Amber's Waves: Sami's Married!

My little sister got married this weekend in Wilmington, NC. She had a gorgeous ceremony & reception!

First things first - I and her friend, Meredith, were in the wedding party, so we threw her a bachelorette bash Thursday night. I can't give you the details to protect the innocent, but we started with dinner and ended at 2am at a Cowboy Bar called City Limits. Sam had a great time as you can see form this photo (all others have been destroyed. :)

Samantha holds her own on the mechanical bull!

I also got stopped near the UNCW campus by a mandatory drunk driving checkpoint. This was pretty fun, since I was probably the only sober person on campus that night. The cops, however, apparently didn't believe that I hadn't been drinking (I don't think anyone in that town believes that the MN driver's license is real), so I got to take a breathalizer test on the spot!! Double zeroes, baby.

Sam recently moved to Massachusetts, so this may be the last time we visit Wilmington and we needed to live it up while we had the chance. Nathan and I stayed at the Blockade Runner hotel on Wrightsville Beach. Although it was too cloudy each day to see the green flash, we did enjoy the very beachworthy weather (80's in October!) and took full advantage of the beach (we saw dolphins almost every day)! I also met up with a woman who was on the Corporate Service Corp Tanzania 3 team, Gloria. We'd worked together via the phone, but had never met in person. She showed me around the South side of Wilmington and took me to Carolina Beach State Park. I bet you thought Venus Flytraps lived in abundance in the deep forests of the Amazon, right? Me too. Apparently, they only live within 75 miles of Wilmington, NC and that's it! They are also incredibly tiny! I got to see two patches in the wild, which was, well, wild.

Wild Venus Flytraps

Ok, back to the wedding. Sam had been planning to have the wedding outside in Greenfield Park, but all week it was threatening to rain. It was touch-and-go there for a while, but we all arrived at the park at 3:30pm to sunshine. The place is gorgeous - a lake, beautiful trees, and Sam walked over to the ceremony on a bridge. Colors were ivory and wine. Look at Sam all grown up!

The ceremony was short and this turned out to be key. Five minutes after it ended, we heard thunder. We scrambled to simultaneously take pictures and get chairs and music equipment into the cars. Just as we'd finished taking the basic set of shots (the last few were quite dark), it started to rain. We'll have a good picture of the wedding party running to their cars. About a minute after we got into the cars, it started to pour.

The reception site was the Best Western Coastline Convention Center in downtown Wilmington, a cute little brick building on the river. Dinner was awesome, then we danced the night away (wait - did I say we? I meant Adam's family - they are much more outgoing and comfortable with their moves than we are!). Actually, I felt a little overpowered by Adam's family; our side being so far away, we barely rounded out one 8-person table. The rest of the 63 guests were Adam's.

Anyway, Sam had fun. She and Adam left in style at 9pm, riding in a limo all the way to Raleigh to catch an early flight to St. Lucia for their honeymoon.

It was a VERY successful day. The only thing that "went wrong" is that the black chairs Sam ordered turned out to be white. This is by far an improvement over Nathan and my wedding, in which the officiant forgot to have our witnesses sign the marriage certificate (the one thing that needed to happen to make it official)!

Congrats Sami & Adam!! Here are some pictures for you to enjoy!