I love, love, love weddings.
From the amount I've been to, participated in, and seen on TV, I'd say I was a connoisseur.
When my family heard that my estranged cousin was engaged to be married at the Ritz-Carlton in Half Moon Bay, we tried our best to fuse a new relationship just to get an invite.
(JK, this is sort of a sensitive subject for my aunts and uncles; he invited us to rekindle our relationship ITS ALL GOOD).
If David Tortora could plan a wedding here, he'd probably shit glitter.
This was the view behind the bride and groom and it wrapped around to the right of the guests.
The wedding was beautiful, was embellished with what my great Aunt estimates as $10,000 worth of flowers. The only issue was that the beach wasn't private, so people on the beach path were walking by during the ceremony, and there was also a poodle next to me who was chewing something crunchy really loudly, which almost ruined the entire ceremony for me. Just sayin'.
The gazebo on the beach originally looked like this:
And tens of thousands of dollars later, looked like this:
The bouquets were mostly peonies because her bridesmaids wore pink.
I loooved the mason jar idea, it made it look like they weren't spending a lot of money.
BUT THEY WERE.
The bride has a Persian side, so inside of the gazebo, there was a little shrine. It is custom to take a photo of the bride and groom in the mirror after they wed. They also opened gifts here right after the ceremony, another Persian custom.
Weirdly enough, my cousin- the groom- is Jewish, so it was a very jewish-persian-christian-cultured wedding, which made it even more fun.
The reception was held inside the Ritz-Carlton, a chain of high-end hotels of which I had never even walked by but now am very familiar with.
The tables were named after significant places to them- my cousin grew up around Boston but then moved to Virginia but went to school at UPenn (where he met his bride!), and his wife is from Arkansas (?) then went to UPenn but her family lives in New Jersey but she now works in San Fran but now will move to New York with my cousin, where he'll start his medical residency!
I sat at a table called Central Park with all my cousins.
The centerpiece of each table was a real tree adorned with more flower-filled jars.
We had champagne and wine and a several course meal, and the wedding cake had like 5-7 (I can't remember) (open bar) (this is why I stopped taking pictures) layers, each was a different color/flavor!
I didn't get the "wear blue!" memo.
sunburned sibz.
The cake was decorated with motifs of special places to the bride and groom. Speculation arose that it was made by Cake Boss.
Upon seeing the cake, my dad made a point to remind me that I'll be paying for my entire wedding.
The arrangement over the Bride and Groom's table
We danced for literally 5 hours to a cover band with all our cousins and aunts and uncles and our grandfather and the bride and groom, we drank seabreezes and gin and tonics and bourbon and coke and did tequila shots.
I love my extended family, I always have so much fun with my wild n' crazy cousins and I can't wait till my cousin David gets married a year from now!
ANOTHER WEDDING.
Bring it.
