Mary + Luke, Part I

A few weeks ago Preston and I headed down to Virginia, that loveliest of states (deepest apologies, Pennsylvania - you know I love you, but Virginia will always have my heart), to see my friend Mary marry (ha!) her then-fiancé/now-husband Luke!

This was the first wedding in which I'd been actively involved (I was a bridesmaid) since my own wedding, and although I was SUPER excited a) to see my high school friends, b) to witness Mary and Luke saying 'I do' and c) to take SO MANY pictures, I was not 100% excited about going through Project: Wedding again, even if it wasn't my own. In my experience (and granted, my experience is limited), weddings seem to bring out if not the worst of people, at least a super stressed-out version of those people.

The emotions weddings elicit are intense - not that that's necessarily a bad thing. For example, I don't think I've ever felt closer to God than when Preston and I knelt on the altar together at our wedding two years ago, and when I looked out at the crowd in the sanctuary after our ceremony, my heart swelled with joy in a way I didn't realize was possible. [Indeed, much like the Grinch, my heart grew three sizes that day, and then I enjoyed a feast with my friends. The similarities are striking!]

On the flip side, in the weeks leading up to my wedding I was incredibly unhappy. I was sleeping an average of four hours a night, effortlessly losing weight from stress, and trying desperately to put on a happy face for everyone around me. Inside I was brittle and broken and had panic attacks about anything and everything. Similarly, as Mary put it a few nights ago, in the week leading up to her wedding, she cried at least once a day every day. Because y'all. Weddings are hard. They are joyful and beautiful, but also HARD. Especially when you have planned everything yourself, as both Mary & Luke and Preston & I did.

All of this is to say that before we drove down to Virginia three weeks ago, I was really nervous about heading into the hotbed of estrogen that is Planning A Wedding (and remember, at this point I was four weeks pregnant and EVEN MORE hormonal than usual). In the end, however, although there were some stressful moments that week - there were tears and disagreements and even some snapping between spouses (ahem, I may have been one of those spouses...) - when I look back at the pictures from the weekend, all I see is love. And I mean that in the purest way possible.

I don't know how to say it without sounding ridiculous, but there it is: the weekend was full of love, and that is, without a doubt, the dominant memory from those days in Virginia (which is in and of itself pretty amazing, considering that it was one hundred and four degrees that weekend, and that I could - at all moments - feel my back sweating (you're welcome!)). But when I look at these photos I don't see the heat and the sweat and the stress. All I see is love - and not the sunshine and lollipops kind of love (although there was plenty of that too) - but real, deep, we're-in-it-for-keeps love. And it was awesome.

I'm gradually transferring these photos to Flickr, but because I took SO MANY, they will be going up in batches. As of right now, the viewable photos include those from Mary's bachelorette shindig, those from the party that Preston and I threw for the happy couple, those from the wedding set-up day, and those from the Rehearsal/Rehearsal Dinner. More coming soon!