Time to share wedding pictures!

Amy and I got back from our honeymoon last night! What a three weeks we've had, I think we're going to spend the next three weeks (months? decades?) trying to catch up with what happened.

The first step is to start sharing wedding pictures around. First up are the official photographs from Carl Walsh. There are 604 of them! And we love them all! You can go to this website just to browse through them. Or even buy them a la carte if you really feel like it.

CLICK HERE TO SEE THE OFFICIAL PHOTOGRAPHS.

As good as those are, it's so often the case that the best or at least most beloved photographs come from unpredictable sources. Darin's photographs, of course, which you've already seen, are totally great. But we've started to get some others in that we really love. My mom sent some nice photos in, CLICK HERE, and Jimmie sent us just a few that are really good, CLICK HERE.

If you have some photographs you don't mind sharing, either with the whole group or just with us, please add a comment or send them to us via email. We'd love to see them!

Music is Love

MUSIC IS LOVE by David Crosby.

Hi there! Since we're heading off for the great North, this is the last post we can promise on this here website. We may post some updates, or bits of information, or anything, but from here until the wedding (and then after that, of course), we won't be too near computers too much. Besides, it's time to have the wedding, and stop talking about it! We'll still be around off-blog, so if any of you have questions, just email or call us and we'll try to work it out.

Amy thought of a couple more people we should thank, so I'll do that now. First Kevin Heaphy Fitness. We love them, and if you live near us and find yourself jealous of Amy's guns at the wedding, you should consider signing up! I'd like to thank our friend Oscar Udeshi for making my suit. It got here this week and, frankly, it's awesome. Any of you guys in New York or London wanting really well-made clothes should ring him. I'd also like to mention all of the people who can't come to the wedding but who have nevertheless sent the nicest messages to us. We'll miss you! I am going to single out Dr. and Mrs. Vardaman in this regard, but only because they were the only people that asked to be put on the website despite not coming. Here you are! ;)

We'd like to leave you with a song cross-posted from our music blog. Music Is Love. It's a song we've become quite fond of around here. Have a listen, have a download, and have safe travels to Maine. See you in a few days!

LISTEN.

Saturday Schedule of Events Revisited

We're going to get tired of saying "I can't believe it's only x days until the wedding" right up until the wedding is over, but still, 8 days is blowing my mind. Tomorrow Amy is driving Martin up to Maine, and unless I can contrive a work reason to stay behind, I'll be going too. I'm looking forward to the trip, but I woke up early this morning fully convinced that we won't have enough room in the car for everything. We've got a list a mile long to do between now and then.

One way or the other, we'll get there, and all of you will to. But the point of this post is to tell you a little bit more about Saturday.

On the main website, we have a schedule of events for Saturday. Look at it here.

We've already told you about taking a ferry out to the island, with driving directions and everything.

Click here for directions to the ferry.

The ceremony starts at 5, and the last ferry leaves at 4 from Southwest Harbor. That ferry will probably arrive around 4:30, giving people half an hour to loiter and wander up to the church. We know the majority of people of people will be on that ferry, but we have encouraged people to come early if they can, by telling them about places like the museum, the Islesford Pottery shop, and most importantly, the croquet tournament on the town field!

If you would like to come out early, you can come in full dress or even bring your wedding clothes with you and change on the island. There are a few houses we have access to where you can freshen up.

We're looking forward to the wedding ceremony, and don't want to talk about it too much yet, but thanks in advance especially to our parents, Mayur, Christie, Darin, and the Rivals for helping us out with it!

After the wedding ceremony is over, we'll wander more or less directly back down to the Islesford Dock Restaurant, and the food should start coming pretty quickly.

Click here to watch a short video about our friends and the restaurant proprietors, Dan and Cynthia.

A word about the reception. There will be no formal "sit-down" period at the reception. There will be food stations, and food brought out by servers, more or less continuously, but not a sit down appetizer course, entree course, etc. We thought this would be the best way to let people mingle and relax in the casual spirit of things. Just make sure you eat and don't wait!

