The Princess Bride: Bridal Shower: Big, British Floppy Hats!

I knew my bridal shower was going to be awesome because people (read: my mom) kept telling me how much work they were putting into it. My mom is the type to go above and beyond anyway, and she's a teacher, so she has the summers completely free. Thus, I knew it would be special.

I feel bad for how rushed I made my bridal shower and bachelorette party. I had exactly 2 hours for my bridal shower while in Southern California, not the most to work with. Still, my mom and MOH did a fantastic job.

My biggest request for that day was to have no idea what was going on, except for the when since I had to catch a plane. I wanted nothing to do with the planning. My only additional request was that I thought a British tea style bridal shower would be pretty cool.

Boy, did they deliver!

I know rather more about British tea traditions than most Americans having lived in England for a semester, and the place they chose was certainly authentic. Scones, clotted cream, jam, and lemon pudding with finger sandwiches and cute little desserts and of course 3 kinds tea. It was super tasty.

They also had 2 big tea partyish hats for me which was pretty cool.

Please excuse the sunburn I have in all of these photos. I had just gotten back from Catalina an hour before.

Me and My Hat and My Ribbon Bouquet

Warning: the rest of this post is not work appropriate.

And of course there were presents. Daniel should definitely be happy with the results. First, we played a game in which everyone bought me a pair of underwear, and I had to guess who brought what. I failed appallingly and was decorated thus as punishment:

The only one I got was Patty's because she wrote Wingardium Leviosa on the ass.

Then, there were the presents that were clearly meant for Daniel which will remain unpictured for now in case he can't restrain himself.

But the gifts I got from some old family friends I used to babysit for really topped it all. They're not even coming to the wedding, but they blew everyone else out of the water. First, there was the box which they made themselves:

I totally wanted a cake like this at one point!

Then inside was monogrammed note paper, monogram stamps, 2 cute little figures of me and Daniel wearing stuff that we like (Disney hats, Cubs jersey, holding Harry Potter), 2 signs--one with our initials "carved" onto a tree, one that said, "The Feldmans"--and more. It was beyond belief, and I am so touched that they would do that for me. I haven't seen them in 6 years! I was touched by how much everyone did for me. A lot of guests had a travel an hour or more to be there, and everyone put so much thought and effort into it. I felt really, really fortunate to have people do so much for me.

And so the best part was getting to see everybody that I love and do not get to see very often: