The Wedding

I've waited so long to post that I don't even know where to start!  I wish I could just one - figure out how to copy our wedding DVD and then two - mail it to everybody.  Wouldn't that just be easier?  Me thinks yes!  But...since the likelihood of me figuring out how to copy the DVD is fairly slim (can anybody help?) I will blog!

Oh wow, where do I begin?  First I just have to say that I felt that the whole wedding experience was just such a beautiful one.  I feel so incredibly blessed to have had so many friends and family at our special day to celebrate with us.  To top it off, I am crazy in love with my Rich and to have a day devoted to celebrating our love and life-long partnership was pure bliss.  Of course the day went by so fast which I was warned about but I took Lori's advice and at times just stopped to take it all in.  To breathe it all in.  And it felt good...really good!

We held our wedding ceremony and reception at the San Marcos Crowne Plaza in Chandler, AZ (which is basically in the Phoenix metropolitan area).  It is a historic hotel built in 1912 and is in the middle of our little downtown Chandler.  I love how much history this hotel has and it's beautiful Spanish inspired architecture.  This really was the perfect spot for us.

We took pictures an hour prior to the wedding with all of our family and since we didn't have bridesmaids and groomsmen, we asked some of our closest friends to join as well.  This was probably the most stressful portion of the whole day to be honest!  Trying to get the right groups of people together at one time wasn't quite as easy as one would think as we had a couple wanderers.  :)  I can't wait to get these formal portraits back and hopefully we don't have too many blinkers.

Our whole day was a mix of our such different cultures and religions too!  Rich is white and grew up Jewish in Chicago and I am Indian yet grew up Roman Catholic in Dubai.  Seriously, how different can you get?  So we strived to make sure that both ethnicities and religions were represented not only through out the ceremony but the reception too and personally I think it went really smoothly.  We started off the ceremony by signing the Jewish Ketubah with the Rabbi and Minister, witnessed by Rich's Mum and brother.  The ceremony itself was a blend of our two religions.  Thankfully both the Rabbi and Minister have worked together in the past and they had written a beautiful ceremony for us.

A couple special moments during the ceremony included a song that my sister Aarti and her husband Bren not only composed but performed.  They sang and played the eukalaylee (spl?) as we walked down the aisle and it took all my might to not burst in to tears.  The song is so tender and the harmony melts my heart every time.  There were many compliments and Aarth/Bren - please record the song and show it around to the big or not so big music companies - I swear it's a hit just waiting to happen!  Everybody loved it.

My Mum and Rich's Mum both had readings during the ceremony which made everything extra special.  My Mum read from Corinthians 1:13 and Helen read a poem by e. e. Cummings.  My little sister also read the Prayer of the Faithful.  We had many elements from both religions and it just made me *so* happy to have both interwoven through the ceremony.  We ended with the breaking of the glass and a nice big "Mazaltof" from everybody there!  One of my favorite moments of the wedding was walking down the aisle (leaving) to bubbles everywhere as we gave everybody bubble blowers.  It made for some awesome pictures too!

While everybody went to cocktail hour, Rich and I had our own picture session with our photographer.  I had so much fun!  Little did we know that there was a local Zydeco festival going on just outside our hotel where the wedding was at (San Marcos Crowne Plaza) so we went over there and got some great pictures.  We even danced in front of the main band and everybody cheered for us - I felt like a celebrity for a split second!  It's amazing how nice everybody is to you once they see you in a bridal gown with your new partner.  There were smiles everywhere and lots of random people would say things to us.  :)  Especially random married couples!

The reception began at about 6pm and opened with us walking in to Black Eyed Peas' "I got a feeling" - I heart that song.  I really wanted everybody to know that this was not a poofy-foo-foo-snobby wedding.  We wanted everybody to relax, eat, drink, be social, dance and just have a good time with us.  Having everybody come up on the dance floor the first few minutes accomplished that!  My Mum gave us a blessing as well as Rich's Mum - she did a blessing over the Challah bread.  Rich and I had our first dance to "The Way I Am" by Ingrid Michaelson and then came the daughter/father dance as well as the mother/son dance.  My Dad was nervous to dance in front of everybody but he did a great job and we talked, joked and laughed the whole way through.  It was truely a special dance for me.  In that moment, I truely felt like Daddy's little girl.  :)  Oh and we danced to "My Girl" by The Temptations.  Love it!

