RJ's First Wedding (Amy & Luke's Wedding)

On July 28, RJ attended his first wedding - his Aunt Amy's. Not only did RJ attend, but he was also part of the wedding party along with his mommy, who was the matron of honor, and his daddy, who was a groomsman. His official title was "baby groomsman". This is a completely made-up role that basically meant that Grammie Carola made RJ a cute little red and white outfit (Amy's wedding color was red) and involved my cousin Sarah, the Jr. Bridesmaid pulling a decorated red wagon with RJ and his car seat down the aisle. Made-up or not, this had to be the cutest thing ever, particularly because he was an angel and slept through the whole ordeal - even when Sarah had to go off-roading with the wagon to get him to his nanny. This really only reiterates the fact that RJ really is a very chill little baby.
RJ also discovered what planning a wedding was like - particularly the three days in a row of shopping and errands with my mom, sister, and I. Like any good member of the male species, RJ slept through his visits to various stores and rides in the car. As angelic as he was during this wedding planning, I would like to point out that while he was great with all our running around, it was not free as RJ was pretty awake (and fussy) at night. We were taking shifts taking care of RJ between feeds at night to help with my general sleep deprivation and ability to function. This basically meant that I would feed him every three hours, but when he was done eating, he'd go to either Grammie or Aunt Amy for burping, diaper change, and getting to sleep. We did this because otherwise, I'd only get an hour of sleep or so every three hours by the time he would go down, and would be useless the rest of the day. RJ particularly liked to be awake (and fussy) during Aunt Amy's 12-3 shift. This was fitting in a way because he *might* have been paying her back for having to go shopping all day long. : ) This led to Amy's wanting to burn the onesie he wore one of those sleepless nights, which said, "Party in my Crib, 2am". I think it got easier as we got more settled though.

The wedding itself was a lot of fun. My mom set up a nanny (her friend's daughter, who is a professional nanny) for RJ from noon until midnight. This allowed Lance and I to actually participate in the wedding and the requisite primping for it and to enjoy the reception, while still having RJ around. The nanny took care of RJ right at the wedding and reception, which was really nice because we could scoop him up and show him off when we wanted to, and also take him back when we wanted to have some time to ourselves. This allowed us to dance for the first time in quite a while. The reception was a lot of fun - the music was great and both families really got into it! Even though the Bride and Groom typically start off the dancing for the evening, at this reception, Luke's niece and nephew, Gracie (flower girl) and August (ring bearer) started dancing during dinner, providing some fantastic dinner entertainment. Gramma Ho!Ho! joined in on the "locomotion" and my Uncle Bob even got so into dancing that he ended up on the floor. I'm sure he was sore the next day, but at the time he got right back up and continued dancing! Amy and Luke seemed to really enjoy their time on the dance floor as well.



Another plus was that I was able to enjoy the top shelf bar at the wedding - my first drinks since September! This was very exciting and I was thrilled that I amassed enough pumped breast milk for the whole wedding and night after.

And lastly, since we had booked an extra room at a B&B down the street in case anyone needed it, and no one did, Lance and I got our first full night sleep together since RJ was born. My mom wanted to watch RJ overnight, since it was her last night with him for a while, there was plenty of pumped breast milk, and we were not about to argue with getting a full night sleep! So Grammie Carola left the wedding with RJ and we traveled the one minute down the road to our night of good sleep! The B&B was unique in that it was also a llama farm. So when we got up in the morning, we were shown through the llama barn and got to see the llamas up close.

All in all, we had a terrific time and wish Amy and Luke the best in their marriage!