The Wedding

Hello and welcome to Yammie's Noshery's return from the dead. I am going to make up for my two month absence by posting like crazy from now on. Really, I'm actually serious this time.

The reason I've been gone so long (in case you didn't already guess from the title and photos) is because I got married. It was the best wedding ever. I'm not just being biased either (okay, maybe I sort of am), but tons of people personally told me it was the best wedding they've ever been to. Maybe people just say that to be polite, but whatever. It was the best wedding I've ever been to anyway.

Samuel (that's the ridiculously good looking groom in the picture above) has a huge family. He's the eleventh of twelve kids. We tried to get a picture of everyone, but it was a tight squeeze. I think at least a little piece of everyone's heads got in which is cool.

 The best part of that is that I became an aunt to over 30 kids in one day. That was pretty exciting. And they're all painfully cute.
 


 This picture just kills me. That face.

Anyway, the service was beautiful. It was in my home church and Samuel's dad married us (he's a pastor). The church was pretty packed so it sounded awesome when everyone was singing the hymns. We didn't really have too many mishaps except that I put the ring on Samuel's right hand instead of his left. I should have known because it was way too tight to go on that finger so I was working at it for like ten minutes. Plus he actually gave me his left hand when I was about to put it on and I ignored it and grabbed the right, which I didn't remember or believe until I saw the video about a week later. Then we kind of messed up on our vows a little (we were supposed to say "I will", but instead Samuel said, "I do... I will!!!"), and maybe we messed up on a few other things too. Okay, so we actually messed up a lot, but we still got married in the end, so no worries.

It got a little stressful at times, but we were always there to help each other out...

 I was pretty excited about this dress. I got it on BHLDN and then got the lace topper from Tulip Bridal for a grand total of $370. Actually, that's a lie that I ordered it from BHLDN. Well, I did, but then I got a notification that it was on back order, so I cancelled the order and bought the same exact one for even cheaper on eBay. It came in the mail, fit like a glove, and was just what I wanted. I probably shouldn't suggest that you order your wedding dress online and expect it to fit perfectly and be just what you want on the first try, but it worked for me, so hey. 

I also really liked my bouquet. I had a bunch of garden roses and lots of different greens cascading down. Overall it was very Pinteresty, if I do say so myself.

 


Some friends decorated the getaway car for us. They did such a good job. I never knew a suburban could look "cute", but I just couldn't stop talking about how cute it was. Just ask Samuel.

We had the reception in our barn. My dad put tons of work into fixing it up and did an AWESOME job. I've got four more sisters who can get married in it too, so all his work will hopefully pay off in the end. Anyway, I was just totally determined since I was about two years old that I was having it in there, so I guess he didn't really have a choice.




We had a giant cheese tower for the appetizers. By the time I got there after the photos it was just a few scattered slices of cheese, but it looked cool in the picture. Plus those few scattered slices tasted awesome.




So, here's the crazy thing... Samuel's family is Norwegian (that's not the weird part) and they're always talking about gjetost which is a Norwegian kind of cheese. When my sister was ordering the cheese for the tower, she just tasted a bunch and picked what she thought was best, and guess what she picked for a layer. A wheel of gjetost. CRAZY.

Okay, I guess it wasn't that crazy, but I was excited about it.

You're probably wondering what we had for the meal. Well, I've heard brides say before that they don't even remember what they ate at their weddings and I thought they were crazy. How could you forget the most important part?? But now I am one of those brides.

Wait! I just found a picture...

Okay, I remember now (I mean, I see in the picture what it was and it looks familiar). It was chicken with a mushroom sauce, potatoes and vegetables. It looks like I was enjoying it anyway.

And now I will answer the question you have probably all been wondering since you heard I was getting married. Yes, I did make the cake. Well, my sister/maid of honor and I made it together.
 

We've made a few wedding cakes before together and my sister always is worrying about everything and saying we need more supports in it and stuff because she's freaked out it's going to fall over and get smashed. I always tell her to quit worrying about it because they always turn out fine. If we follow our instincts all will be well.

