My Brother's Wedding: Pictures! Finally!

This bee has been a wee bit busy (do you like the rhyme/alliteration I used there?) but finally I have a spare second to put up the pictures from my brother's wedding that I traveled to San Diego for two weekends ago!

It was a lightning-fast trip...I left at 5am Friday morning and got back at 8pm Sunday night, and did MOUNTAINS of homework on the plane, but of course it was worth it to see my brother marry (finally!) For awhile there we were getting a little worried (all my brothers are in their thirties and he is the first to take the plunge. Our joke is that I'll be next, before either of my other two brothers).Let's back up. I was *supposed* to leave on a 6:45am flight Friday morning. I got to the airport at 5:30am, plentyyy of time to get through security, even though I spied the line and for some reason, at 5:30am Albany airport was a zoo. But nonetheless, I was confident it would be enough time. But when I got to the ticketing counter, an employee rushed over to me and said that the flight from Albany to Newark wasn't leaving until 9:50am, even though my connection to San Diego in Newark was leaving at 8:50. Crap. So they rushed me over to the counter and put me on a 6:08am flight. I protested, saying that there was NO way I would make it through security in twenty minutes, but they rushed me off. Frazzled, I decided to just carry-on my bag, since it was small(ish), but I forgot that I had packed full-size (and rather nice/expensive) toiletries. I finally got to the security scan at about 5:55. Yeah, my plane had already begun boarding, and I hadn't even screened my bag yet. I asked them to move to the front of the line, since my flight was leaving in 15 minutes, and they just said "everyone is in the same situation." Um, no, no they were not, since I was forced against my will onto an earlier flight, and had I known I was going to be on a 6:08am flight, I would have gotten to the airport at 4:45am.

But I digress.My bag went off in security due to my full-size shampoo, body wash, and eye makeup remover, but by this point I was so anxiety-ridden about making my flight that I just told them to toss whatever they needed to toss. They did, but then announced they'd have to RE-scan my bag! I ran to my gate and got there around 6:07, and indeed, the guy was literally JUST closing the door. I had missed my flight. This was the point where I sort of just lost it. I dropped my bags and burst into tears and told them I needed to get on the next flight to San Diego or I would miss my brother's wedding. (White lie. I would definitely have missed the rehearsal dinner).After much crying and much ado, and after they told me they would NOT be able to even GET ME to San Diego by that night, I finally switched airlines and was put on a 10:30am flight to San Diego. For someone who already has a LOT of anxiety about flying, this all certainly did not help.

But, most importantly, I made it. In time for the rehearsal dinner, and the wedding. And it was beautiful and wonderful, and we all agreed I won the award for worst travel to get there.
The rehearsal dinner:


Getting ready the next morning in Tiffany's suite:

(Adorable champagne bottles!)


The ceremony:

(My brother Brad is the best man, the first groomsman from the left. My brother Scott is next to him, second groomsman from the left.)

Then we took some family/wedding party photos:


The reception: (I did not catch the bouquet. Much to my chagrin.)

(My parents when they got married! They were my age!)

(Brad thought the Best Man's speech was actually a stand-up comedy routine. Case-in-point: During the speech, he called out one of my brothers' friends for apparently attempting to hit on me all night. I was so involved in taking pictures I apparently didn't even notice!)


Thanks for looking! Weren't her colors beautiful? And I LOVE the reception hall...it was very modern-lodge.

San Diego Trip, Part III, or, TITANIC Disaster

[If you missed parts I and II of my trip recap, you can read them here and here, respectively!]

First of all, good job to those of you who tried to guess the mystery city in which we're having our next reunion in two years. It was...CHICAGO! Woo hoo! I've never been to Chicago but always, always wanted to go.

Now, Saturday, the third and final day of our reunion, was by far the most eventful. And by eventful I mean exhausting and terrifying, with more than a few familial spats. I won't lie, day three of a 24-hours-a-day reunion can get some nerves on edge!

