Day before the wedding & a shout out to The Man

Tuesday morning we decided to have a welcome breakfast to replace the normal rehearsal dinner. I had a couple of reasons for this. One, we were having a luncheon reception for our wedding so I didn't want the rehearsal dinner to be nicer or more formal that that. And two, it was less expensive. Well, scratch that. We were able to offer more food at the same price if we went with breakfast. And because I know my family, as with most Filipinos, they were very happy because it was a breakfast BUFFET.
Ahhh-yahhhhhhh.
Just kidding. I mean, not about the buffet because it was actually quite nice! Of course, I'm bias. Maybe my sister or cousin can give a review ;) The Welcome Breakfast was at the Palm Terrace restaurant located in the Turtle Bay Resort. The food was quite yummy with the selection of fresh tropical fruit, french toast, bacon, omelets ... all the good stuff. We have 29 guests that day because a few were either flying in that day or had already planned to do something else but it was still a pretty good turn out. For many of them, it was the first time they had been at the resort and they really enjoyed the scenery.
I wish we had been better about fluttering from table to table and conversing. But we weren't. The Man is shy and I'm much better in a small group setting than a large one. Oh well, I don't think our families minded ... at least I hope they didn't! We made sure we at least greeted everyone and thanked them for coming. We just weren't able to hold conversations with every person and I kind of regret that. They all chowed down and thanked us for hosting the breakfast so we figured people were happy!
After the breakfast we had our rehearsal. It was interesting because we were doing it without our reverend, hotel coordinator and the ceremony location. The reverend said that he didn't think we would need him due to it being such a small wedding. Plus, because it was on North Shore, he would have to charge us a travel fee of $100, I think. OK - never mind that. And our coordinator wasn't joining us because it would cost us $150.00 to have her one hour. And we were rehearsing outside of the Pavilion and not in it because it would cost $600 to rent it for the rehearsal. Can you imagine? $850.00 just to rehearse for a 15 minute ceremony. Goodness! I asked my two friends to lead us and walk us through the motions and if they thought anything looked unusual or awkward, they could change it.
You would think it would be easy to get people to gather in the lobby when we all just had breakfast together. It was like herding cats, people. My two friends, my sister, my mom and dad, his mom, and his brother ... good lawd, I thought we were never going to start! Someone had to go to the bathroom, then another, then my dad wanted to go to the bathroom ... up in his hotel room! When we finally got it together to do the run through, most of my relatives stuck around to watch us. And as my sister mentioned, many of them were wondering why I was going to have my wedding outside of the Pavilion rather than in it (we didn't take the time to explain so I'm sure it was a pleasant surprise for them when they saw the next day that the wedding was being held inside, after all!) I remember I thought it was really cute how my dad wasn't sure about the process of giving my hand. "Kiss your cheek, shake Jon's hand and then give your hand to him? Or kiss your cheek, give your hand and then shake Jon's hand with my other hand?" Who knew the process was a bit complicated? I was even forgetting to kiss him before he gave my hand ... such small details that can end up making a difference! After several tries, and much input from my friends and the crowd, Jon and my dad figured it out so it didn't look like we were all doing a secret handshake ;)
As for the rest of the day, Jon and I separated - he stayed in the room on the laptop and I went to the pool and chatted with my relatives and then walked around with my sister and cousin. Remember those declarations of love? Well, one of us hadn't written them yet and one of us was very stressed out trying to finish them. So I visited with family and friends. In fact, he needed the entire day so in the evening, I went with some friends for sushi in Hale'iwa (FYI: Bonsai Sushi is pretty good!) to give one of us more time to finish his DOLs. Hee hee, I'm just giving him a hard time now ... I was much nicer at the time because he was seriously stressed out!
No pictures from the breakfast, the rehearsal or with my relatives (umm, cousin, please also send me digital copies of your pics!) But I do have a bad ass picture of the sunrise from our hotel room:

I think the sun rises were one of the highlights of my days. While The Man was asleep, I would grab the newspaper outside of our hotel door. Then I would make a cup of coffee and sit on our balcony, read the paper and watch the sun rise. I know, I am a 65 year old woman trapped in a 29 year old body. But it was seriously absolute bliss for me!
The Man also did a time lapse thingee of the same sunset. It's beautiful. I only wish we knew how to use our mic so you can hear the waves (we had our camera in a waterproof shell so we could take under water. Unfortunately, it greatly muffled the audio.) So if you've got time to check it out:

No editing capabilities yet ... we're working on it! So you will have to watch this in boring silence. I can't wait until I can edit, add music and do all that fun stuff with our videos!

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OK, I have to also give a shout out to The Man. We were together for 21 days, often times the entire day with no breaks! Why is this significant? We didn't fight the entire time! I know, we've had a few vacations now where we didn't fight, thank goodness, but 21 days is a long time to be together all the time. Miracle of miracles ... no fighting! Sure, I broke down crying several times during our adventure hike (oh, don't you worry, there will be a whole entry on that) but we got along very well on our entire trip. In fact, I think it was our best vacation to date. It probably helped tremendously that we have lived together for a while but it was really awesome. And the whole experience just reignited my big ol' crush on The Man. I actually missed him today while he was at work and I worked from home. Good lor', what am I ... 15?! So big ups to The Man for being one kick ass hubby! Oh, and Cyn, you had asked if anything was different now that we are married and I didn't have an answer for you. I asked The Man and he said that not much has changed. But when we refer to each other as "husband" and "wife", it feels like we're playing around. And he's kind or right ... it does! We are adjusting to the new titles. I've slipped and called him "my boyfriend" a couple of times.