Wedding – Page 6 – Jo McVey Photography

Franklin Rehearsal Dinner….Aloha!

Well, it’s finally happened! I’ve kept my word, and the pictures I said I was going to share with you have finally come!

This past week and weekend we have been very busy bees! Tuesday night, Steve went out with Rustin and his friends for a bachelor night full of……..well…..whatever it is that bachelors do….minus the strippers. All I know for sure is that Rustin most likely did not remember the entire evening. Or probably most of the entire week, for that matter. He had a “bachelor week”, and much to my delight, Steve only participated in that one evening instead of the entire week of bachelor madness.

So, getting back to the rehearsal dinner, which took place Friday, May 27th. It was Hawaiian themed, and the first things I noticed when we got there were these awesome centerpieces. Live fish! Now, granted, this type of goldfish usually don’t last more than a month or so before they die, but when I was little, I remember keeping one alive for at LEAST a year. I know. Impressive.

Here’s Jen, one of the 3 bridesmaids. Doesn’t she have beautiful, blue eyes? They draw you in!

Steve was in the wedding too. One of Rustin’s 5 groomsmen. Isn’t it usually the bride who ends up having a hard time narrowing down who the bridesmaids are gonna be, and eventually ends up with more attendants than the groom? Well not this time apparently. He’s got beautiful, blue eyes too. 🙂 Please, Lord, let our children get his eye color, but my 20/20 vision! That would be awesome! Thanks for listening!

Here’s where the ceremony took place. Ceremony and reception were held in the lovely backyard of Rustin’s parents, Eric and Wendie.

Look at that happy groom! But then again, he is always cracking jokes, so this is nothing new.

Back up, sista! Rustin can never be serious…….as I mentioned in my toast at the wedding. 🙂

Can you guess what Rustin is doing here?

How about now?

That’s right. He’s dancing down the aisle.

We all danced down the aisle.

Shake that booty, Steve!

Yes, even I got in on the dancing action! Hey, it’s what they wanted, so I obliged! Note: There will be no dancing down the aisle at my wedding!

Elizabeth didn’t dance. She’s the bride. She can do whatever she wants!

So we ran through the ceremony only one time, I believe, and we didn’t really even go through the whole thing. We just practiced where we’d stand and when Elizabeth would hand me her bouquet, etc.

Then we practiced walking out. I didn’t get to walk out with Steve, unfortunately. And it made it a little awkward, because on the day of the wedding, I was wearing 4 inch heels, so I was significantly taller than Eli, the best man.

Here’s the beautiful bride, Elizabeth, with Krista, another bridesmaid.

Bride and maid of honor. In about 40 days, those rolls will be reversed! 🙂

The bride with all her bridesmaids.

Then, of course, Steve being the class clown that he is had to come and jump into our picture.

Then one by one, each bridesmaid’s hubby came and took a picture with us girls.

Can you guess which man belongs with which lady?

Ah yes, the Dr. Evil shot. Don’t ask me why we did this pose.

Rustin had handed out some victory cigars. Victory for what? I’m not sure. Getting through the rehearsal? His last day as a single man?

Yes, you’re all very cool. But I don’t think you’ll make it into the mafia.

See that pool in the background? Just keep that in mind for a future post. 🙂

Best Friends Forever!!! I can’t believe I’ve only known Elizabeth for a year, and already we are so close. I feel like I’ve known her my whole life!

Love you, girlfriend! <3

Bridal Shower Sugar Cookies

I was a little naughty last week. My Aunt Sally sent our wedding gift a couple months ago, and I’ve had it sitting in my sewing room unopened, because after all, it’s bad etiquette to open wedding presents early! However, a few days ago I was updating my bridal registry and noticed that one item had been purchased. And when I saw what it was my heart started to pitter patter.

I brought the box downstairs and set it on our kitchen counter. To open or not to open…..that was the question.

Surely taking it out of it’s cardboard prison would be acceptable. And to leave it in there would be an injustice!

Oh man! I know I need what’s in this box desperately! It would make the next few days so much less stressful, and make my baking for the bridal shower so much faster! Have you guessed what it is yet?

I’m seeing some pink!

Oh my goodness! I’m starting to get excited!

It’s my pink Kitchen Aid Stand Mixer!!!!!!!! I’m very sorry for opening your generous gift early, Aunt Sally. I thought if you knew how much I needed it this past week you’d understand. At least my wedding is less than 3 months away! 🙂

And I LOVE IT!!!! Mixing is a breeze! If you don’t have a stand mixer, I HIGHLY recommend getting one! Now, onto the cookies.

Start by putting 2 sticks of cold butter and 1 cup of sugar into your mixing bowl.

Cream together using the paddle attachment.

Next add an egg, 3/4 tsp of vanilla extract, and 1/2 tsp of almond extract to the butter and sugar.

Mix until combined.

Next, add 3 cups of unbleached all-purpose flour and 2 tsp of baking powder. You might not want to add all the flour at once. Try adding it a cup at a time, and start mixing on a low speed, or else you’ll have flour all over your face and your kitchen.

Mix until thoroughly combined, scraping down the sides and bottom of the bowl as needed. I didn’t take pictures while rolling out the dough and cutting out the shapes. For one, I had flour all over my hands, and the main reason is……I forgot.

So just know that you need to roll out your dough on a floured, flat surface with a floured rolling pin. Dip your cookie cutters in some flour before you press them into the dough.

Place your cut out cookie dough on some parchment paper on a cookie sheet, and bake at 350° for 10-12 minutes.

Next it’s time to make the royal icing. Clean your mixing bowl and add 4 Tbsp of meringue powder and 1 scant cup of water.

