Wedding part 5: The Ceremony

So all the wedding flower issues aside, the day was running remarkably smoothly. When the flowers were finished the guests were seated (at like 5:20), we began the ceremony.

One of the Jewish traditions is to have the groom walk down the aisle with both of his parents (technically the bride does the same, but I didn't follow that tradition), and with permission I have a picture...of the back of their heads. Notice how the MIL is walking quite a bit farther to the middle of the aisle than she should be...




And then came the groomsmen/bridesmaids (of which I'm not posting any pictures because I don't have permission), and then the ring bearer and flower girl (who are siblings and are my cousins) who were originally slated to walk by themselves, but one of the wedding day creative changes was to walk together. They were adorable, though admittedly, not a whole lot of flower petals were dropped.






And finally my dad and I began what was a very long walk to the aisle. He told me when we left the room that when we got to the fountain he was going to tell me a joke and sure enough, when we got there and asked, "why do men die before their wives?" And of course, the answer? "Because they want to." Ah ha. Ah ha.




And then we met Slappy at the front, hugged and parted. You like how I found a picture where you absolutely cannot see Slappy? He's directly behind my dad. I'd say they're approximately the same height.




And then the ceremony got started for real. It was a fairly standard ceremony, though with 2 officiants. The Jewish part of the wedding was a little more regimented than the Christian side, but both were done beautifully. The only real surprise was when we went to do the rings, the Rabbi told us that we were to place it on our spouse's right forefinger. What? I discreetly asked Slappy which finger was the forefinger because I've heard it called a pointer and an index finger, but never forefinger and we both wondered if he'd said 4th finger, you know, your RING finger. But no. So we played along until we were given permission to move the rings to the proper finger.

We also did a different take on the unity candle. Because our ceremony was outside the candle generally would not stay lit, so we did unity sand instead. We each poured a different color into a single container, and it is to represent the coming together of 2 families into 1. It's a neat tradition and it worked beautifully.














After all the required elements and prayers, the Rabbi spent some time talking about our relationship with each other and this was the only part where I was nearly crying. Nearly I said. I never actually shed a tear, but I got a little teary eyed and of course, the photographer snapped a picture.




And shortly after this we kissed, he smashed a glass, and we left. I love this last picture and I had to crop out Slappy's face, but if this doesn't capture just how smitten I am with this guy, well, then I don't know what will.




Next up- the reception!