During the day, Matt the best man started texting us back and forth to try and figure out what his wedding outfit should be. James and I had given him very general guidelines on his outfit: Tan pants and a shirt in the same color family as the matron of honor's seafoam colored dress (Pastel purple, yellow, blue... didn't matter to us). We were surprised that Matt was a little pickier than we expected him to be. He wanted to make sure the khakis were the same shade as James', that the shirt didn't clash with the pants, and that the shirt was bright enough, etc. Lol.
We all settled on that teal shirt you see in the picture.
Tuesday night we headed out to the 3rd Street Promenade to help James finish up some wedding shopping at J. Crew. He didn't have a shirt for the wedding either. Haha! But luckily we had one of the employees help us out and found James a great shirt/tie combo. We also had J Crew send Matt a pair of khakis that would match James'.
We then picked up some stationary for a handful of thank you notes I realized I needed to write before the wedding.
Unfortunately we left the Promenade shoeless. James still needed his wedding shoes , I needed some good sturdy (and waterproof) walking shoes for our Irish honeymoon. So we decided we'd need to head to the mall the next day. We left the Promenade, grabbed dinner at West 4th and Jane, and headed home.
Luckily we found just the things we were looking for at Westside Pavilion. James found his shoes, I found my shoes, and I also picked up more stationary as I realized there were more thank you notes I needed to write. I had COMPLETELY forgotten to give the casting directors at Central Casting a heads up on my upcoming nuptials and honeymoon. They were gonna wonder where I've been for an entire month!
So my Wednesday evening wasn't QUITE as relaxing unfortunately. I had to hand write and address 18 thank you notes that night I thanked them for all the work they've given me so far this episodic season, informed them of the wedding, and told them I'd be back and ready to work by November. KILLER writer's cramp kicked in about half way through, but I pushed through and finished. GLAD it's done.
Thursday I thought was gonna be a super packed, kind of stressful day. My dad, uncle, AND grandparents were scheduled to arrive this day. But Thursday ended up being pretty relaxing too!
I took a run in the morning to clear my head. At noon we packed up the car and headed down to LAX to pick up my dad. Then we continued down the 405 to Seal Beach to check into the Pacific Inn. It was a fairly uncomfortable drive. We had to fit 4 suitcases, 4 people, and all the wedding stuff in my little Honda while trying not to wrinkle anything. Mom and I were holding stuff in our laps in the backseat...but we somehow managed!
Who should be pulling into the hotel parking lot the exact same time as us but my uncle Norman! His flight had also landed around noon-ish, but in Orange County. And he decided to rent a car for the weekend and drive himself up to Seal Beach. The timing couldn't have been more perfect!
The 5 of us walked over to Main St. and ate lunch together (Beachwood!),
got settled into our rooms a bit (watched some of the Cardinals/Pirates game),
then I headed out solo with my dad. Thursday afternoon was the ONLY chance for alone time I would have with him.
So we headed over to nearby Belmont Shore in Long Beach and took a stroll together. While we were out I managed to squeeze in a few last minute errands. I needed to pick up a few thank you gifts and drop off a few decorative things at the reception site. My dad got a chance to drop into one of his favorite cigar shops. We also grabbed some Starbucks.
After about an hour, we headed back to the hotel. Dee was pretty jet lagged and needed to turn in early. Back at the hotel, my mom and uncle were taking it easy also. So James and I headed back to our hotel room to relax too.
FYI, James and I were in the admiral suite, which happened to be room #323. 3/23 is my birthday so I took that as a good omen. :)
We headed back out at 8 to meet with our officiant Alan.
The meeting with Alan was short and sweet. We just needed to do a talk through of how the ceremony would go since there was no rehearsal. So James and I definitely had a few questions, like where everyone would be standing and what the hell we were supposed to do with the rings. We also talked a bit more about the vows. We decided it might be nice to inject a few humorous/nerdy bits after all. So Alan took care of that for us and we were on our way.
Since Norman and my mom had graciously agreed to pick up my grandparents at the airport that evening (their flight got in around 10:30 that night), that allowed James and me to have one last date night as singles, just the two of us.
We settled on Simmzy's, one of our favorite spots when we lived in Long Beach. And if you must know, our last meal together as bachelor and bachelorette was the chili verde mac and cheese. We really enjoyed ourseves I'm glad we had this alone time. :)
Back at the hotel, we decided to stay up a bit longer and say hi to my grandparents once they arrived. They both seemed pretty energetic considering it was nearly 2 am in the time zone they flew in from! I think they were just excited to see everybody. :)
James' family would be arriving early the next day. Also, I had an appointment for a mani/pedi the next morning. So we both headed straight to bed.
To be continued...
**Louisa**
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