As indicated in previous posts, I got married on April 5. Although it was obviously one of the most important events in my life, I haven't written much about it, due to lack of free time. So, here's all the stuff I should have written during the past few weeks.
The Wedding
Pebble and I both wanted a simple wedding. Our first idea was to only invite immediate family. But then we figured we should also invite our neighbors. And if we were inviting the neighbors, we should also invite close friends. And if we were having that many guests, maybe we should have a band. So, we ended up with about 50 people attending the wedding.
The wedding and reception were at The Oar House, a nice little restaurant that happens to be about a mile from our house. The restaurant's property borders the Chestatee River, so we hoped to have the ceremony on the river bank, followed by dinner reception.
Pebble is an ardent do-it-yourselfer, so we spent a lot of time at craft stores getting all the stuff needed for decorations, place settings, centerpieces, party favors, and so on. We also spent a lot of time putting the stuff together, but we were able to draft family members to help with that.
Then, it rained on the wedding day.
We were, of course, disappointed. Due to the rain, we had to abandon the idea of the riverside ceremony, and instead hold it inside the reception tent. We also had trouble getting good pictures in our wedding garb.
But, in hindsight, the rain wasn't all bad. It kept everybody inside the tent, which gave intimacy to the event. I enjoyed spending the time with good friends, some of whom I haven't seen in years.
We hired the band Emerald Rose to perform. They hold a special place in our memories, as Pebble invited me to see them on our second date. Also, one of the band members is our next-door neighbor, and another band member is the husband of the woman who officiated, so we have a lot of connections.
As we left, Pebble and I both commented on how beautiful the whole thing was. I give her full credit for how wonderful everything looked, but we were also happy that our friends and family seemed to enjoy it as much as we did. The staff at the Oar House did a great job.
The Honeymoon
After the reception, we drove to a hotel near the airport. The next morning, we flew to Honolulu. It was a nine-hour flight. We had both forgotten our Bose noise-cancelling headphones, so we picked up two pairs of Sony noise-cancelling headphones at the airport before the flight. The headphones served us well, but we now have no idea where they are.
I was surprised at how big Honolulu was; I had always thought of it as a small resort town, but driving through it felt like driving through Los Angeles. We stayed at the Outrigger Waikiki, a hotel on Waikiki Beach. We didn't get all checked-in and unpacked until around 5 PM Honolulu time, which is 11 PM Atlanta time, so all we did that first day was go out to dinner at Cheeseburger in Paradise (which had great coconut shrimp) and head back to the hotel.
Kris Screws Up, Big-time
The second day (Monday), we decided to spend the morning at the beach. Pebble bought me a bodyboard and thought it would be fun to watch me drown myself while she sat on the beach. As I walked down to the water, Pebble said "Don't lose your wedding ring," and I said "It won't come off; it's too tight." I went out and played in the surf for a while, but didn't like the experience. There were a lot of rocks on the bottom, and I smashed a couple of my toes pretty good (they were purple for the rest of the trip). After getting a little sun, we headed back to the hotel.
As I laid down to take a nap, I reached for my wedding ring, and discovered it wasn't there! We looked around the hotel room, but I knew I hadn't intentionally taken it off. It was out in the ocean.
After apologizing to my wife profusely for several minutes, I got on the phone and called the jeweler to ask whether they could ship us a replacement ring. Unfortunately, their computers were down, so they couldn't look up the records that day.
Over the next few days, we did get an identical ring ordered and shipped to us in Hawaii. I hope our sacrifice to the Polynesian gods will bring good fortune.
Rain
After Monday, it rained every day. So we didn't spend much time at the beach or doing other touristy things. But we enjoyed ourselves anyway. We were newlyweds.
We spent a couple of days driving along the north shore of Oahu. It is a beautiful area, and not as densely populated as the Honolulu area. We saw whales, sea turtles, and a sea lion.
We spent some time with the Bedient family, friends of Pebble's who live in Honolulu. The two girls, aged 19 and 21, decided they wanted tatoos, so Pebble and I accompanied them to the tattoo parlor. They lobbied hard for me to get a tattoo as well - one suggestion was having "I lost my wedding ring" tattooed on my forehead - but I left still unmarked.
The Return
We really didn't want to come home. Really, really, really did not want to come home. It was a difficult adjustment to go from living like royalty to being normal people again.
We've discovered that the Sears wedding gift registry website sucks. First, some people had trouble placing orders through the site. Now, we've discovered that there is no way to find out who bought the gifts we've received. So, if you sent us a gift through Sears, but haven't received a thank-you note, we're sorry.