(Crane’s invitation: red and gold ink.  Floral cherry blossom bellyband with matching envelope-liner and gold ribbon)

I still haven’t consummated my marriage; I’ve been too full. It’s no secret that I’m a foodie, so we wanted our wedding to be all about the food, wine, and song.  It’s why we rented out Django Restaurant, where they assigned us our very own waiter and bent over backward to meet our every need.  It wasn’t your typical wedding with dancers and a band or DJ playing “We are family.”  Instead, we hired some singers (Natalie Douglas) with some serious pipes to sing our favorite songs.  Guests, when they RSVP’d, were asked for their three “favourite songs,” because when it comes to wedding invitations, it’s all about UK spellings.  There was singing and some light dancing, but mostly, there was food coma.  I want this documented (mostly for me, so I remember it all):

HORS D’OEUVRES:
MUSHROOM & GOAT CHEESE TURNOVERS
SLICED FILET WITH HORSERADISH SAUCE ON CROSTINI
TUNA & GREEN APPLE TARTARE WITH YUZU JUICE
FOIE GRAS WITH MANGO CHUTNEY (This was my favorite.  It seems pregnancy has made me love foie gras.  It’s meat butter!)
CRISPY DUCK CONFIT CIGAR WITH POMEGRANATE SAUCE
PANCETTA WRAPPED SCALLOPS WITH ROSEMARY STICK (Oooh, my second favorite)
MINI CRAB CAKES WITH AVOCADO COULIS
LEMON SAFFRON CHICKEN SKEWERS WITH SAFFRON COCONUT SAUCE

Then came wedding speeches from our fathers and friends, where I cried, and they cried.  My father quoted Rod Stewart’s “Forever Young.”  Speeches are my favorite part at weddings.  Though I did love our intimate ceremony.  So let me back up.  First we signed the chatubah, privately, with hand-selected witnesses and close family.  Then we made it down the aisle, where we were joined beneath the chuppah with our immediate family for a ceremony.  Our rabbi had previously asked each of us to describe the other in terms of nature.  Philip described me as fire, always changing, evolving, and taking things to new levels.  I described him as a mountain: a bitch to navigate, stubborn and certain in his stance, but once you make it to the top, it’s worth the view.  Then our rabbi made it all perfect by bringing up grilled cheese!  Philip had mentioned to him that when he’s hungry, he might want a grilled cheese sandwich and would grab ordinary bread and your basic cheddar, but now that I’m in his life, I’d get four different cheeses and special bread.  He said I enriched his life, even in the ordinary.  In turn, he pushes me to change and face the things I want to change.  He makes it safe for me.  Then we ate.  I didn’t drink (maybe less than a quarter of a glass combined).  Instead, I had them fill a champagne glass with sparkling water. Then came dinner:

As for our wedding night… well, when the clock stuck 1:30 AM, I needed to leave.  My body and the guppies were exhausted.  I begged my husband to strip me down in our room.  Then I pulled the pins from my hair, ripped off my underwear… and threw up all night.  It wasn’t the food.  I was just so overtired, and my body, or the kids, were punishing me.  The next day, I slept in the nook of his body for a good twelve hours.  Tonight I’ll shower and make it with the father of my children… my beloved husband.