After awhile we'll be opening up the microphone for toasts and stuff, and eventually the music will start. We've asked our friend Jason to kind of oversee all this, so he'll keep you informed of things. Jason and Stu (and to the extent they need help, Jimmie) will be DJ'ing, and I can tell you now they've got some excellent material lined up.

Around 10:30 you'll have an opportunity to bid us adieu, as the first ferry back to Southwest Harbor will be leaving around then. After that, the music will just continue until people run out of steam entirely (there will be a late snack to help keep the party going). But all good things must come to an end and there will one more ferry taking everyone else home, leaving anywhere between midnight and one (depending on how it's going).

Thanks to everyone that has been helping us put this all together (there are LOADS of you, it's really humbling), and of course thanks to everyone for dragging themselves up 200, 500, 2,000 miles to get to the thing.

August Eight

Happy Birthday Dad!

Life on Islesford

When we went up to Maine in April to do some wedding planning, we had a fantastic dinner at Dan & Cynthia's house with their friends Bruce and Barb Fernald. The meal was excellent, and the company was even better. It was the first time we had seen Barb since the day after we got engaged--she was having dinner with Dan and Cynthia when we arrived at the restaurant, and so she was among the first in the world to know about our engagement (not only that, as the local society columnist, she was the first to publicly record it, in the July 27, 2006 edition of the Mount Desert Islander!)

Little did we know that Bruce and Barb were famous! I recently picked up this charming little book called "The Secret Life of Lobsters" by Trevor Corson, and it turns out Bruce and Barb are major characters in it. Here's how the book starts:

The morning sky was glowing pink in the southeast but a chill hung in the salt air. The grumble of a truck engine echoed across the harbor. Bruce Fernald's rust-encrusted Ford pickup skidded to a halt in the gravel near the fisherman's co-op on Little Cranberry Island. ...

A century earlier, three hundred Maine islands had been home to year-round communities of fishermen and seafarers. Little Cranberry Island was one of just fourteen such year-round communities that remained. A mile and a half long and shaped like a pork chop, it lay among four other small islands that together formed the Cranberry Isles. Nestled just south of the larger island of Mount Desert, the Cranberries were visible to hikers in Acadia National Park as a cluster of green slabs on the ocean.

Little Cranberry Island had been Bruce's home for most of his fifty years, and he'd spent most of his adult life trapping lobsters around the island's shores. ... Down the main street was the Protestant Church. In the other direction was the Catholic chapel, where a fisherman's net hung behind Jesus, the fisher of men. Bruce Fernald attended neither, but if the lobstering didn't improve, it was possible he'd begin attending both.

Guestbook Outtakes, Part 3

...And just a few more.

Guestbook Outtakes, Part 2

Here are some more photos. Nice looking people we got coming!

Guestbook Outtakes, Part 1

We had a great time putting pictures together of all of our friends and family that are coming up to Maine. Sometimes it was a question of finding any suitable picture to use (or getting Martin to stand in), but more often than not it was a question of picking one picture out of lots of great ones. Rather than binning all of the other photos, I thought it might be nice to post a few of them here.

August Eighteen Invitational Croquet Tournament

It's too bad we're not all up in Maine right now, because we're all missing the 31st annual Claremont Croquet Classic being held at the Claremont Hotel in Southwest Harbor. (We have one lonely guest staying at the Claremont for our wedding, by the way.)

But if you're really eaten up about this (as I am), you're in luck! For awhile we've been planning to have the August Eighteen Invitational Croquet Tournament on Islesford's town field before the wedding Saturday afternoon. [Late update: The "Invitational" part is very much meant to be tongue-in-cheek. Everybody's welcome to play whenever they show up!]


Now, everything about that last sentence is pretty tenuous, from the name (which I just made up), to the "planning," which basically involves bringing a croquet set and some champagne, getting permission from the mayor to have alcohol on the field, and enough people show up early to play.

Mayur has agreed to bring the croquet set, and Jimmie has agreed to secure the booze, so we're in good shape! Come out early and have a whack!

