Another Wedding (in the rain)

  You might recall I had a bride-to-be contact me about the possibility of wedding photos here in the garden this past week?  The bride and I had walked the gardens on Wednesday, chatting about the best spots to take pictures and I assured her the weather was supposed to cooperate with sunny skies and mild temps on Friday.  

My forecast held true for the first part of Friday, we had a rather nice day.  But then, as the day wore on, the clouds started to appear on the horizon and on radar--yes, I was watching the weather online like the inept meteorologist I am--and I kept fretting, if they don't get here before 4PM, we're in for rain.  Carl was home from work at noon and we had done some last minute tidying up here and there until it started to mist a bit and then sat down on our gazebo to wait for the wedding party to arrive.  As we sat there, the time went by quickly, it was nearly 4:30 by now, and the rain started to pick up too.   We decided they had probably changed their minds about outdoor photography.

Carl yawned and asked me what I wanted to do now, since the wedding photography was off.  I was sorta sad, when you get ready for an event and it doesn't happen there's a bit of a let down.   He was rearranging some chairs on the gazebo while I sat on the park bench watching the rain start to drip off the roof and I said, "Did you notice this thing moves a bit when we do?"

He said, no, he hadn't felt it move, but when he held still and I jostled it a bit, then he noticed a slight sway to the small lanterns I had hanging from the railing .  We built the gazebo back in 1981; just like us, it's not getting any younger.  Carl shrugged and said, "Oh, well, I suppose we'll have to look into repairs someday soon.  Come on, it's getting really wet out here, let's go in." 

We both climbed the stairs down from the gazebo and halfheartedly went into the house.  Just as we shut the door behind us, a bus pulled in our driveway.

The wedding party was here after all!

 ................and so was the rain.............

Carl and I went scrambling for umbrellas and then went out to the driveway to meet the group. The beautiful bride disembarked from the converted school/party bus and the dismay on her face when our eyes met was plain to see.  What bride wants to stand in a cold rainstorm for photography?

There she was, with her pretty bridesmaids, standing in the rain with her gorgeous gown trailing on our now quite wet gravel driveway.  She had brought her own pretty pink parasol though, and looked lovely.  As her bridesmaids bustled the train a bit more, I held an umbrella over as many of their beautifully coiffed heads as I could.  And, as silly as this sounds, I apologized for the rain.  I know, it sounds ridiculous to apologize for the weather, doesn't it? but I had promised the weather would be nice earlier in the week.

She said, "You know, this is not what I hoped for, but........this is our wedding day, we are here and we are going to take these pictures no matter what."   And with that, she shrugged off her disappointment and we all scurried into the back yard to get started.  She was truly the best-natured young lady I've ever met. No 'Bridezilla' here, no sirree.  She was determined to make the best of the situation, and she did!  Her attitude will stand her in good stead for the rest of her married life, no doubt about it.


First they took pictures of the bride and bridesmaids, and remember, it was raining steadily with a stiff northwesterly wind and temps in the upper 50's:

With and without umbrellas:

While the girls were on the lawn having their photo taken, the groomsmen all climbed up on the gazebo to stay dry.  Then the rain picked up even more and the entire party scrambled for the gazebo:

The same old gazebo Carl and I were discussing the faults of less than ten minutes before!  Oh, we were a 'bit' leery when we saw eighteen people pile in there........Carl turned to me and said, "What's the load capacity, do you think?"

I said, "Oh, no, we're gonna get sued."

We both held our breath as we stood in the rain watching this unfold.  I will let the suspense end here and tell you that the gazebo held up to the challenge and everything was fine, but we were really concerned.  Normally the only people interested in the gazebo for pictures are the bride and groom, not the entire bunch.  In fact, this is the first wedding I can remember that ever used the gazebo, but hey, it was sort of dry up there.

They did get some nice photos, though my pictures aren't lit as well as I'm sure the professional photographer's were. 

 After the photos in the gazebo, they all trooped back out into the rain to the backside of the Quarry garden:

Did a few celebration shots (hard to look totally enthused when you're dripping wet, but they all did a great job) and then the wedding party was dismissed to go back to the bus.

Here the photographer was trying to take action shots.  I had been holding an umbrella over his head most of the time to try to keep the camera dry, but since he was  moving backward, I just kept out of his way.

 

You can see the rain in the pond beyond them...

Can you see me (wearing my camouflage coat) on the left-hand side of the picture?  I'm holding the umbrellas again for the photographer.

I thought this was such a cute picture, they are both drenched, but such good sports about it.

And then they are done with photos, and off to their reception.

Congratulations to a wonderful couple!! 

This was Friday's wedding couple--believe it or not, the next day we had another wedding (I forgot about this one, ooops)

Stay tuned............ ;-)

Karen