I can't quite remember the order of events that evening but we ate a very yummy dinner, and had all of the toasts.  Rich and I did something a little different and wrote toasts to each other - almost like elongated vows but in a more relaxed atmosphere than the ceremony.  I cried multiple times during these toasts - especially my sisters' toast as well as that of my best friend Kelly - they knew how to turn on my tears!  The toasts were all so touching, so well said, so funny, so heart warming...I can't express how wonderful it was to hear our favorite people toast to our marriage.

We did some of the expected things like the garter thing and the bouqet toss.  We cut the cake to the music of Jaws and thankfully Rich didn't mush my face too much with cake - just a little bit.  :)  ps - the cake was *so* yummy!  I know this sounds wierd but it was a carrot cake but don't let that deceive you - it was fabulous!

I have two more favorite moments to share with you.  Although I was dreading this the whole night, the Hava Nagila dance went ok.  For all those that aren't familiar, this is when the bride and groom sit in chairs on the dance floor and the men folk hoist you up in the air and throw you up in the air continuously in time with the music.  Half-way through the song, we are let down and then everybody dances a traditional Jewish dance in a huge circle.  The latter half is my favorite!  The first half I could have done without as I was very terrified of being thrown off the chair!  Also terrifed that one or two of my boobs were going to pop out and my goodness, that would have made for a very unique wedding experience for everybody, huh!  :) 

The other favorite moment was a special and *surprise* dance for everybody that Rich and I performed.  We have been practising for about 2 months a choreographed dance to Jai Ho - a song from Slumdog Millionaire.  It went off fabulously!  Everybody came up to watch us and although we had one or two dance snaffus, we didn't care.  We danced our hearts out and loved every minute of it - well at least I did!  Maybe I shouldn't speak for Rich, huh?  :)  One of the pictures on the photographer's website is of us dancing.  And then half way through we had everybody up on the dance floor dancing to Jai Ho!

While the celebration was fantastic, my heart was feeling sore for Rich whose Dad passed away in 2006.  Although Arnold's spirit was felt the whole day and really I feel him with us every day, my heart was hurting especially that day as Arnold was not there to see his baby boy get married.  My heart hurts that I never got to meet Rich's Dad who really was his best friend.  I sometimes feel like I know him somehow - through the pictures, the stories, the video - everything I've seen and heard about him.  Just very sad that Arnold couldn't be there in person although he was there in spirit.  That is probably all I will say for now in respect for Rich and his family.  I'm getting choked up just writing this so it's best that we leave this part alone.

Big sigh. 
Where do I go from there? 

Sigh.
I think that's all I got actually. 

Wow, I got through it.  How do you feel?  Exhausted?  Excited?  Bored?  I can't believe that it is all over but at the same time, it feels good that life can get back to normal again.  It was such a unique and a once-in-a-lifetime experience... although I would do it all over again in a second if I could.  I am so glad that at the last minute we decided to hire a videographer as we were able to catch our special day for history's sake.  I know this sounds soppy but I can't wait to show our kids our wedding.  I also can't wait to watch the DVD every weekend.  :)  Just kidding!  We've only watched it once so far and that will probably be it for a while.  I think it will be nice for us to watch it once a year on our anniversary - I won't torture Rich with it any more than that!

I want to especially thank our parents and siblings- Mum, Dad, Helen and Michael, Aarth and Bren, Crish, Jeff and Michelle - for making our wedding possible and for making it a beautiful celebration!  We couldn't have done it without you all - we really couldn't have.

Well, I have lots more to blog about - my family's trip to Arizona, more wedding pics, our stay-cation-honeymoon.  Phew - I've got lots to catch you all up on, huh?

Thanks again to everybody for the well-wishes and for the love you've showered us with!