Rach and Kev

FIRST - You have GOT to check out Jedd Goble's video montage of the day - it is FANTASTIC! Here's the link.

What you might see in a newspaper announcement:

On Sunday, August 23rd, 2009 Rachel D'Aun Goble of Pleasanton married Kevin George Carey of Lafayette surrounded by many loved ones on a gorgeous evening at Wente Vineyards in Livermore. There is some debate over how they first met, but either way it is clear the couple are very much in love and make a fantastic pair. Kevin and Rachel plan to honeymoon in Italy and Thailand.

The real deal:

The rehearsal dinner was O-mazing. Just a really fun night at Postino thanks to fantastic planning by Linda and MC'ing by Chuck. Lots of funny and heartfelt toasts. Kevin turned sheet-white when I got up there and admitted to embarrassing things about us as kids and he wasn't sure what was going to come out of my mouth. HA! I'm laughing to myself thinking of that exact look on his face.

The day of the wedding all the girls met at D'Aun and Roy's house and did all the pretty princess things like hair and makeup and nails and giggles and gossip. And of course... what's a pretty princess party without food and a bride looking so - um - gorgeous?...


Haha ok was that a mean way to first show off the bride? Well if you had watched the video link it wouldn't be the first you saw now would it!? So unfortunately this is the part of the story that was heartbreaking. Even dudes get why this is the worst thing that can happen to a bride on her wedding day (next to the groom ditching out, I guess... that would have been worse huh Rach?). Ok so here is Rachel first getting on her gorgeous dress at Wente so she can take some pictures and then see Kev. We're all right on schedule at this point...

Notice Rach and D'Aun's faces... something is not quite right. The conversation went something like this:
Bridesmaid Chorus: Oooh, Rachel! Stunning. Love it! Amazing, Gorgeous!
(Dress not quite zipping up, people adjusting it on her to get her to fit just right in it so it will zip...)
Rachel: This is not my dress.
D'Aun/Jen/Bridesmaid Chorus: Nooooo. No, no. That's silly. This is your dress! This is totally your dress. This is your dress, right?
Rachel (still totally composed): This doesn't feel like the dress I tried on in the last fitting. I really don't think it's my dress. The size on the tag is smaller than the one I ordered.
Bridesmaid Chorus: ....... !(@*$@&^@!)(!@*!#&*%$*!(!(!*@*&

And then panic mode ensued involving Clarissa's Couture in Walnut Creek being called multiple times (It was Sunday! They were closed! No emergency number!) and my mom marching down there and banging on the door and asking nearby businesses for backup cell numbers of the Clarissa's people... nothing. A prayer circle began around Rach when the realization that they had given her the right dress fitted for some other bride set in but really... the girl just needed to see Kev. So Kevin (now on Wente grounds also) was summoned into the girls room and marched dutifully in to comfort a still-keeping-it-together-but-a-teensy-bit-emotional Rachel. Rach was a whole new happy girl hand in hand with Kev after that and a fun wedding party toast really kicked off the party :)


Ah, but what did we end up doing about the dress you ask? So the wedding coordinator ended up tracking down a seamstress on her day OFF who raced over and literally LITERALLY sewed Rachel into the dress she had by adding a panel to the back of it and doing a really cool crisscross weavy kind of thing to make it look fantastic. And it did, it looked wonderfully fantastic. Here's a happy Rach patiently getting sewed into her now-custom designed dress...


And then the rest of the day... man... it was just FUN. Rachel's creativity and vision and style came alive in the venue. The boys standing before guests arrived looking at everything gives you a sense of what it all looked like...

Announcing for the first time Mr. and Mrs. Carey! (Love that Emily is giving a big hallllllelujah! haha)

Love this one of the ladies in their post-vow sunglasses. Especially the little girls - the looked SO cute!

Awww... first friends :) Oh ya - forgot to add that Kevin FORGOT the marriage license at home so I made a run and get it in the middle of the reception. What are first friends for?

We danced the night away (which clearly I don't have good pictures of since the camera would have inhibited my hot dance moves!) and all too soon, it was time for Kev and Rach to hightail it OUTTA there in Roy's old Ford that was sufficiently dressed up with streamers and a "just married" sign.

What you don't know or won't read in a paper:

There was something so spiritually RIGHT about this wedding. There was not an un-ugly cry to be found when Rachel walked down the aisle towards Kevin. I have a softness in my heart and fresh happy tears in my eyes when I think about the Goble-Carey wedding because it was - it REALLY was - a blessed day where two very well loved and cherished people in their own right became one very well loved and cherished couple.

I Eat Stories Like Grapes

It took me all Summer to get through East of Eden for two reasons:
1. I forgot it in the back seat of my car before a trip and had 750 pages worth of distraction by a Harry Potter I picked up at the airport as a substitute.
2. From the very first page, I knew it could be one of the very best novels I ever read. So I allowed myself to slow down my eyes, quiet my mind, sit with each chapter, and marinate in its deliciousness.

If you read East of Eden (or should I say WHEN you read East of Eden), may I recommend the Centennial Edition pictured above? It has those serrated and offset pages that feel sacred against your fingertips.

