J+R

Well, I only have a few pictures of the bride and groom... and they are dancing in every one of them. I decided that it's the photographer's job to take photos of the bride and groom so I stuck to family ones.

Little Hailey was the flower girl. She was adorable!! Rachael's nephew was the ring bearer and he decided to sit down halfway down the aisle. Apparently Hailey looked back at her mama and said, "uh oh, Levi fell down!". She then turned around, saw Anthony and yelled "Daddy!!!" as she ran down the aisle to him. He married Joel and Rachael so he was conveniently at the end of the aisle. 

Hailey was a hoot! She jumped and twirled and danced the night away. She warms this Auntie's house because she is always so excited to see me. She is excited to see everyone, but that doesn't make it any less endearing. I can still see her scooting across the carpet to jump into my arms even when she had no idea who I was. And she's hilarious to boot.

And Jessica and Kaitlyn... I still cannot believe how beautifully grown-up these nieces of mine are. They aren't little girls anymore. Keeps is heading to grade 12 and Jess is coming to Kelowna to start her BSN. And they are gorgeous!

I love weddings, especially Jansen Family weddings. Not to toot our own horns, but we do weddings right. At least we do receptions right. Okay okay, I may be exaggerating a bit, but we do have fun. We entertain ourselves at the very least and embarrass our new in-laws at the most.

We have a tradition at weddings. Sharlene sadly missed out as many of us were merely infants when she married Brian. Our ages ranged from 16 months to 20 years (I was only five). But I digress. Our tradition is that we write an ABC for the individual getting married. We usually throw in a couple other skits or speeches or games, but the ABC has become a constant. This ABC has often been written around a campfire the night before the wedding (which is loads of fun, as you can imagine), but due to the lack of proximity to each other, we have started writing bits and pieces months in advance whenever we see each other. The writing of said ABC is the most fun, but we also enjoy sharing it with the individual it is written about.

I was going to give a few examples from my wedding, but after reading over them I don't know if they would be appropriate. Maybe I will post them sometime, but I'm not brave enough today. And this is about Joel and Rachael's wedding, after all.

We threw in "Guess the Chest" at the reception. Rachael was blindfolded and had to feel each of my brothers' chests and decide which belonged to her husband. She guessed wrong. We were going to play "Canadian Bacon", but didn't know how well received it would be if Rachael had to grab each of my brother's derrieres.

It was a wonderful wedding filled with laughter and love. Rachael was stunning. Joel was handsome. And they are finally finally husband and wife. We couldn't be happier for them.