Home for a rest…

The very long-awaited wedding week of 2008 has come and gone. It was so packed with adventures and action, that I’d be hard-pressed to fit it all into one post so I’ll chop it up a little.

1. Most importantly, the wedding was beautiful. I can’t prove it because I have not one photo from the day beyond the ‘getting ready’ photos that I took of the girls in Liz’s suite. The bride was beyond gorgeous, calm, cool and only slightly teary. The groom was caught with a wee lip tremble but he managed to make it through. It was perfect.

Jaia was the flower girl and though she only took a few steps down the aisle before she noticed all eyes on her and turned to me with arms outstretched, she did a marvelous job looking absolutely, unforgettably adorable. I’ll post a pic or two of the bean in action when I receive some.

2. The resort was amazing. And amazingly huge. It was easily a 20-25 minute walk from one end to the other. Some things – namely the evening drinking holes – were faaaaaar . The good side of that was that the guests could eat and drink all they wanted all week (which we did), and I doubt anyone gained a pound. I may have even lost a little. And another bonus was that all of our rooms were just a hop, skip and a jump from the giant pool, the beach and 2 of the 8 gazillion restaurants on the property.

Beyond size though, the resort was beautiful. The landscaping was out of this world and meticulously kept. There were peacocks and herons and flamingos and these crazy little black duck-birds all over the place and the flowers covered the trees. And the insides of the rooms, restaurants, lobbies, etc. were just as pretty.

3. Jaia had a blast. She had oodles of family around to hang out with and she loved, loved, loved being in the water (or splash splash, as she called it). The pool was her early favourite, but when we brought her to the beach and she could play in the sand, nothing we could do could drag her away. She kept her pappy there forever just filling the bucket with water, carrying it over to him and pouring it out. Something tells me that he didn’t mind one bit.

She was really a peach throught the whole trip. We had worries about the plane ride there and back, or about how she might react to a strange crib or funny milk, but it turned out we had nothing to worry about. She slept amazingly, didn’t notice a change in the milk whatsoever and she shocked the young dude who was sitting beside us with how pleasant and quiet she was. Yay!

4. Friends, new and old. I knew Mark for a couple of years before he and Liz started dating. We had a little tight-knit group that started hanging out regularly in Washington in 2000. Our weekly ritual at the time was a Survivor dinner on Wednesday nights when the show was in it’s first season (one of which Liz showed up for and where she and Mark first laid eyes on each other though neither seems to remember).

I moved back to Canada in 2001 but never lost touch with most of that old group, and with good reason – I still adore spending time with them and having them be part of my world. I feel very fortunate. And though I see them often enough when i go back to DC, it was lovely to get to spend a week with them…on a beach, drink in hand, without a care in the world. During my short stint in the US, I was also lucky enough to have met and spent time with some of Liz’s best friends, most of who came to the wedding and who I got to catch up with again.

But I also met some of Liz and Mark’s ‘new’ friends, Mark’s family and some of his ‘old’ friends. If it sounds like a lot, it was. This couple had 63 guests at their wedding. Some people can’t round that many up in town, let alone at a destination wedding. It was such a great group of people, all of whom spent the majority of days and nights together, and all of whom were beyond thrilled to see these two get hitched.

4. Honestly, the only bad part of the trip for us began when we arrived in Montreal. And that could be a post in itself. Efforts by the P.E. Trudeau International Airport people to make travel easier did nothing but slow us all down. It took us over 1.5 hours just to get out of the airport. The customs line was beyond ridiculous. Not in number of people, but the obstacle course they make you run to actually get yourself in line and in front of an agent. I will do my best to never fly into that airport again.

I’ve been writing this post all week. It’s been impossible. I keep getting nudges and hints from friends that I haven’t updated, and here I am, hesitating. We’ve been waiting forever for Liz and Mark’s wedding. I went into labour when I was designing their save the dates, so that gives you indication of just how long ‘forever’ has been. And so, since there was all the build up, all the prep, an amazing week and a beautiful wedding…I feel kind of sad that it’s already over.

Thankfully we have tons of pictures to help us all daydream about white, sandy beaches, CocoLocos, palm trees, scuba diving, polite Dominicans, sunshine, Bam Bam, swim-up bars, mojitos, tacos for breakfast, Presidente beer, and everything else unavailable in Canada.

I think we should start planning the 5 year reunion tour. Now.