I'm finding it difficult to summarize why I loved it. Or make a pitch for why YOU will love it. Perhaps there are too many possibilities to package. For me, it was the familiarity of the Salinas Valley setting. It was the complexity and honesty and under-explanation of the characters. It was so much history in english. And many, many things in between.

The wonderful thing about East of Eden is almost without exception (I've found one so I have to say "almost"), everyone who finds out that you are reading it clasps their hand over their chest and exhales a huge "OHHHHHHH my god. What part are you at?! Can you believe how evil Kate is?" No actually, I can't believe it. Her sharp little teeth are my favorite representation of her inherent evil. And speaking of, IS she inherently evil? If one of the central messages of the novel is "thou mayest" then she must have chosen that evil right?

"Maybe I will tell you some time when I can tell and you want to hear."
"I'll want to hear," Samuel said. "I eat stories like grapes."
"A kind of light spread out from her. And everything changed color. And the world opened out. And a day was good to awaken to. And there were no limits to anything. And the people of the world were good and handsome. And I was not afraid anymore."

Shane and Carissa McLean!

Writing their names out like that makes me even more happy than I imagined it would. Shane and Carissa said their "I do's" last Friday, August 21st. They held the ceremony and reception at this really neat mountain home in Boulder, Colorado on an absolutely perfect night.

Unfortunately my camera battery didn't make it through the whole night so I didn't end up with many pictures, but here are a couple highlights... 

Oh Carissa, you are lovely beyond words.

You may kiss the bride, man!

This one is for Big Wiz, who is definitely the most likely to ask about the food and cake :)

My camera held out just long enough for one with the bride and groom - Yay! (Yes, I'm wearing the same dress as I did to Erica's wedding AND to Staff Ball in DC. Shut up.)

It was a very quick trip - I flew into Denver on Friday morning and out Saturday afternoon but I am just SO glad I was able to make it. I was thinking about how with people you know are going to be your friends forever, the meaning behind being present for something as huge as a wedding is going to grow exponentially as we get on through the years. 

And there will be many sweet years to come for these two :)

Baby Don't Ya Wanna Go...

...back to that same ol place SWEET HOME CHICAGO.

When I was in Madison I caught wind that the FRENCHIES were going to take Chicago by storm along with an epic gaggle of DC gays for Market Days. Well I simply could not have them having all the fun without me so I rationalized that I needed to take a trip there to meet with the NP program I want to get into anyway and bought a ticket I couldn't afford.

There were SO many people in town! It was like every time I turned around in the bars there was another DC person I wasn't expecting. They practically transplanted Logan Circle to Boystown. It was glorious! 

We did have to get some touristy things in of course, so we went to the top of the Sears Tower (or Willis Tower now apparently). It was a miserable two hour wait to get to the top, but once we did the photo shoot ensued. 

They have these cool see-through boxes coming off the side of the building that you can sit/lay/stand in and look straight down the billion floors under you. It's really exhilarating actually! Here's Luis, Bobby, and David "falling" down to the city streets...

Walking on air!

Ah I just love this picture. I need to frame it. HOTT.

This is the scene from our little VIP area we made for ourselves on the sidewalk looking out on Market Days 2009. It was CRAZY! GREAT dance music, by the way. We found ourselves saying "Why don't we always party outside like this!?"

Too cute we are :)

By FAR the BEST picture of the whole day if you ask me.

Each night brought with it a different adventure and I literally saw the sunrise more in those few days than I have in probably five years. Ridiculousness, of course, but it was just no time to be sleeping! The last night we were there was Madonna-Rama at one of the clubs and we were all like completely exhausted from the weekend so everyone was kinda tuckering out and the boys asked me if I was ready to go. They are used to me being like YES let's GO and this time I looked at them and in all seriousness was like "I am NOT leaving until I hear Like a Prayer." I was resolute. So we waited around for another hour or so for it to be on and then performed it aggressively on the dance floor. Love it. 

Not surprisingly, Patrick and I still managed to get ohhhhh about 20 hours of coffee shop reading time in. I even discovered this great used bookstore on Broadway and injudiciously bought a "Complete Works of Winnie the Pooh" that was screaming my name. Actually, speaking of Patrick - you will notice he is not in ANY of these pictures. THAT'S because he hasn't given me the pictures off his camera from that weekend yet. Lame. (Patrick seriously, I want those cute ones of us on the bed that we had a good giggle over (ooh that could be interpreted badly haha). Also the "GET YOUR ARMOR" ones too! OMG! I want to see those right now!)

Oh! Also noteworthy - Kathryn and I had breakfast for dinner at a great little neighborhood gem of a diner near Clark and Belmont (look at me with all my Chicago street knowledge!) AND Patrick and I both had flights out of ORD at about the same time so we went and actually met up with Stef and Tricia who were passing through on their way to Australia so we had a little pow-wow with them before leaving town right in the middle of Terminal B.

Damn I love that city. I can't wait to call it home. If only everyone who was there that weekend would do the same :)