One might say I have yet to recover completely from the excitement that has been the last few weeks. I've hardly had time to do anything remotely close to sitting at my computer and catching up on my blog. I think I might have time now to share the memories of the day that our little Kathy became a Mrs. Bailey.
Many were under the misconception that I had a lot to do with the planning of Kathy and Mark's big day. The truth was that they did most of it themselves and the whole event turned out to be lovely. Kathy was in a bit of a state in December deciding on when to have the big day. She and Mark are planning on moving to London at the end of the semester and she wanted time to get settled as a married girl before the move. Spring Break was the most logical time and it meant that the wedding planning was put on fast forward.
Because of scheduling issues and just plain convenience, the reception was on March 6th, the night before the sealing, at Le Jardin, a garden reception center in Draper. It was a very pretty venue with little need for any decorations. Thank heavens because it was pretty much just me, Brent, and Stella there to set up the many framed pictures that Kathy and Mark wanted to display. Mark's sister was also a photographer so they had more pictures than the average couple. The reception was kind of a blur for me. Many of Brent's family had just arrived from back east and the rainy weather added a bit to the chaos of the evening. I don't think Kathy and Mark noticed too much chaos though, they were too happy. There were a lot of people who came in and out of the event. It was full of a lot of love, support, and happiness for the bride & groom. I was the only one really taking pictures (except, of course, for the photo booth gal) and so my feet were killing by the end of the reception when John (who had been up since like 4 AM), Iva, Steve, Brent, Stella and I were taking everything down. But it was all worth it, because I would pretty much do anything for Miss Kathy. The whole reception was just beautiful, right down to how pretty she looked, and every now and then I would have to take a minute to just sit back and notice the beautiful night.
It was fun to have my family there too. Miss Ava worked her way through all of Mark's nephews (he has like a gaggle of them) until she found one who would dance with her and be her boyfriend for the night. Good old Sam is still on Ava's mind. Miss Stella was the official videographer during the dancing portion of the evening. She took her assignment as video girl very seriously, and the results are priceless.
Friday morning on the 7th, we drove out to South Jordan for a very beautiful wedding luncheon hosted by Mark's family. I couldn't help myself and had to get up and say how much I loved Kathy, letting her know that she is as much like a sister to me as if I'd known her my whole life. I also talked about how much Stella loved her and how from the moment she held hours-old Stella, I knew that they had a special friendship and auntie/niece bond. Stella then wanted to talk. She got nervous so I helped her but I had her say things that she had actually said to me before. She was happy for Aunt Kathy, but sad about her moving. She liked Mark and he was just her friend then, but soon when they got married he would be her uncle. It was cute. Then Brent got up (with a little wifely persuasion) and said some sweet things about his sister that made her cry. Joking at first that they always say she is actually adopted because she is the most normal one in the family. Then saying what a wonderful person she has become and that he knows she will be a great mother from watching how she is with Stella. Later Kathy told me that she was surprised to hear Brent say such nice things. "I didn't know he thought that," she said. Typical brother behavior I guess--sometimes I think the whole Sallay clan wonders what I am doing married to Brent, because he can be kind of a twit with his siblings.
We then headed down to the Salt Lake Temple for the sealing. It was a very beautiful sealing and Kathy had lots of tears throughout it. We then waited a good while for them to come out before taking pictures in the cold wind. I was in charge of taking the family pictures. It was a lot of hard work and I'm not sure that everyone was taking me all that seriously. The end result is that the pictures aren't really up to my usual standards, but I think I still did a pretty good job considering that I had to do so much multitasking.
The pictures of the bride and groom turned out really pretty though. The light was lovely. Overall, I think the whole celebration was really nice and I hope Kathy and Mark will always look back at their wedding weekend as a very special time with family and friends.
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