The day at least started out beautifully, when we all traveled about 45 minutes to Vista, California, to Tiffany's mom's house, for her bridal shower. I won't post about that now, since I actually wrote about it as a guest post on Date Girl's blog for next week (I'll link to it then so you can all check it out!), but I won't leave you hanging without at least a picture of all the loot:


After the bridal shower, however, we were all feeling pretty pooped out from the exciting day and from possibly a few too many glasses of champagne. However, my brothers had planned for us all to board a San Diego harbor cruise from the Catamaran Hotel that night, as a good-bye sort of thing, and though I and most of the other girls would have loved nothing more than to stay home, throw on some sweatpants, and watch tv, we had to go.
The boat tour my brothers chose was on the boat called the Bahia Belle out of the Bahia resort, but we docked at the opposite side of the bay, at the Catamaran Hotel. The deal is that you get on on either side of the bay, and the boat runs continuously back and forth between the two hotels all night, taking about a half hour each way. You can stay on as long as you'd like.


Do you guys know the episode of the Office, Booze Cruise? Remember the boat they go on in that episode? Guys. I kid you not. We were on the SAME BOAT. Down to the hokey dance floor and live music and EVERYTHING.

The night actually didn't start out too badly. It was absolutely beautiful outside, even though it WAS freezing and all I had on were shorts, a tshirt, and a cardigan.




However, pretty much as soon as we got on the boat and pulled away from shore, things started going downhill. Neither Tiffany, Christine, nor I felt much like having a drink because of our long afternoon, and while that was fine, have you ever been the person not having a drink on a booze cruise? The loud, raucous people really started to wear on me and my poor headache not soon into the ride. Moreover, a big reason why we had gone on the boat was to see the fireworks at Sea World from the middle of the bay. However, we boarded the boat at 8:00pm. The fireworks didn't start until 9:50.

My mum and I cozied up on a bench on the top deck of the boat around 9:30 or so and I told her that I was exhausted and would really like to get off the next time the boat reached our shore. At that time, we were docking at the Bahia shore, and all those guests were waiting to get on. I had hoped that we could catch the fireworks on our way back to the Catamaran, and then unload there and head home, where I could crawl into bed. At this point it was probably about 55 degrees outside, and I was in shorts and sandals, but didn't want to go below deck because of all the drunk people and booming music.

And right at that moment, disaster struck.

While the Bahia guests had been waiting on the dock to board the boat, the boat officials had had them all line up on one side of the dock, making it easier for the passengers leaving the boat to unload. Well, all that weight on one side of the dock, combined with no doubt faulty maintenance, caused something very, very bad to happen.

Suddenly, everyone on the top deck of the boat was screaming and running to the railings. Then, they started yelling, "the dock collapsed! The dock collapsed!"

The dock had just given out, causing about 60 people all in dresses and nice clothes to fall about ten feet into the freezing bay. The outside air was about 55 so I can't even imagine how cold that water was--I know I was numb just standing on the boat. At very first, people sort of chuckled--you could possibly see how it could be funny, like that scene in It's a Wonderful Life where they all fall into the swimming pool under the gym floor.

Except, it really wasn't funny. People actually got hurt--one man broke his nose, another his arm, and countless others got bumps, bruises, and scrapes. Not to mention, they were all soaking wet and didn't have anything warm to change into. It didn't take long for the ambulances, fire trucks, and even search helicopters to start showing up. One particularly drunk, fratty boy started shouting rude things about the tax dollars and helicopters, and I really wanted to say, "Excuse me, but if you thought you had a little kid lost in that water, you'd want a search helicopter too."

The situation quickly became dire. The boat captain, who sounded aghast, came over the intercom to announce that we wouldn't be going anywhere for the time being. We were stuck on the boat for at least an hour, if not more. The fireworks did start going off, but they just felt so inappropriate. Then, we all had to remain exactly where we were standing so they could conduct a head count, which meant I had to stand in the freezing cold night air for another hour.

Finally, when the situation was under control, we started heading back to the other shore--at which point the boat turned the music and dance floor lights back on. Ugh! Christine, Tiffany and I agreed that it was so distasteful. People were shocked, tired, and freezing, and just wanted to go home, not dance and drink.

I was sort of bummed that a mini-diaster occured the last night of our reunion, because as good as it was, something like that can't help but put a damper on the festivities. But then we all got to talking and realized that there have been disasters almost every year in the last decade or two that we've held a reunion. Last year in Rome, NY, a tornado (!) touched down right near the hotel and caused the power to go out. Two years before that, a giant thunderstorm also caused the power to go out, leaving everyone stranded at someone's house. And two years before that, there was another tornado incident. Isn't that absurd! I hope we don't have any tornadoes in Chicago in two years!

