July 4, 2015: The wedding! Not a travel update, but part of the journey. We'll have more photos of everyone once we get them from the professional photographer. Stay tuned!
The morning of the wedding was a bit chaotic, but everyone worked very hard (in the 32⁰C / 90⁰F heat) and pulled it all together.
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| Éva doing calligraphy for the escort cards. |
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| Getting all prettied up. |
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| The tables are set. |
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| The ceremony site in the great hall is almost ready. |
Marc and I made our grand entrance on a white horse named Salambo. The guests greeted us at the top of the hill.
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| Surprise! Children showering us with flower petals upon arrival. |
We had a short ceremony (in French) in the great hall of the castle. Marc’s uncle, Michel, even did the honors in full period costume!
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| Marc wrote my vows in phonetic French, so I could fake it ;) |
The bridal party signed pages in a bible that was more than 300 years old, from Éva’s family.
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| We signed in ink with a feather pen. |
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| Marc's family. |
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| Lauren's family (plus an adorable little girl who wouldn't let go of my hand). |
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| Scenes from around the castle. |
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| View from right outside the castle. |
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| The wish tree! |
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| Speech by Marc's dad, Jacques, and beautiful song by Éva. |
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| Amazing band with a growing entourage. |
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| Loving all these dance moves :) |
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| Our traditional French dessert cake, pièce montée, which was fittingly in the shape of a castle. |
Other memorable moments:
- Marc seeing all his relatives, and some of his cousins' kids for the first time!
Although the kids didn’t speak much English, one little girl wanted to show me a picture she drew, which was a Christmas scene with Marc, me, and… a baby! Whoah, slow down there kiddo, haha.
- Releasing balloons from a balcony down into the castle courtyard and beyond!
I got in an epic water spray battle versus all the kids. I’d like to say I won, but those kids were sneaky.
Marc’s uncle, Guy, performed a complicated and well rehearsed dance ;)
Marc opened a champagne bottle with a saber, yes, a small saber sword. And the rest of the champagne bottles came out with sparklers attached.
At the end of the night, all the guests lined up with candles lighting out way down the hill. It was magical.
[Special thank yous: Jacques and Éva did an AMAZING job of planning, organizing, and coordinating the wedding, we are really grateful for all their hard work and preparation. Marc’s sister, Marianne, did a great job coordinating and MCing (master of ceremony) the wedding, and even made us a Japanese wish tree. My friend from grad school, Liana, came all the way from Cambodia, so of course we had to put her to work translating French and doing floral design, hehe. Many thanks to Seb for his seriously awesome band that rocked out all night. Thank you to my family for all the help setting up on the day of the wedding. And last but not least, to the Hupays family for allowing us to have this celebration at their beautiful castle!]
It was a beautiful wedding!
ReplyDeleteAnd a pleasure for me to play the MC ;)