Amanda’s Toast at the Rehearsal Dinner

Like I mentioned yesterday, Amanda channeled Love Actually on us and toasted with words on paper and not her voice.

Her toast was posted in the bridal suite and I have it here for you to read it. It will be even more special when you see it on video.

Enjoy.

Love and Hugs, Lizzie

May 3, 2012– Part III The Rehearsal Dinner and Beyond

I last left you at the rehearsal at Immaculate Conception. Once we finished rehearsing and everyone (kinda) new what they were doing, we all started walking to Le Foret. It was a 2.5 block walk, but I knew it would feel like 3 miles in heels so I slipped on my flips and enjoyed the short walk.

We arrived and dove into the food. I think I actually started the food line as I really, really wanted the gnocci! I had 10 plates of it. It was by far the best thing on the menu (in my humble opinion) and I chose the menu! ha.

I got to hang with some of my favorite peeps…

Around 8:15 pm, doug and I officially kicked off the presentations/speeches with one of our own. We shared the results of the RSVP short answer, true/false and some of the awesome drawings you created for us.

The RSVP Card questionnaire looked like this:

You would not believe some of the awesome responses/pictures/answers to these questions! That presentation was filmed by Bridefilm and I will share it when get the footage.

In the mean time, I will share some of my favorite answers/facts:

-Options for our new last name: Broux, Devlin, Awesomeo, both kinda suck honestly, and Tony Danza.
-A higher percentage of you thought I drafted you over doug. Technically, I could only draft 50% of you, but at least 70% though I drafted them. I have no idea what this implies, but I love it.
-To the question, “what color would doug’s tie be”, the best answer hands down is “pale yellow with holes”. Kenny L, you rock.

Question: What next minor holiday should they celebrate:
-“Groundhogs Day – Doug you be the ground hog and Lizzie says if you can come out of your hole” – most innocently dirty answer ever written.
-There were also lots of answers that had to do with us having a baby. You will see in the video.

Question: What song best describes them?
-I’m sexy and I know it – ??? really? you guys think we think we are sexy? :)
-The Dave Ramsey Theme song
-It’s peanut butter jelly time!
-The Titanic song….ha.
-Anything Bieber

Advice for the newlyweds:
-laugh a lot, don’t be rude, 1 kid max.
-keep our Thursday night volleyball team forever
-drink lots of water. It’s important to stay hydrated
-get more cats. eat good food. don’t eat the cats, that’s just rude.
-if you are going to fight, fight naked
-be fruitful and multiply
-make babies…our country is in desperate need of some good ones.
-Ignore everybody’s advice

And then we shared all the drawings that I blogged about here, but the epic finale was this one:

This was cut from our couples shower invite, wedding invite and wedding inserts! So clever and then we finally figured out why so many of you had babies on the brain! :)

After we presented the answers, the video slide show was played! It was hysterical. Sarah did a fabulous job. I wanted only awkward, terrible pictures to be shown. Why, you might ask? The slide shows at rehearsal dinners are usually of the “cute” stages of the couples life. I have even seen some slide shows where they completely skip the awkward phase (middle school, plus or minus 2 years) like it never existed. I LOVE and embrace that terrible awkward stage. We all went through it! Let’s share it so we can all enjoy it. Like I always say, OWN IT!

When I pitched the idea to Sarah, she absolutely loved it. She just giggled and giggled because she had seen most of my terrible awkward photos. I did tell a few people about the idea and most of them loved it. I have to admit a few of them thought I was crazy, but I went for it. Sarah volunteered to make the slide show and keep it a surprise from me. I gave her all the terrible photos I could find of myself and doug.

She did a great job. Thank you Sarah!

The video from Sarah!

Once we had sufficiently laughed at fat/awkward doug and lizzie, Shawn (the best man) got up and toasted us. When he set up the powerpoint, I had no idea what to expect. Would he show pictures of doug doing crazy photo-shopped things? Terrible pictures of me? None of the above. He gave a very heartfelt toast to Doug and I while showing hilarious photos of animals. They were completely unrelated and awesome. Totally Shawn. It was for that one moment in time Shawn was very sweet and wonderful when it came to the topic of me. Once that night was over, we went back to being sworn mortal enemies…:) Not really…but kinda. heh.

