Instead, we partied for hours and hours, and slowly the crowd thinned out. Around 9 PM, people started taking decorations off of tables, we cut off the DJ, and our somewhat inebriated family members got up on ladders and took down the lights and lanterns that had been so carefully hung from the rafters.
Right then seemed like an appropriate time to depart. We gathered our things and headed out to our getaway vehicle, which was the 1969 Cougar I'd arrived in earlier that afternoon. It looked a little different than it had before, and that wasn't just because it was dark outside:
Dancing wasn't our guests' only option for reception entertainment. We had a Photobooth, and boy, was it entertaining....
Niki Ross Photography
Our Photobooth, provided by Jensen Photobooth of Sacramento, was fantastic. The booth was huge, and sometimes more than six people were in there at once. Our guests could choose to have their pictures taken in black and white or color, and we had a huge bucket of props for people to choose from.
But the best part was that the booth printed two sets of pictures--one for our guests, and one for the Goodlaffs. We also got a DVD of all the images taken that night, both of the strips, and of the individual pictures themselves.
Jensen Photobooth
All of our guests were encouraged to hop in the booth, take pictures, and then leave us a note in our guestbook. They certainly lived up to the task!
With all the required elements out of the way, it was time to let go and get to getting down on the dance floor. To encourage our guests to get moving, our DJ suggested that we do an anniversary dance. We invited all couples to the dance floor, and the longest married couple still dancing at the end of the song won.
Needless to say, Mr. Goodlaff and I lost that contest.
We did things a little differently in the bouquet toss arena.
Our DJ invited anyone who was feeling lucky--whether male, female, single, or taken--to the dance floor for the bouquet toss, because this was not your typical bouquet.
My bouquet was quite literally made of money, and was, if I say so myself, quite a catch! We got everyone out on the dance floor. Even though we opened it up to everyone, it was mostly the single ladies that decided to participate anyway.
I would like to say that choosing the Father-Daughter Dance song took some thought and time. But it didn't. Finding the right version of the song did. Years ago Mama Goodlaff made an off-handed comment that she thought my Father-Daughter dance should be to "You Are My Sunshine," because Daddy Goodlaff used to sing it to me when I was little. I guess it kind of stuck with me.
When I went searching, I found many, many versions of the song, but mostly jazzy, five minute long renditions that were unsuitable for dancing, and for a while, I gave up on the song. I looked at lists of normal Father-Daughter Dance songs, but none of them seemed right. Then, buried deep in the trenches of iTunes, I found what I was looking for. A two and a half minute Nat King Cole version. It was perfect, and the deal was done.
I collected Daddy Goodlaff and we got ready for our dance, but as the music began, and we began dancing, Mama Goodlaff (who had no idea what my song choice was) was nowhere to be seen.
Uh Oh.
As we danced, I kept looking for Mama Goodlaff, and told Daddy Goodlaff, "Mom is gonna be so pissed that she missed this!"
Early on, I fell in love with the idea of a cake bar, and even now, months after the wedding, it's one of my favorite things. I mean, just look at it:
Um. YUM. Looking at our cake bar made me feel like I was a kid in Willy Wonka's Candy Factory, and I wanted a piece of Every. Single. One. We had eleven different flavors, and one two-tiered cake for Mr. Goodlaff and I to cut into.
While our guests settled in for dinner, Mr. Goodlaff and I sat perched at our sweetheart table, observing the room. I'm not gonna lie: the sweetheart table was the best way to go. We still had guests coming up to chat with us, but for the most part, dinner allowed us a little bit of alone time before the party got into full swing.
Our food was fantastic, and even though we did a buffet, the caterers delivered plates of food to Mr. Goodlaff and I, which was fortunate. The last thing I wanted to do was try to navigate a buffet line with a very poofy, very white dress.
About halfway through dinner, Mr. Goodlaff up and left me:
Never fear, it was for a good cause! He went to get me some champagne, because the toasts were about to begin!
BIL Goodlaff led off, toasting to how perfect Mr. Goodlaff and I were together, and how happy his brother was...
Deciding on our first dance wasn't nearly as hard as deciding on our entrance song. I'd say that fairly early on, we knew what the song was, and that there was nothing more perfect for us in terms of first dances. We chose "The Luckiest" by Ben Folds. It's not a typical first dance song; it's a little quirky, but beautiful, and it still gets me a little choked up. Press play. You won't regret it, I promise.
We got out on the dance floor, and our song began:
Very early on in the planning process, our DJ told Mr. Goodlaff and I that the entrance song--the song which you enter your reception to--is the most important song of the evening. Even more important than your first dance song, the entrance song, he said, sets the tone for your entire reception. Pick a good song and you will have a rockin' party. A bad song equals a snooze-fest. So, no pressure or anything.
Accordingly, Mr. Goodlaff and I had a hell of a time picking our entrance song. We didn't want to pick the wrong song, for fear of setting the tone for a crappy reception, so we thought and thought and thought some more, but nothing seemed to be exactly what we were going for. After months of debate, with many song rejects, the answer was so simple that we should have figured it out earlier: we would enter to our song. Well, a cover of our song.
For reasons beyond all explanation, "Come On Eileen," by Dexy's Midnight Runners is our song. It's not particularly romantic or sentimental, but it's ours, and sometimes a song just fits, and that's just how it is. In fact, "Come On Eileen" is how we first came to meet our DJ, and it's how, months later, he knew who we were when we contacted him about playing at our wedding.
We decided that it would be a perfect entrance song, but because we wanted to hear it twice in one evening, and because we wanted something with a bit more kick than the original, we chose a cover of our song done by the ever-peppy ska band, Save Ferris:
Talk about setting the tone! It turned out to be the perfect entrance song!