More guests in the guestbook!

Welcome to August! The last month is finally here, and we're ringing it in with news of new guests coming to the wedding! Kyle and Sarah. Sarah is Laura's sister, which makes Kyle Laura's brother-in-law and Corbett's bandmate. With Kyle, Corbett, Sinderson, and Flood all coming, we almost have the full band in attendance on Islesford. Hmm.

While I was updating the website I added a bit more info to the Schedule of Events if you're really bored. Today Amy and I bought a couple of great prizes to give to the best dressed male and female at the Friday Night barbecue. I was going to take a picture and put it up here, but Amy already wrapped everything up, so it will have to remain a surprise. Go visit Sheplers.com and get your cowpoke stuff quick!

A night out on the town

We're getting down to the stage where every time we see someone it might be the last time before we see them before the wedding, so maybe in that respect our adventures last night are worth a short comment. First up we had dinner with Janelle and Freddie (and Windy, Katie, & Chris) at Habana Outpost in Brooklyn. I hadn't met Freddie before, so that was good. We talked music--Elvis, late-50s rock & roll, mid-90s hip hop, you know, the usual!

After dinner we went over to a birthday party for one of Amy & Janelle's colleagues, at a bar in Park Slope. We were well and truly cooked by then, which may explain why we decided it would be a good idea to make one more party--back to Manhattan we went (me and Amy and Windy) to a bar holding a karaoke night and celebrating George's birthday.

We got there after the high point of the party but still managed to revel with Philip, Deirdre, Maddox, and George, among others, and also brutalize Heart's Alone and Digital Underground's The Humpty Dance.

A great night, for which we've spent all day today recovering from!

Wedding Music

I don't know how many of you read our music blog, but for the past couple of weeks I've been preoccupied there with what's going on over here. The wedding, that is.

So first I posted some tracks that won't get played at the wedding reception, even though I kinda wish they would.

Then I went through some boogaloo tracks that would also be nice, but depend on who is in charge of the reception music.

This week I'm posting some songs that I can almost guarantee will played, and rightfully so.

In addition, I've posted a couple of times about The Rivals, who will also have an important role up there.

So if you aren't already, I encourage you to check the other place out, from now until the wedding!

It was one year ago today...

...that Amy and I got engaged. It was such a long-running joke (sometimes warm, sometimes awkward) that Amy and I were "married" already, that I'm surprising no one by saying I feel like there's nothing more Amy could do to feel like a spouse post-August 18 than she does already, but I suppose that's we signed up to find out!

In my life this year I've had my fair share of highs (Katie's wedding especially!) and lows (the lowest, of course, being losing my Grandma back in May), and not only can I say Amy's been a rock for me with all of that, but she fully shared all of it with me. They were her highs and lows too, and I find that amazing.

***
Given the amount of material we've generated for this wedding blog, there hasn't been all that much about how we got here, so here's a little story.

July 2006. We had been planning to go up to Maine for awhile, but I had to work a little longer, so Amy took Martin and drive up ahead to York Beach to stay with her Dad. The next day (?), I left work early and got on a bus to go to Portsmouth, New Hampshire. I probably should have just taken a plane, because I ended up getting stranded in Boston and having to rent a car to drive up the last hour north, but being on the bus gave me a chance to write a letter to Amy about getting engaged.

That night we stayed in York Beach, and the next morning, I took Martin to the beach (While watching the dog run around I sent John Southard a text saying "I'm in Maine," btw). Then we packed up and drove up the coastal highway, stopping at Red's Eats, then taking the late ferry out to Islesford (just like we did last week!)


Sunday the 16th, we got up on Islesford and took the ferry into Acadia National Park, where we spent the day climbing over rocks, having fun, taking pictures with our digital camera (many of which are dotted all over our website today) (more here), and getting ready for camping at Blackwoods Campground.

Campsite #110. We had all the gear but we (I) wasn't the most competent camper. So I let Amy set up the tent and everything else, and I documented her efforts on the digital camera. Then I suggested that, instead of trying to cook over a fire, we drive into Bar Harbor and try a restaurant Corbett and Laura had suggested.

