Today’s Story To Tell Saturday is from Pamela who’s blog is Skin Care In the City . She is a very good bloggy friend of mine, and here she shares her story of her second marriage. Even bad weather wouldn’t bring this party down. Here’s to making the best of every situation! That’s what weddings are about…being with the ones you love and celebrating.

If you want to participate in future Story To Tell Saturdays please send your stories to jen@afterthealter.mwpsites-a.net . I’m looking for any story regarding your marriage. A story about your date nights, special anniversaries or even silly fights and ways you made up. Saturday is a day to share all things marriage related.

June 17th 2006 Samuel J Jordan and I, Pamela J Fatone, were married.

 This was my second marriage and Sam’s first and we decided to have our ceremony up in Vermont. It was a neutral place – not Connecticut where I am from and not NYC where we live.

 Our families and a few friends traveled up to share a great weekend with us.

It began with a lobster bake rehearsal dinner on Friday night, a leisurely morning on Saturday and then the wedding ceremony that afternoon. We were married up at the lake on the property of the Kedron Valley Inn and right after the ceremony we had to hurry back down to the Inn because a severe thunderstorm blew in and all of the outdoor seating was ruined. Although we did not enjoy the outside cocktail tables the evening continued on.

 The Inn has an amazing, large deck, built back in the 1800s, and was holding many of the 80 guests that hurried onto it to get out of the rain. (The Kedron Valley Inn is the one that Budweiser used to shoot the 1980’s Christmas commercial with the Clydesdale Horses coming down the snow-covered lane. It is still used to this day at Christmas time.)

 We had no back up plan in place for rain and this caused a slight change in how dinner was going to be served and where.  (Can you feel the stress level rising? Every bride’s nightmare, thunder storm, hotter than Hades, and the outdoor seating and tables literally washed out.) The dining room was not really big enough to feed everyone at once but somehow the innkeepers worked everything out perfectly. Funny, maybe because it was my second wedding I did not need a back up plan. The first was 425 people and indoors, and I remember being very stressed to insure my wedding played out according to my plan. But in the midst of the thunder and lightning I was not feeling stressed. Why not? I am still not sure. Was it because it was a second marriage or because this was Woodstock, Vermont – the epitome of relaxation and laid back-ness.

 While The Inn keepers did a wonderful job making sure that the details were executed and that everyone was having a great time, the three piece ensemble we hired to play prior to the ceremony and for the cocktail hour, kept everyone entertained for the two hours we had cocktails due to the rain delay.

 Sam had spent time mixing the music to create our play list – choreographing the music, as we wanted it for cocktails, dinner and dancing. He was our virtual DJ by giving the discs he had created to the Inn to play. He also made up a disc set for all our guests that we used as our thank-you notes and we had a local glass blower make ornaments for each guest using the colors from our floral arrangements – Dutch Hydrangea, Lemons and Sunflowers. Lynda Dandeaneau created gorgeous pieces that we used as our wedding favors.

 My gift to Sam was a hot air balloon ride and as it turned out our wedding weekend was the annual Hot Air Balloon Festival. I arranged our ride for Sunday afternoon, and unfortunately it was shorter than normal due to the wind conditions. What a great experience and I would love to do it again! We had a fantastic wedding weekend filled with wonderful memories to last a lifetime, and Sam and I look forward to celebrating our fourth anniversary this June the 17th.

 What I take away from my two very different weddings is that maybe small intimate weddings are the way to go. I seemed to have enjoyed this small wedding more than my beautiful “what every girl dreams of”, very large wedding. I am thankful to have had the big wedding, but I do not remember enjoying it the same way I enjoyed our smaller intimate wedding. I enjoyed my wedding, thunderstorm and all.

  Woodstock, Vermont

 Lodging & Restaurant, Rooms and Suites – Kedron Valley Inn