The only problem is, you can't trust the reliability of your good instincts on your wedding day.




It was disgustingly hot and humid the morning of the wedding. We pulled the cake out of the freezer and I started throwing the layers on top of each other.

"I don't know... it's pretty hot out. I think it might fall while we're at the ceremony," my maid of honor said, wringing her hands.

"If it falls over we'll just eat it off the floor. No problem."

"Maybe we should just try to put a few more skewers in..."

"It will be fine. Look at how sturdy it is!" I said, giving the cake a hearty pat, "Whoops!"

She cringed as I smoothed over the huge smear I had just made in the frosting.

"Now come on!" I said, leaving cake pans and frosting everywhere for somebody else to clean up and dragging her with her feet flying in the wind behind her, "We have to get to that wedding!"

Well, as it turns out, she was right. The very top layer of the cake did fall off and it ended up looking like the leaning tower of Pisa by the time we cut it. But whatever. It looked more whimsical that way anyway. Plus somebody took it upon themselves to put all those flowers on it which looked great, so thank you whoever you are that did that. And thank you also to my sister that made these silhouette toppers. Even though you'll probably never read this post, I still love you!

I really did like those toppers though. I was copying the toppers my friend had me make for her wedding cake a few years ago (that was the first wedding cake I ever made). 

So, cake flavors. We had four different flavors; classic/boring white (actually it's an awesome white cake recipe that I really should post sometime), chocolate, java chip (which was coffee flavored cake with chocolate chips), and chocolate peanut butter (which was chocolate cake with Reese's Cups and peanut butter frosting). Everybody seemed to love it so I guess it was a success in the end.

By the way, sorry if I misused that semicolon. I always get excited when I think it's finally time to use a semicolon and then after I do, I start second guessing myself and having post-semicolon stress. Anyway, moving on...

When we cut the cake, Samuel took a piece and shoved it in his own mouth since he didn't know what to do. As you can see by his face in the picture below, he is very confused by these types of rituals.

Our first dance was awesome. We did a swing dance so it was really fun. I taught Samuel how about a week before the wedding and we only practiced a few times, but he was a natural. A huge thunderstorm came out of nowhere right when we were doing it so there was a big lightning show behind us which was awesome. Then it started raining for a little while later in the night so we all danced it the rain and got all muddy and had a good time.




Anyway, I can't think of anything else to tell you about the wedding except that it was just really awesome and I wish you all could have been there.

For our honeymoon we stayed for a while in my grandparents' cottage on Lake Huron, then drove up to Mackinac Island and spent the day riding a tandem bike, strolling the touristy streets, and smelling the fudge. Then we drove to Samuel's family's cabin up North and spent a while being outdoorsy and exploring waterfalls and woods and lakes and pretty much just living on the wild side.

In case you forgot, Samuel goes to school in Berlin, so after all that honeymoon stuff, I had to go home and pack like crazy, trying to cram all my life's possessions in a suitcase. Our flight to Berlin was another one of my proudest cheap finds. We both flew over here for a total of about $500. First we flew from Detroit to Miami where we had a layover which was about 9 hours which we spent on the beach, eating some crab legs and swimming in the warm water. Then we flew to Stockholm and had another long layover which we spent exploring the city. Then we finally flew into Berlin.

 


So far we have been having an awesome time slowly getting our apartment furnished and running around trying to get everything in order. I LOVE our apartment and I LOOOOOVE Berlin. I'm sorry that's dorky of me doing caps lock like that, but I just really like it here. Berlin is an awesome city. Plus our apartment is great. I'll have to show you some pictures of it sometime when it's all decorated and everything.





Anyway, my German sucks, but I will hopefully be confident enough to have a regular conversation soon. And by the way, if any of you people happen to live in Berlin and have any tips on living here, just tell me in the comments below.

Here's a live action shot of my current view sitting at a coffee shop down the street. I seriously love this place.

Stay tuned on all my new Berlin adventures and recipes by following on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest or following by email by enter your email address in the top right hand sidebar. Tschüss!