July 19 - At last the day was here! The wedding of Jenni and Sam was the reason we went to Ireland, and we felt keenly how privileged we were to be able to celebrate with them that day!
Jenni and Sam got married at Kells Presbyterian, that stately old stone building where Jenni and her dad had worshiped and she had taught Sunday School for some number of years. Derek and I remember the short drive down the road to the church from their home when we visited back in 2007.
April and Tim. :) April read Scripture as part of the service.
Sam and his three best men taking a selfie before the service began.
I don't have many good official-looking wedding photos, and the ones we do have are heavily weighted toward photos of our family, but I chose around 30 of the best of our 120 to share (and this is after my original sifting!). This moment is just a memory . . . the wigglies while we were all waiting. :)
No bride's face here, but there is a glimpse of the happy groom's . . .
They were married by Jenni's pastor from Belfast, where she'd lived in N. Ireland most recently. And that's all we have from the ceremony, sorry! I spent the sermon outside with a noisy Ruthie, but I do remember singing at least two hymns/spiritual songs. The order of their service was different from our own wedding, but the elements were the same with one notable exception. While music played, the bride and groom and their witnesses signed the marriage certificate in front of everyone. I loved it!
It was soon time for Reception stage 1. :) The Pastor had invited the general population into the fellowship hall for tea, and I share this photo partly to illustrate how much more care the British put into dressing for weddings than we do. There were many hats, headdresses, formal updos and semi-formal gowns, even for an afternoon wedding. It was all lovely!
Friends serving tea, which accompanied a large table of dainty desserts.
Meanwhile, the children played in the nursery and we did our best to capture the two Gemmas. :)
(The aforementioned barn door.)
While the bridal party took photos, we explored a little bit and tried to get some portraits of our own, with mixed success. :)
Before long, we were all welcomed to find our seats in the barn. The rumor was that Jenni had brought back these teacup place card favors and coffee beans from a market in Ethiopia. The children had jelly beans in theirs. :)
We had lots of laughs over dinner, especially once the speeches started. The British truly outdo us in speeches! Both dads spoke, and all three best men spoke (Sam's brothers holding up a bar graph to display the relative number of spankings each sibling received growing up! According to them, little sister Yolanda had just about none . . . ). Sam spoke, Gemma's husband Graham spoke . . . and there were probably others, but I had to spend some of the time outside, corralling little ones.
This photo really shows Jenni--trying to get her dinner, yet ready to smile for a random camera while someone else tries to get her attention! Lovely Yolanda is in the background.
Making friends. :)
Always the self-forgetting hostess, even on her wedding day, Jenni was soon working her way around the tables, greeting all her guests. In the course of chatting with our Irish tablemates, John and I learned that the clinking of glasses was a foreign custom to those present, but we decided to try, and clinked in sync, as loud as we could. Others looked around, a bit confused, but Jenni knew what to do, and quickly found her husband to give him the kiss requested by us Americans. :)
Cutting the cake . . . after serving us each a large dessert! There were three choices, and I remember that I had an exceedingly rich and delicious caramel pavlova.
Then we briefly detained poor Logan, pipe-in-hand, hoping to get a family portrait in front of the stone building. We tried.
After dinner, the waitstaff asked us to wander about while they removed the tables from the barn for dancing.
There was plenty to do while we waited. :)
The children, being darlings . . . Gemma and Graham's girls were so sweet to ours.
The afternoon wore on, and the little ones began wearing out. :) I love this photo of Mr. Campbell, being a sweet grandpa.
As it grew dark, it was time for Reception, stage 3! The British outdo us not only in speeches, but in their celebrating! Since the barn could seat a limited number of people, additional friends were invited as "evening guests," arriving about now in time for a completely new buffet of sausages, sandwiches, chips, more sweets and more tea. I snapped this photo after the table had been rummaged through a bit and it was growing dark.
Soon the DJ was ready and the dancing began with a Cèilidh (pronounced "kaylee," I believe), which was practically speaking an Irish barn dance. :) A caller organized us into circles, lines, or squares, as each dance required, and walked us through the steps for each one. It was loads of fun, though a bit hard for our little ones to understand. Gemma was content to stand in the middle of a circle with all the grownups skipping around her, but Ruthie was tired and confused, so I attempted to dance with her on my hip for a few rounds.
We sat out for a couple of dances, then Sarah and Logan kindly watched our children while we returned to the barn for what became the last "dance" of the Cèilidh--the hat game. It was like a version of musical chairs, with height being a certain advantage as it involved passing hats to the person behind you and making sure you had one on your head when the music stopped. I say this because John ended up being one of the two or three finalists. :)
Then the DJ started playing the usual stuff, and even our little ones had fun with daddy for a song or two. It was growing late, however, and as it neared 11, we realized the party was going to last longer than we were. We loaded our exhausted children into the car and drove back up to the coast in the dark after a full day, later seeing photographic evidence that we had missed out on some fire-breathing by abandoning the party so early!
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