyote because ALL I WANTED TO DO WAS HANG OUT IN THE POOL WITH MY MAID OF HONOR BUT MY FUTURE HUSBAND WAS A FREAKIN' TOOLFACE WHO DECIDED TO GO CLOTHES SHOPPING TWO DAYS BEFORE HIS WEDDING.

Deep breaths.

Eventually I ate a sandwich and calmed the eff down. Mr. Coyote purchased an entirely new wardrobe, we finished wrapping all of the wedding party gifts and I poured myself glass of wine. Actually it was more like five glasses of wine, but it's okay because my maid of honor came over, my brother acted like a complete idiot to cheer me up (or because he was also drunk. I'm really not sure. Let's just go with the first one.) and all was right with the world.

He's special.

Were the days leading up to your wedding super stressful? Did you fight with your fiance over stupid things like clothes shopping and tuxedo fittings a few days before your wedding?

Miss a recap?

• I babble about being married and share our wedding video.

Love Under the Moon: The Coyote Wedding

Last week Mr. Coyote and I celebrated our one month anniversary as a married couple. It's hard to believe that just over a month ago we stood up in front of all our friends and family to proclaim our love for each other and commitment to one another. It was hands down the happiest and most beautiful day of my life (so far!).

Photo by Upstate Photographers

In the past month the question I have fielded most often is, "Do you feel any different?" and my immediate answer is always no. After all, we have been dating for seven years and living together for five years. Our routine is the same, our apartment is the same, and our lives were already intertwined in such an intimate way. What could possibly be different?

(Guest Photo) / Yep, we are still this goofy.

But then somewhere between the honeymoon and the thank you notes and the boxes of wedding gifts I stopped and realized that I do feel different. And although I have always prided myself on my writing I find that words escape me when I try to describe exactly what it is that is different. It is a feeling. A feeling like I have never experienced before. I honestly did not believe that after seven years I could love or care for Mr. Coyote any deeper than I already did. But I do. I feel stronger, happier and more committed to Mr. Coyote than I ever did before. I know that I am getting all mushy on you guys and starting to ramble, so I am just going to wrap this up by saying that being married is friggin' awesome!!

 Photo by Upstate Photographers / Soooo awesome!

Now that that's out of the way, I would like to start off the Coyote recaps with our beautiful highlights video. A video that shows the emotions of the day better than any words could possibly describe and STILL makes me bawl every time I watch it:

Cristina & Jason, Marry Me from Dennis R Shaw, Shaw Video Prod on Vimeo.

Alright you guys... Let's do this thing!