By Sunday, I was sort of ready for a vacation from my vacation. Family reunions are exhausting! I'm totally looking forward to Chicago, but it was awfully nice to get off the plane, get back to L. , and even go back to work. Which is nice, because I think I managed to counteract the post-vacation blues! That's why, even though we were invited to a massive birthday celebration in New York City this weekend, I think L. and I are happy to have a relaxing weekend in. (Plus, the party is for the same guy who threw the New Jersey Pool Party, and I could not survive another day like that one) .

Hope you guys have fun (or not/relaxing!) things planned this weekend! I have a lot of fun posts planned for next week (including a GIVEAWAY!!!), so get excited!

Part II of the Family Reunion

[If you missed Part I, you can read it here!]

On our first morning in San Diego my dad woke up early to go play golf with some of the men, and my mum and I were left wondering what we were going to do on a cloudy, cool day with no car. Luckily, my brother Brad saved the day by calling us and asking if we wanted to go shopping with him at Seaport Village, a super cute coastal cluster of shops and restaurants arranged like, well, a village.


We were pretty shocked that Brad wanted to take us shopping. Neither he nor any of the other men in my family have much "patience" when it comes to it. (Which makes me so grateful for L.!)

But, we should have known there was a catch. Sure, we were going shopping--but he really needed our help picking out prizes to give out at the giant reunion dinner that night. Ha! We should have seen it coming.

I suggested that we find fun, handmade things that hail from San Diego, as sort of a neat souvenir for our family, who hail from all over the country from places such as Upstate New York, Florida, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Chicago, and Colorado, and put them together in themed baskets. Brad really wasn't very helpful with this, and we couldn't find any baskets, so I ended up getting some cute ribbon from a hat shop (which I suspect is where all the girls go when they're going to Del Mar racetrack), and tied little bundles of like-things together. We ended up with a San Diego coffee mug stuffed with San Diego-made coffee, a mexican cookbook bundled with homemade San Diego hot sauce, and this really nice hand-painted San Diego tile.

At our dinner, which happened at 6pm that night, we handed out the gifts to the oldest relative, the relative who had contributed the youngest generation to the family (my cousin Leigh with her baby Kinsley won that), and the family member who traveled from furthest away (this might have been us, but we didn't want it to look rigged.)

But before the dinner, my mum and I got back to the room after our "shopping" outing and
got lunch at the Blue Wave Bar and Grill, the restaurant at the resort. We got to sit by the window and stare out at the harbor and all the yachts, which was really nice. Plus, I had the most delicious Cobb salad of my life, so I was a pretty happy camper.


After lunch, we decided to go in the hot tub. On Friday it was approximately 62 degrees in San Diego and cloudy--just an awful day. But we had fun relaxing in the hot tub and then I huddled, shivering, in a towel while my mum went swimming in the pool. She's crazy! (Okay, okay, it was actually heated to 80 degrees).

My mum and I got dressed and headed to the dinner, which was being held in the resort's Sunset Room, a gorgeous function room overlooking the harbor, to help set up. I offered to be the name-tag giver-outer and the money-collector, since the all-you-can-eat Italian buffet was running people a pretty penny. I joked that no one was going to talk to me the whole night for taking all their money!


Here was the view out the window, which you can see behind Scott, his girlfriend Angie, and Brian and Tiffany.


I think this photo of my mum and me at dinner is so sweet. Don't you love my dorky nametag? She refused to wear hers! What a rebel.

We had about 60 people at the dinner, and after everyone finished eating, each table had to stand up and explain which branch of the family they were from. It sort of took forever, but it was nice to be able to trace the line all the way back. And then, the big moment of truth:

Who was going to host the reunion in two years?
Drum roll...

In two years, I'll be going to:

!!!

I'll let you guys try to figure it out. It would be tricky for me, but those of you more familiar with the city will probably get it. It's somewhere that L. and I have been dying to go and even considered moving after graduation, and we were planning on making a big stop there on our cross-country road trip next summer when we move to California. But now we'll be going in two years, so we don't have to! (Which means more time in Vegas!!!)

