Welcome Wedding Season!

At Stonewall Farm. I got to wear that awesome new necklace!

It's official: wedding season is here!  This past weekend Alex and I flew back east for a belated celebration of the marriage of my brother Tim and his wife Danielle.  They actually eloped to Las Vegas and got married (by Elvis!) at the end of 2010 before my brother left to serve in the war in Afghanistan for basically all of 2011. A year half later, Tim is back in the U.S. safe and sound, they have a beautiful baby girl that we are all obsessed with, and a lot to celebrate.  It was a long and very busy weekend full of traveling, eating, partying, and general running around, but as always, never a dull moment with my family.  Here are some highlights of the party and the weekend...

We started the weekend with a quick visit in Rhode Island at my parent's house.  A stay at their house wouldn't be complete without Alex hiding the life size cardboard cutout of Taylor Lautner in one of my sisters' bedrooms. 

We also got in some quality time with adorable baby Maeve.  I introduced her to my favorite childhood pastime-- starting at myself in the mirror-- and then Uncle Alex proceeded to teach our niece some inappropriate words/life lessons.  We're going to be fab parents someday.

Then we embarked on a family roadtrip from Rhode Island up to Keene, New Hampshire where the wedding celebration was taking place.  Alex and the girls were SUPER excited for that car trip together in the family truckster.  Poor Alex was not prepared to be trapped in the car with us for a few hours singing along to the best of the 80's on Dad's iPod.  Pretty sure he is scarred for life.

The party was held at Stonewall Farm-- what a cool location!  It's on the outskirts of Keene, which I totally fell in love with-- it is such a cute little college town.   Places like this really make me miss living in New England!  And it was the perfect night for a party too.  The forecast looked threatening all week, but it ended up being a nice day for a white wedding after all.

Human guests aside, we also met a chicken snacking on the back of a sheep and a llama named Frosty (be careful! He spits).  My sister Megan took a liking to Frosty and dubbed herself the "llama whisperer" this weekend.  Again, never a dull moment.

And then it was party time!  That's the bride and groom shouting it out, dancing away, and an illustration of the two of them (along with Nyan Cat) courtesy of my sister Libby on a tablecloth at the reception.


My goofy husband and goofier uncle proved that they were basically soulmates this weekend.  They even showed up in matching checked dress shirts (and then with color coordinated souvenir sunglasses and plastic fedoras) ready to party.  Precious.

It was a little warm in the hall and so nice outside that everyone was hanging at the outdoor bar and the poor DJ seemed a little bored inside, so my sisters and I took it upon ourselves to get the dance party started by ourselves.  I just love these girls.  We were all really sore, tired, and hoarse the next day.

Speaking of starting the party,  a family wedding celebration isn't complete until Uncle Don breaks out into a solo dance performance.  Usually he selects an old school Michael Jackson song to bust a move to, but this time around he wanted something more current and consulted with the DJ on some good Top 40 options for his New Hampshire dance debut.

Check out a snippet of his Call Me Maybe Moonwalk here.  There was also an encore later that night to Blame It On The Boogie.



One of the best parts of the evening (and the weekend in general) was getting all five of us "kids" back in the same room again.  It's the first time we have all been together since Tim's return from Afghanistan and that is too long!

That is definitely something to celebrate.

And finally, we were so exhausted when we returned to Chicago on Sunday night that all we could do was order Chinese food and watch TV.  My fortune read "You are always welcome in any gathering."  I think that pretty much sums it up. ;)

What a fun weekend with the family-- and a great way to start a summer full of weddings, family, friends, and travel.  Can't wait to share it all with you!