Trendy Girl Party

An Unforgettable Windy Shower

We had our first couple’s wedding shower almost a month ago and I must say, it was UH-mazing…..in spite of the 60 m.p.h. winds. Like everything concerning the wedding thus far, this party gave us some unnecessary turbulence prior to and during, but everything worked out fairly nicely in the end, which is what I hope will be the outcome of our wedding. My family had been preparing for this wedding shower for about four months; every single detail was taken care of. I joked, nervously, that the shower would be much nicer than the actual wedding.

Everything seemed perfect, until three days prior to the wedding shower when we started getting word that our guests hadn’t received their invitations. I didn’t know what to do! I didn’t have everyone’s number to call personally and the people whose contact information I did have, I didn’t want to seem too pushy and ask, “ARE YOU COMING TO OUR SHOWER?” What if some people got the invite but are just choosing not to show up? I let things be and that is the one action I really regretted. It turns out a lot of people who had wanted to attend the shower hadn’t received an invitation. By not following up with them, after getting word that not all of the invitations were sent out, I made it seem like we didn’t want to invite them at all. Hindsight!

The people who were lucky enough to have actually received their invitation arrived right on time. The thing is the weather was not cooperating. The wedding shower was held at my eldest brother’s house and the plan was to have an elegant outdoor affair. Instead, all of the centerpieces were on my brother’s ottoman since the mixture of high winds and glass centerpieces would have created a hazardous event. The first guests arrived and they REFUSED to go outside, I started to panic. I wore a sleeveless dress on the day of the freezing wind party, but I refused to put a jacket on. I thought if people saw me without a jacket they would assume the weather wasn’t so bad and would want to go outside. Well, it didn’t quite work that way. Everyone huddled up inside in any crevice they could find. My brother’s backyard looked like a ghost town. My cousin who was also the DJ for the night, started setting up outside with a winter coat on. I hoped that once people saw the music had arrived they would definitely want to go outside, again, not the case. Only my 17 and under cousins decided to brave the cold winds to do, whatever sort of dancing they do at this day in age.

For about a 30 minute window, the winds had died down and the weather was somewhat bearable. Most of our guests rushed outside because, I think, they saw the despair in all of our faces. That didn’t last too long though, eventually everyone made their way back inside once the winds started up again. Throughout this havoc, all of the men in my family, including Adrian had tried to find a solution to the cold weather and made a trip to the store to buy outdoor heaters. Everyone agreed the heaters would not make a difference since it was the cold winds that were making the outdoors unbearable. They came back about an hour and a half later with a dozen heaters and never even opened the boxes, the heaters were definitely no challenge for the evil winds.
Though the inside of my brother’s house looked like a super-sized can of stuffed sardines the ambiance was so lively! The shower finally took off once we started serving the food. Everyone began to talk to each other, people that wouldn’t otherwise have met, due to the long and separated tables outside, developed a close bond. My world and Adrian’s world were finally mingling; it brought a warm feeling inside. Finally, my family can put a face to all of the people I rave about in Adrian’s family and hopefully that Adrian raves about too! Though I wish everyone we invited could have made it, or would have at least known about the wedding shower I believe everything happens for a reason. Hopefully there will be at least one more shower of this magnitude where we will make sure to double and triple check that everyone is informed about it.

I have to admit, Adrian and I didn’t get to see much of each other throughout the event, but it felt really nice to know how much everyone cared for us. Adrian’s mom, his step dad and my aunt drove for hours from out of town just for the shower, another aunt worked tirelessly to make two huge and DELICIOUS mountains of cupcakes for the event and my immediate family did not take a break for weeks to make sure everything looked just right. And of course it wouldn’t be a party without my beloved grandma’s rice and salsa.

We are both so grateful to have such a loving family that would be so willing to come together and meet the people that are most important in our lives, for us. I couldn’t ask for anything more and at times I feel selfish for not fully appreciating the little things in life that so many people can only dream of having.

Needless to say, I learned quite a few things from this shower. Here are a few bridal shower planning tips:

1. If you have not received RSVP’s from most of your guests, and you suspect there is an issue with delivery, follow up to make sure everyone received their invitation.
2. Relax and have fun! Something is bound to go wrong, if and when it does, fix it and if you can’t, just move on!

Our wedding shower helped me realize that no matter how bad things get on the wedding day, knock on wood, it will all turn out beautifully and much better than we ever would have expected.  This puts me at ease for my upcoming wedding.  Thanks for reading…until next time!

-Adriana