Utah Wedding, Part 1

This week, I'm in the beautiful state of Utah. I'm here for my daughter's wedding. It's one of those unique moments-in-time that parents get to experience. Most of my friends don't have children old enough to get married. I, however, am lucky enough (some would argue differently) to have both of my oldest children get married within two months of each other. I have already posted the experiences at my oldest son's wedding here. This time, it was my little girl:

Before diving into specific events, I wanted to take a moment and share some thoughts that I had during the time here in Utah...

First, since my daughter's mother and I aren't married anymore, this wedding was an interesting experience. Not only did we bring two new families together, but with all the parents involved - we actually brought four families together (I could try to explain, but you'd get lost...trust me). The bottom line is that my ex-wife and I actually work very well together on things like this - where the focus is on the children. Her husband jumped in and was really a huge help. I can tell you that I'm lucky to have a good man like that, helping my children for so many years.

Second, since my daughter and her fiance decided to get married in Utah, we had a great deal of family here. The groom's family all live near Salt Lake City. I have family down near Orem. My wife's family live mostly in Utah County. This meant that we had some great resources to draw upon for all the events. I can't tell you how amazing all the families were. We held five separate "events" for my daughter's wedding. Each one required financial, logistical and emotional support. All the families came together magnificently and make each event special. Families are incredible. I'll write more about the events over the next few posts.

Third, I don't think I've seen a collection of people with so much applicable talent. Within the four families, we had a seamstress, professional photographer, floral arranger, poet, many cooks, craft makers, and an audio-visual specialist (me). We all brought our skills to bear and helped to reduce the overall cost of all the events. In addition, we were able to personalize the events to a level that you couldn't reach by hiring people for all these jobs.

OK, enough of the thoughts. Let's move on to some of the wedding experiences. One of the first was the "bridal pictures". Mind you, my daughter only decided to do bridal portraits about a week before they needed to be done. The bonus is that my wife was the photographer, so there was some flexibility. We took the pictures on Thursday and my daughter wanted one of these portraits printed and framed for the reception. A tall order, to say the least. As I've mentioned, talent was brought together to accomplish the task.

Putting the finishing touches on her gown and hair...

Both of my daughter's parents served as photography assistants. My brilliant job was to hold an umbrella to keep the bride from melting in 90+ degree heat:

We started taking pictures in downtown Salt Lake City, at the Brigham Young Historic Park:

We continued at the historic Joseph Smith Memorial Building. In my opinion, this is one of the most beautiful buildings in downtown Salt Lake City. Here's a picture of the building's exterior:

Here are some "bridal" shots from the interior of this amazing building:

As you can see - I'm a pretty proud father ; ) You can find even more pictures of my daughter's bridal session on my wife's photography blog here.

Coming up on the next blog post - the rehearsal dinner....