Shawn is an awesome guy and we have a special relationship. The only reason I can write this is because I am SURE he does not read the blog so I can say all the nice things here. He is a great friend to doug and I am very glad he is in our lives. (I also love his wife, Lauren, but that is for a different blog on a different day…)

After Shawn toast, Ashley took the stage with a full on powerpoint! She told the “Geode” story and gave doug is very own geode. He also gave me a geode ring and necklace. We will save the geode story for another post to give it the time and attention it deserves. Ashley, would you be willing to be a guest blogger to tell the geode story? Then Doug and tell his side of the story also!

After Ashley, was Dad. Oh Dad! He is such a great job and showed the most embarrassing photo of me shaving my legs for the first time! He was very sweet and talked a lot about being raised in a veterinary hospital! I have photos of him coming later! Thank you dad for your sweet words and awesome toast!

Next to hop up was Amanda. Anyone who knows Amanda is fully aware that she goes makes most of her decisions with her giant, warm, amazing heart. She is a wonderful friend and she knew she would cry (like the ugly kind) if she had to speak while toasting doug and I. She went Love Actually on us and wrote her toast on small poster boards and had planned to just hold them up. Once she realized how big the room was and how people in the back would not be able to see, she enlisted Ashley to read the signs out loud so everyone would be able to enjoy them.

As soon as she started, she started crying. She gave such a heartfelt toast and shared so much love that I got a little teary eyed. She gave me her cards and we hung them in the bridal suite so I could see them the rest of the weekend. I share the toast on another blog Thank you Ball. She loves us thissssssssss much!

Next up was Courtney! She wrote an awesome poem that I posted a few weeks ago! You can read it here! She was amazing and was rocking some amazing shoes! :) There were so many memories wrapped up in her toast. I loved it even more when she emailed it to me.

Last, but not least was DJ (Doug’s mom). My favorite line from Doug’s mom: “Doug is like a butterfly.” :) She did a great job and so sweet in her toast to us! I regret that I do not have any photos from her speaking yet. They are on they way, but not here yet.

To wrap up the night, I toasted Doug. All I remember saying was, “who knew a nerd could be so hot?” :) Then he toasted me and related to loving me like he loves his old, yellow, holey t-shirts. It sounds crazy, but he worked it. He also mentioned not just marring someone you could live with, but marrying someone you could not live without. He did a great job and I loved it. I can’t wait to watch it again when we get the video!

After the toasts were finished, I started telling people goodbye as they were heading out. It was then that doug reminded me we had not given out the wedding party gifts. I rushed to get them all out as we had already missed two ushers/groomsmen.

We also gave our parents their gifts! I think they really liked them.

Below is the picture of what we had framed and we wrote a little note in the middle saying they could pick their favorite photos from the wedding and put them in the middle.

 

We gave all the groomsmen/ushers and fathers a bow tie and socks. (This is important to the story later). Doug made a special point to tell each guy that the socks and tie were to be worn at the wedding.

As the night wrapped up we took a few more pictures at Le Foret.

notice my geode necklace!

It truly was a fantastic night! We felt so loved and blessed to have such fabulous people in our lives. I could not have been happier (or so I thought!)

So the plan was to go out dancing after the rehearsal dinner. At the end of the rehearsal dinner, I decided I was kind of tired after all of that and really just wanted to chill in the bridal suite with friends and family. So we moved the party (and left over food that Doug and I ate on for days on our mini-moon) to the bridal suite.

We had a blast! Kenny ran to the store and purchased some beer for the party and we just hung out for a few hours. I do not have many photos from the mini-party, only these:
 

As you can imagine, it was pretty awesome. One more thing I want to mention. I got to spend a lot of quality time with Tammy, Brian and Nhung. Tammy and Nhung worked with me in Disney in 2002. Tammy dragged her awesome husband, Brian, to Nola for the wedding and they hung out with us late. I loved getting to actually talk and spend real time with them. Nhung came from California and Brian/Tammy came from Orlando. It was such an honor to have them at the rehearsal dinner, wedding, tea, and other random events!

We finally went to bed very late. It was such a fantastic night! Thank you everyone who helped make it happen, have loved us and supported us and everyone who toasted us. We are so loved and blessed.

Love and Hugs, Lizzie

Man, that was a long one.

May 3, 2012– Part II

Moving right along with the story…

As soon as I dropped by bags in the suite, we got the call that Scott had arrived with the pieces and parts of the centerpieces! Doug and I met Scott in the valet and helped him bring up all the ingredients for the centerpieces to the Royal Room.