The West Street Cafe. Amy got the Early Bird lobster special, which entailed donning a lobster bib. I began teasing her about the bib.

Amy said, "Fine, I'll take it off!"

I said, "No, keep it on, and if you wear it the rest of the night, I'll think of a reward."

Amy said, "Deal, but the reward better be good!"


I smiled to myself at that! So we finished dinner, and drove back to the campsite. On the way we picked up some firewood, and Sunday NY Times to use as kindling (you wouldn't think I would need an entire Sunday Times to start a fire, but let me remind you I'm an incompetent camper!)

Back at the campsite. Everything is set up, and Amy is tired of wearing her silly lobster bib.

Amy said, "Can I take this off now? You owe me a reward!"

I said, "Okay, but let me take a few photos of you in the bib for posterity's sake."

So I did--they capture the last thirty seconds of Amy's life as a non-engaged person. So I finished taking the shots, and went to put the camera away.

Amy said, "Wait! Let me see how the pictures turned out!"

Here's where I had done something clever (don't call it a gimmick!) Back when Amy was setting up the tent, I had snuck off and taken a picture of myself holding a sign proposing marriage to her. (We still have that photo, of course, but as far as I know Amy's never let anyone else see it.) So when Amy started scrolling back through the photos, she eventually, climatically, came across this one.

Amy, stunned, crying, said, "Is this for me?" (!)

I said, "Well, will you?"


She said yes! And that's how we got engaged. The next day we thought we'd go to the top of Cadillac Mountain to see if we could call our families with the news. No luck (Please note, wedding guests: Acadia has very poor reception for everyone except AT&T/Cingular customers. This is how I justified buying an iPhone!)

Because we couldn't tell anybody, we spent the whole day with our special secret to ourselves. That night we went back to Islesford and told Dan and Cynthia and all of the patrons of the Islesford Dock Restaurant--the same place, of course, where we are having the reception. It was only the next morning, towards Bangor, that we got enough reception to contact our families and friends, i.e., all of you, and we spent the rest of our trip back celebrating and thinking about coming back to Maine for the wedding.

Meet the Flynns

We have new guests to tell you about, and important guests they are! Matt and Jeanne have been great friends and role models to Amy forever. We always knew they were coming, but the logistics of getting three kids together and up to Maine takes time, naturally enough. We're psyched they're booked up though. Go see them here (scroll down).

Trip to Maine, Part 4: The Return

Sunday morning and we debated whether to catch the 8:30 a.m. ferry or wait for the 11 a.m. In hindsight (and at the time to be fair) the better option was to get the earlier boat, but we couldn't be bothered. This time Amy stayed in bed and I took Martin down to the beach.

Once I got tired of the dog splashing in the water, I went back to the house, then went and fetched the car from the restaurant. (Fetching the car means walking about 6 minutes down the lane and across the town field to the restaurant, then a 40 second drive back.) We loaded up our stuff and hauled it right back to the dock.


At the restaurant we discussed the reception a little more with Dan & Cynthia (tablecloths, if you must know), then waited for our food. We waited a little bit more. Then we started checking our watches in a mild but still ridiculous anxiety that people from the mainland get when they're on the island: MUST. NOT. MISS. THE. FERRY. Dan has told us before that a surprising number of guests at the reception will take the first boat back solely because of this anxiety.

As it turns out we were more ridiculous than most. The whole time we were chatting nervously about the schedule, looking out the window, the ferry driver himself was sitting right next to me, having his breakfast. We got our check and rushed out. He strolled over about 5 minutes later.

We made it back safe and sound, of course, and exactly 12 hours after we boarded, we walked back into our apartment in New York. Yes, 12 hours, but we stopped at Amy's dad's house for more than an hour, and the traffic in Southern Maine coming back from the July 4th weekend was unusually dense. Nothing much happened except we realized we hadn't taken any photos together, so we fixed that. So concludes our planning trip to Maine! (Want more? Here are some more photos.)