A scant cup means not quite 1 cup.

Beat meringue powder and water until nice and foamy.

Add 1 lb. (about 4 cups) of sifted powdered sugar to the bowl. Beat on low until combined.

Add 1/2 – 1 tsp of light corn syrup. Try not to notice my lovely chipping nail polish. Oh man, I just directed your attention to it, didn’t I?

Beat the icing on medium-high for about 5 minutes, or until a stiff peak forms. This is not quite stiff enough.

This is perfect! The peak should stand straight up even if you wiggle it around.

Transfer icing to bowls where you’ll add the coloring, and cover with plastic wrap so that the plastic is touching the icing. Royal icing dries really quickly so you need to make sure no air comes in contact with the icing if you’re not working with it right away.

Add some coloring with a toothpick or knife. There are several different gel colorings out there. I use Wilton brand since it’s what I have on hand.

Mix all the colors you’ll need and cover the ones you’re not using with plastic wrap.

Transfer the icing to piping bags filled about half way. Place the bags in a cup with a wet paper towel at the bottom. This will ensure that your icing doesn’t dry up at the tip when you’re not using it. Place plastic wrap over the remaining icing in your bowls.

Start outlining your cookies using a #2 tip. You’ll want to outline them in the same colors that you’ll be filling them in with.

When you’re done piping, take your remaining icing in the bowls and add water 1 tbsp at a time until it has the consistency of syrup. Place a wet paper towel over the bowls and let sit for 10 minutes to allow the air bubbles to come to the surface.

Stir the icing gently with a spatula or knife to pop all the bubbles.

Pour into a squeeze bottle.

Now you have both piping and flooding consistency icing.

After letting the piping dry for about an hour, flood the cookies with the thinned icing. You can use a toothpick to spread the icing into all the corners.

Let the cookies dry overnight, and then you can pipe on the decorative details. If you’re in a hurry, you can let the cookies dry for a couple hours and then decorate them, but since I had applied the flooding icing pretty late at night I decided to let them dry overnight.

Use the piping icing you had in your bags from before (just put the whole cup with the piping bags in the fridge until you’re ready to use them).

Above all, remember to use your creativity and have fun! This cookie and royal icing recipe can be found on Bake at 350.

Elizabeth’s Bridal Shower

So the reason I have neglected my beloved blog this past week is because I’ve been super busy preparing for Elizabeth’s bridal shower. This was the first shower I had ever hosted, and I wanted it to be perfect! I spent 3 days making and decorating sugar cookies, cleaning, and baking cakes and cake pops. And let me tell you, cleaning up after 2 Saint Bernards and 3 cats is no easy task. The cats are actually pretty easy to clean up after. They just leave cat hair that can easily be wiped or vacuumed up. The dogs, however, manage to fling their drool all over the house, including the walls, ceiling, floor, couch, doors, windows, counter, bed…..I think you get the point. But let me tell you, Mr. Clean Magic Erasers are AMAZING!!! I don’t know how they do it, but they get even the toughest drool spots clean. I think I’m going to need to buy them in bulk.

I set up the tables and chairs in our living room, which fortunately, after almost a year of living here, we still haven’t put any furniture in. So set up was easy since I didn’t have to move any furniture out to make room for the tables.

We had exactly enough chairs for everyone, which was incredible since I only got a few RSVPs. Having enough places for people to sit was one of my main stresses before the shower.

Here’s the food table. Fortunately the other 2 bridesmaids were wonderful enough to bring the food dishes, and I only had to worry about the dessert. That took so much stress off me. So thank you Jen and Krista!

Elizabeth and I went to Kroger about an hour before the shower was supposed to start and bought some flowers to put on the tables. And instead of buying perfectly fresh roses for $20, I found some that were a couple days old on sale for $4.99 and $7.99. I also bought some candles and put them in gift bags for each lady to take home with them.

Here everyone is hanging out in the kitchen before we ate lunch.

Elizabeth sneaking a cookie before lunch. 🙂

Here’s the view from our cat walk above the living room.

Wedding themed sugar cookies that I made.

The dessert section! Strawberry cake, cake pops, and sugar cookies.

Here’s what the inside of the cake looked like. I added a white cake layer in between the 2 strawberry layers just to make things interesting.

Such a pretty lady. She’s going to make a beautiful bride!

We started by eating the lovely lunch that Jen and Krista (seated) provided.

Elizabeth is telling a story, that I can’t remember…..

But I remember that it was funny, because Jenni and Cheryl are laughing.

Then we played a game where I asked questions about Elizabeth and Rustin and whoever got the most answers right got a prize.

Then we played a game where each team wrapped a girl (Elizabeth and Rustin’s little sister, Sam) in toilet paper. And whoever looked the most like a bride won a prize.

It was a close one, but Sam ended up winning.

Elizabeth enjoyed the cake pops. 🙂

Present time!!!

This bag had a TON of tissue paper in it, so luckily when she tossed it in the air I had my camera pointed right at her and captured the moment. 🙂

This was a hilarious moment! This gift was from Lindsey, who apparently didn’t have many greeting cards at home….

So she gave Elizabeth a “thank you” card…..

…and wrote “Thank you for getting married and inviting me to your shower.” She said the only other card she had was a sympathy card. We were cracking up so much we needed lotion. Bahaha!!! I know, I should have been a comedian.

She loved her new Keurig coffee maker! It’s great! I have one!

Cheryl, our Sunday School teacher’s wife and the leader of our weekly Bible study gave a wonderful devotional on how to be a godly wife.

Afterward, she gave Elizabeth this beautiful painting she did titled “The Art of Marriage” listing all her talking points from the devotional. What a wonderful gift!