San Diego Family Reunion: Part I

Our family reunion trip to San Diego was in full swing before we even left Logan Airport in Boston, since my parents and I woke up at 5am, threw our bags into the car, picked up my aunt Ginger and uncle Rich, and met my other uncle Ken and my cousin Tyler at the airport. I don't know if you guys have ever traveled in a group of seven, but that was a whole new experience for me. Sort of like in Home Alone, when they're all running through the airport and take up the entire plane? Well, except for that time in high school that me and 14 other students went to London. THAT was hectic. But mostly because I got lost and stood alone, crying. I was 14, and that's a story for another time.

Anyway. You all probably know that I'm terrified of flying, and if you don't, well, you should. So right off the bat I of course joke that if anything happened to our plane, half our immediate family would be taken out in one fell swoop. Perhaps that's morbid for pre-vacation talk, but guys, this is what I think about. Oh, and also, pre-flight, I got into the car to go to the airport, and promptly heard a loud "rrrriip!" It was, of course, my favorite and perfectly-broken in pair of Express skinny jeans, and now I'm skinny jean-less and the closest Express replacements are $80. So that happened.

I was delighted to find that our Jet Blue plane had individual tvs on every seat, so naturally I spent the six-hour flight (my parents like direct flights, ever since they missed their connection in Chicago. I'm more partial to layovers-- I like being able to grab something to eat, a new magazine, and stretching my legs) watching quality television like Cupcake Wars and Bethenny Getting Married. Understandably, the flight whizzed by and before I knew it we were on the ground in San Diego, crowding into our rental mini-van (which promptly dashed my hopes of a shiny black Escalade--thanks for that, Dad), and scouting out some Mexican food.

After what was probably the biggest lunch I've ever eaten in my life (it was so big I didn't eat dinner), we checked into the hotel, which was just as pretty in person as it was in those pictures I posted, pre-trip, here and here.

See?


This is the front of our building, the Casa del Mar building. You can clearly note the CLOUDY SKIES because the sun hardly came out until the day before we left. I was devastated but the way I saw it was, I'd rather be in cloudy San Diego than cloudy Massachusetts or New Hampshire!



This was the view from outside my brother's villa. That's the smaller of the two pools and next to it is a little seating area where I sat Thursday night with my cousins Sara and Leigh and their husbands, Dave and Jared. Leigh's baby girl, Kinsley, just turned one, and she was adorably sleepy. But this was all around 10pm, approximately 5 hours after this photo was taken. So what happened before then?

Well, when we first got in, I had the special privilege of meeting my brother Scott's baby boy. See, Scott's not married or anything, and we suspect he probably might not ever be, but that didn't stop him from getting a baby all for himself:


His name is Halo (not after the video game, NOR the Beyonce song, NOR after the things that angels have, but after the parachute jump of the same acronym, High Altitude-Low Opening. He was in the Navy, after all. I think he's so ugly!

Since Thursday was a traveling day, my brothers didn't schedule anything big, but just had a little get-together that evening at their villa with some drinks and food. My future sister-in-law, Tiffany, put together QUITE the spread. She's really phenomenal. The poor girl was faced with meeting her fiance's ENTIRE extended family, and I mean ENTIRE--people that are so extended they don't even have the same grandparents or last names--and she totally rose to the occasion. She brought over her homemade guacamole, fresh shrimp, pâté and crusty baguette, egg salad sandwiches, and smoked sausages. I'm getting hungry just thinking about it! It was a relaxing night of mingling and trying to remember names of all the distant relatives, which we're all impossibly terrible at.


All the girls! Tiffany's Maid of Honor, Christine, who is the biggest sweetheart you'll ever meet, myself, my mum, and the bride-to-be, Tiffany.

And of course, the men. Pardon my brother Scott's awkward grimace-half-smile, and then the Best Man, Brad, my dad, and the groom, Brian.

Part II will be all about the big reunion dinner we had Friday night, which also revealed the location of our reunion in two years! (Hint: It's somewhere I've never been and ALWAYS wanted to go.)

Then, the juiciest for last, Part III will detail our disastrous boat ride on Saturday night and how we could have ended up in the bay. Very Titanic.

(Note: I'm not trying to create a false sense of excitement by breaking this up into three parts. It's just that I can only do so much blogging at work before I begin to feel guilty and/or need to close out my Blogger screen.)