Trip to Maine, Part 3

Saturday was our only full day on the island and we were determined to make the most of it. Around 7 am, Amy got up and took Martin down to the Sand Beach for a bit. At 8 am we were supposed to meet with Dan and Cynthia to go over the menu. Cynthia wasn't feeling well, unfortunately, so instead we took a walk into town. Town? That's really overstating it. There's a church, a post office, a meeting hall, a bed and breakfast, and that's about it. So we went to the church and saw it for the first time fully opened up. It looks great. Very New England. On the outside, unfortunately, they're still doing some work on the steeple, but Dan assured us the remaining scaffolding will be gone by next month.


Across the street Amy got us some coffee and bought some stamps to use for thank you cards. If you have any stamp needs this summer, it would be really nice if you bought them from the Islesford post office. Funnily enough, their stamp business is a major source of town income! At the post office we ran into Ashley Bryan, who may be the town's most famous resident. For any of you with kids, I encourage you to pick up one of Mr. Bryan's books. Say, "Ashley Bryan's African Tales, Uh-Huh."

With our coffee we sat down and addressed some postcards and dropped those off. Then Amy stopped at the bed and breakfast to check on something for her Dad.

By then it was time to go meet with Dan at the restaurant. I think the food we picked out is going to be a huge hit. One thing I'm especially looking forward to is the raw bar. Unfortunately, there's no guarantee we'll be able to get oysters the week of the wedding. This is because the restaurant only buys local. All in all a sound policy, but we'll just have to keep our fingers crossed.

By now we were struggling to catch the 11 am ferry, but still dropped in at Marian Baker's pottery for a minute to say hi, while Amy checked out some flower arrangement stuff. Oh, and we drove up to Karen Smallwood's house and had a five-minute consultation on our wedding cake!

Up to Northeast Harbor, over to Southwest Harbor we went. We barely caught Gail the florist to drop off a vase and then over to the Marine store to pick up a new GPS antenna for Dan. And with that, our hard work was basically done. We drove the long way around the quiet side of the island to visit Bass Harbor (a town neither of us had been to), then we made our way to the Knox Road Grille at the Atlantic Brewery.


For those of you reading our invitation closely, you'll know this is where we're meeting Friday night for drinks. And bbq, should you so desire. For $17, they had all-you-can-eat barbecue (pork ribs, chicken, pulled pork, sausage, listed in my order of preference). Amy reports the veggie burger is also legitimately good. The main thing, though, is if the weather holds, it will be an excellent and mellow atmosphere and a perfect place to welcome people to the wedding.

Doug, the pitmaster/proprietor, suggested we arrange transportation between Southwest Harbor and the barbecue so people can more fully enjoy the Brewery's varied and award-winning offerings. So off to Bar Harbor we went! There we stopped at an ice cream shop that's also home to Oli's Trolleys. It's not finalized yet, but we are working on getting a trolley or two for people on Friday night. While Amy was inside haggling over details, I walked Martin over to the harbor. As obsessed as she can be with the frisbee, she's more obsessed with the water, so while we were taking in the view, Martin... jumped in. Nearly bringing me in with her since we were attached by leash. Bad dog.

This report is becoming tedious, but there's still more to tell you about. Two spas, one in Trenton (across from Bar Harbor airport), one back in Northeast Harbor. Between the two Amy and I debated when she'll have time to get her pedicures--with no resolution yet.

We still had some time before the 6:00 ferry so we shopped around for some insect repellent to give to people. I'm allergic to mosquito bites, so this insect repellent thing is a major preoccupation of mine. I carry OFF around with me at all times.


When we finally made it back to Little Cranberry, our energy was understandably ebbing (well, except for Martin, who jumped back in the water below the dock), but we managed to find it in ourselves to go meet with Christina Spurling back at the church, who is going to be playing piano and/or organ at the wedding ceremony. She's very good, and we were kind of abashed because we didn't give her much guidance as to what we wanted. That explains why at this very moment I'm listening to a bunch of organ music I scrounged up from iTunes, hoping to find something we like and she can play for us.

