The day of our wedding started off great from the start.  I had spent the night at my parent's place and when I got up, there was hardly a cloud in the sky.  The sun was shining and already it was in the sixties, which is very unusual for Minnesota in October.  Chantel and the girls were at their house and they had gotten up at some outrageous hour like five or six in the morning.  They awoke at the early hour to go in and have their hair done together.  I opted to sleep in 'til 8:30 AM and have my sister fix my hair a little.  Even this time was a little early for me, but I guess Chantel must be worth it!

At 10:00 AM, we arrived at the church and began that two hour process of taking pictures.  That church, by the way, was St. Agnes' Catholic Church in St. Paul--Chantel is a member of that congregation.  Anyway, everyone was on time and our photographer did a wonderful job, as you will see with the picture to the right and all the others.  While we were taking pictures inside the church, there were a few women of the parish who were milling about.  They became rather upset that we were talking and laughing so close to the alter.  They spoke to the photographer and myself about how this is a house of God and we should remain silent.  We mentioned that we didn't think we were being too loud or disrespectful because this was a joyous occasion.  The lady proceeded to tell us we had to show a little more respect here because God was present.  Then the photographer asked the lady,
"Isn't God everywhere?  Here, outside, in the shopping mall, at my house?"  The lady grimaced and said yes as he proceeded to ask why God would mind people being happy on such a joyous occasion.

The conversation went on like this for awhile and the way the lady was carrying on, you would think we were running up and down the aisles and tee-peeing the whole place while yelling obscenities.  Believe me, our small group was not presenting itself in a bad way at all.  Eventually, she seemed to give up in disgust and we carried on with our "disrespecting of God" and snapped away while talking.  I'm not sure, but I think she wanted us to use sign language.

At Noon sharp, we came down the aisle with our little flower girls leading the way.  My brother, Mike, was my best man and Chantel had her mother, Doris, as her matron of honor.  We wanted a small wedding, so we only had our immediate family in the church--our parents, siblings, and grandparents.  As the ceremony started, the noon church bells were pealing and rang loudly for a good five minutes.  It was difficult to even hear the priest at first.  But soon it died down and we proceeded to have a very nice ceremony and finally became man and wife.

Immediately following our wedding, we ran off to a park and took quite a few nice fall pictures.  Unfortunately, the leaves weren't too colorful this year, but it still looked very nice.  This took another hour-and-a-half or so and then we headed off to eat at Sgt. Pepper's Restaurant.  We had reserved a banquet room in the basement and just spent a couple of hours in there visiting and having a great time.  We reminisced about what this day was like 59 years ago, because it was the very same day that Chantel's Grandfather had gotten married.  He is 92 years old now and we were extremely thankful that he could be with us for our wedding day.  We were also very lucky to have three out of my four grandparents still around and able to attend the festivities.

After dinner, we headed over to the Lake Elmo Banquet Hall where we had our reception.   We got there at about 5:30 and proceeded to spend the next couple of hours putting up decorations, blowing up helium balloons and making last minute preparations.  Our DJ called and was a little bit late because of car troubles, but it was really no big deal.  We just missed a little of the pre-dinner music as people were milling about visiting.

Guests started to arrive at 7:30 and then the fun began.  Over the night, I would guess that we had 200-250 people who came and went.  At 8:30 we had a champagne toast and some wedding cake.  Immediately after that we started the dance with our wedding song, "Love Me Tender".  The music picked up from there and we danced the night away.

Chelsea and Alyssa really danced the night away and this is what happened at about midnight.  They didn't turn into pumpkins, but they sort of crawled off into a corner and crashed.  Not long after the dance had started, we had some food brought out to try and keep the guests filled with a little nourishment and not too much drink.  The food was excellent and there was plenty of it.  Unfortunately, Chantel and I were too busy to get to taste much of it, but I did manage to have a few drinks.  It was about one in the morning before we finally closed the place down.

The following morning, we thought we'd do something a little different and had a bowling party.  All the guests were invited and we had about 100 people show up.  It was really a lot of fun and very laid back.  Chantel and I had some postal prizes (shirts, pins, neckties, etc) that we gave away.  Everyone had a ticket and I would periodically call out some numbers.  We even almost had the privilege of seeing someone bowl a 300 game, but he got a spare in the tenth frame and ended up with a score of 289.  We managed to bowl one game, and I don't think I even broke a hundred--it was a pathetic display.

Overall, we were very pleased with the way the wedding went and if you were one of our guests, we thank you very much for coming.  It was a lot of fun and below here are some pictures from what went on earlier in the day.  The stuff most people missed out on.  Just click on the picture you want to see below, and it will magically blow up.  To come back to this screen and pick another picture, just hit the back button on your browser.

Everyone in these pictures are family.  If you know me, you'll know my family members--so the ones you don't recognize are Chantel's side of the family.  If you know Chantel, then it is vice versa.  If you don't know either of us, you could probably care less but thanks for taking a look anyway!