(The Royal Room was wedding headquarters. It held all the boxes that were packed at my house. It was also our work room for the wedding.)

On a side note, Scott and I had dreamed/designed these centerpieces while on a ski trip in Colorado. With his engineering brain and my useless brain, we came up with what you are about to see. Scott and I met multiple times at his house. Scott basically did all the hard work while I just helped make it "pretty”. Scott even designed it so the centerpieces would spin veeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeery slowwwwwwwwwwwly.

Scottie’s arrival meant it was time to assemble the four main centerpieces for the wedding. Each centerpiece stood about 10 feet tall by itself. Once it was on the tables, it was quite a bit taller.

Doug, Scott, and I began the assembly. The first one took the longest, but after that we were rolling along. Scott had come to help us during his lunch break on a very busy day of work. He is amazing for just getting away from work that day. Scott left us to head back to work with only one more to assemble. I was less helpful than Scott, but Doug put up with me. :) I definitely used too much wood glue. :)

During this time, Mom and Dad brought over much needed food. We were starving. It was also time for us to go to the rehearsal dinner location to set up the projector, let dad practice, drop off the gifts and check on the space.

We ran up to the suite to grab the boxes and head over to Le Foret Restaurant. Luckily (and on purpose) it was around the corner so it was not a HUGE deal when I realized we had brought over one of the boxes that was not suppose to be there. Poor Doug was sent back to the suite to get the correct box.


The space was/is so pretty! I am glad we got there early because I noticed it was not set up as I requested. The staff, Doug, and I changed the room and added two more tables. It was still not enough seating in my opinion, but it had to do at that point.  When we left, all the gifts were in place, the AV was set up and working and Dad was practicing. :)

Doug and I headed back to the suite to relax and change. Here is our elevator shot!
Once I got to the suite I started putting things away and organizing the room. My hair and makeup expert arrived – Brandi Bederka. She is awesome and I fully recommend her if you ever need hair and makeup.

Once they started doing my hair and makeup, Ashley decided she wanted hers done also. I asked Brandi quietly and she made it happen! Ashley was one lucky lady. Doug and Andrew had some quality time while Ashley and I had our makeup done. It was awesome!

Right on time, Doug and I headed down to the lobby to start walking to the rehearsal. It was set for 6:00 pm and I wanted to be there for 5:45 pm as I know things happen and people are sometimes late. Well, they all proved me wrong. They must know me well as EVERYONE was on time at 5:45 pm. So much so that is shocked the wedding coordinator at Immaculate Conception.

Doug was looking dapper in his new suit and I finally decided on the green dress (I was between this or a blue one.)

When we arrived it was hot! Ms. Patricia turned on the AC at 6:00 pm when she arrived and it cooled off quickly. Everyone was concerned for the wedding the following day, but I think they all relaxed when they realized the AC would be running all day Saturday.

Before we started the rehearsing, we snapped some awesome pictures! As you can tell, people were super impressed with my wedding programs.

This one below is my new favorite! I really like that Shawn is in it! :)

Once it was time to start rehearsing, Ms. Patricia lined up all the girls in the back and put the guys in the front. Dad came and hung out with me in the rear of the church.

Each of the girls practiced walking down the aisle, except me! You know it is bad luck for the bride to walk down the aisle during her rehearsal, right? Well it is. :) (Ha, but so is seeing your groom before the wedding…)

Anyway, Shawn’s mom (yes, the awesome driver of all the alcohol for the wedding) took my place for the long walk down the aisle with my dad. They even practiced the “two steps forward, one step back” routine and found it faulty. I will talk about this “step back” on a later post. At the very end of the aisle, I jumped in to practice.

And so we practiced…

I do remember when we practiced coming from the statue of Mary, I was the closest to all the guys and I low “high fived” all of the groomsmen and ushers as I walked by. I think they were all curious if I would actually do it during the wedding.

When the rehearsal was over, Doug and I walked up to the front of the church and said a prayer to bless our marriage and all of the people who have loved and supported us that were there in the church with us and beyond. Amanda (the unofficial official photographer) took pictures for us.

I can remember being so excited to marry my favorite guy
in the most beautiful church in New Orleans!

What a lucky lady I was/am.
To be continued: The Rehearsal Dinner!
Love and Hugs, Lizzie