Alright, I'm tired now just writing this, so here's the rest: emails with Darin about the sound system, dinner with Dan and Cynthia and Leslie, picking wines for the reception, back to the house, sleep!

Trip to Maine, Part 2

Friday morning after going to the beach with Martin, the first item on the agenda was to go to Portland to meet with our photographer, Carl Walsh. Actually that was the second item. First we had to go to the LL Bean outlet because we forgot what we had tried to tell all of you, namely that it gets cool in Maine even during the summer.

So we popped into the LL Bean outfit and got a couple of fleeces and I got some preppy brown jeans. Then it was to the coffee shop where we met with Carl for about an hour. He showed us a couple of albums, which if you've seen his website, you'll know were amazing. On top of that, he remembers Amy from way back in 1999 (mainly because of George the chameleon), because he was on Islesford doing a magazine shoot.

After leaving Portland we took the scenic route so we could stop at Red's Eats again. Let me tell you, the food there is incredible, and I would never say don't go there, but it's clear during the summer that it takes a LOT longer to drive up the coast on Route 1 than it does to just take the interstate all the way to Acadia. So unless you just feel like taking your time getting to the wedding, take the interstate.


When we finally made it up to Acadia, the first stop was Westside florist to discuss bouquets and such. We kept showing Gail, the florist, pictures of wildflowers that we liked while she tried to explain to us all of them grow in swamps and bogs and such. I think (hope) we came to a reasonable compromise. We'll be going for all local garden flowers, no big stuff like lilies, roses, etc. We walk a thin line of tentative preferences and total ignorance when it comes to these flowers, so we'll see...
After that we made a video on how to get to the Upper Town Dock in Southwest Harbor. That'll have to be a separate post. Finally, after all that, we caught the ferry out to Islesford.

Once over, we dropped off Martin at the house, and went down to the dock around sunset for a superb dinner with Dan and Cynthia. (We talked wedding stuff. What else?) And that's it for Friday!

New guests added!

Okay, one last thing before we leave for Maine. Step forward Dave Chu, Ben Eastman, Lily McCabe, John and Nancy McGrath, and Dave Seto! You're all the latest additions to the guestbook. What a great group!

Bike trip to City Island, Trip to Maine, Wedding guests

As our friend and wedding guest John Southard reported yesterday, Amy and I spent our 4th of July on a bike to City Island up in the Bronx. Then as a bonus, John and Jowita Walkup (and the baby, aka, Jowita Jane, aka, Mimi, aka, the Monkey) joined us for lunch at Johnny's Reef.



...And then back again. 50 miles on the bike! We're rather incapacitated today. Yet we're going to push on and drive up to Maine this afternoon to do some vital wedding planning this weekend. We may not be able to update much between now and Monday, but we'll have lots when we get back!

...Finally, we've had a few more wedding guests we need to add to the guestbook, and then the crew should be just about set, barring any last minute changes. We'll let you know!

Off-Season at the Islesford Dock Restaurant

Some of you may recall that we went up to Maine in April (right after a freak snowstorm!) to do some wedding planning. Back then we posted a video of different places to stay in Southwest Harbor. Now that all of you have booked rooms you might get something out of watching that again (or maybe not).

Another video we took was out at the Islesford Dock Restaurant with the proprietors (and our friends) Dan & Cynthia Lief. The Islesford Dock is not only where we're having the reception it's really the spiritual home of the wedding.

So in the video, Dan & Cynthia talk a little about the restaurant and the time when Amy stayed up with them in 1999. Back then, right before Amy went to Investcorp (and mere months before she met me!), Amy hung out at the bar (with her pet chameleon George) every day for weeks, went on lobster boats, and had in general had a great time with Dan (her old boss at Goldman Sachs) and Cynthia.

The quality isn't too great (it was taken on our digital camera), but it's okay to watch.

We're going up to Maine again this weekend and hopefully we'll get some good footage of what it looks like in-season!