Imperfectly Perfect

“Ready erin? You’re going to walk down to the fort and tap Blake on the shoulder…it’s time”
My goodness I never actually thought this moment would come! My hair was perfect, my dress was perfect, my make up was perfect and I could see my groom off in the distance standing, patiently, waiting for his bride. We actually pulled it off and are about to get married!

After spending 10 months agonizing over center prices, cupcake flavors, wedding favors, colors, napkins, transportation, seating arrangements… none of it mattered and none of it was happening.

I never wanted a first look with Blake.. I wanted his first sight of me when I was walking down the isle towards him… funny enough.. there was no isle at this wedding.

… I tapped him on the shoulder and he turned around and I will never forget the look on his face. Happiness. Peaceful. Calm. Ready.

We did our photos first, before the ceremony. My veil wouldn’t stay on because of the Maria’s crazy winds already starting up… I went through a big puddle which got the bottom of my dress totally dirty… but none of this mattered… I’ve only seen a few pictures so far but I think we totally #nailedit.

 

Off to the ceremony. Our wedding music was played using YouTube on an iPhone and a Bluetooth speaker. The song of me coming down the stairs was accidentally the live version with people cheering in the background… but it didn’t matter. Our father daughter dance was first the wrong song and then accidentally cut short. We were married by our good friend Ned, instead of in a church by our priest.
Our reception was at our favorite restaurant downtown, Savant, instead of at the resort we had planned.
My flowers were some sort of weeds found outside instead of pretty pink roses.
My maid of honor and Blake’s best man did not make in due to the storm.
Even the date was wrong…on everything. I was so excited to share my grandparents anniversary with them! We were still able to share their first-dance song together, even though our anniversaries will now be 3 days apart.

We were able to put Maria on the back-burner for a few hours and focus on the reason we were there…We had the perfect storm, if you will, for this wedding to be a disaster… and yet it was imperfectly perfect.

 

Meanwhile, we were scrambling to find new housing for my side of the family. Housing that would be safe and close enough to Blake and I that would be able to check on them and easily take care and assist in whatever happens post Maria.

Luckily we found a condo from good friends of ours that could fit 8 people in. Running water but once power went out.. it was out because there was no generator. Not your idea of a tropical, relaxing vacation, but it was safe and we could keep most of the family together.

“Omg- she’s coming today!” The most unwelcome wedding guest at all presence could already be felt. Curfew was set to start at 10am. Meaning by 10am everyone needed to be off the roads and hunkered down. The power was being turned off by 2pm so whatever you needed to get done needed to be done by then! You could feel the fear on the roads with the crazy traffic and the long gas lines…

..something bad was coming… and it was coming fast!

 

The show must go on!

With eviction notice in hand from Carambola Resort and Spa (which basically said “be off the premises by 9am Tuesday- good luck”) and with the help of many family members, my events coordinator, Nichole Reed (a really true MVP) , many of my vendors, friends and even strangers…we start trying to conjure up a wedding in less than 24 hours. Oh my!
Originally, it was planned to have the rehearsal dinner at Blake and my favorite restaurant downtown, Savant.
“Why don’t we move the whole ceremony to Savant?!”
…all eyes on me… I look around for approval and support to my family members.
“But.. but what about father Lois?! He’s not on island, we are supposed to be married in the church!!”
“I need a minute.. let me make some phone calls..”
I set off to call Nichole and Father Lois and try to get the ball rolling and a game plan in place. Nichole was completely supportive, calming, and truly amazing. She got on the phone with all vendors to start making things happen.
Sadly, I tried to get ahold of our priest to see if we could include him and the church in the new plan, but it had turned out that he had not yet made it back on island from his trip… which was delayed getting back due to hurricane Irma. I came to terms that we would have to have another ceremony to include Father Lois and the church.
Okay back to planning this “wedding by Rolodex” (side note, a good friend of mine, Tracy, coined this term for her wedding many years ago… I thought she was crazy).
 
Call the hair dresser. Call the make up artist! My nails aren’t done, Can we find someone to do them?! My mind was going a mile a minute, and September 17th happened to be my grandfathers birthday. I had planned a sunset sail with the whole family to celebrate his birthday and the start of wedding week. Thoughts of canceling the cruise floated around, but I was adamant we still go and try to have a few hours of “normalcy” before absolutely mayhem set in.
(The cruise was wonderful and both families got to spend 2 hours uninterrupted together celebrating the reason we were all here: family).
When the cruise ended, back to hurricane and wedding prep mode resumed. Blake, my two brothers and cousin raced to our house to hurricane proof it. This happens to not be the easiest task… anyone that follows me on Facebook saw my posts about how difficult a time Blake and I had putting them up during Irma!!
They managed to get the house ready and we all head back to Carambola to get ready for the big day.
Another sleepless night of obsessing about Maria’s trajection and strength.
TODAY’S THE DAY!!! I promised no serious hurricane talk as it’s OUR day that we have been waiting for and we can go back into panic and prep mode as soon as the wedding is over.
While Blake catches some last minute snoozes- I place his groom present on the pillow with a little love letter to him to wake up to and head down to check on the family and get this wedding day started!!

Only… I am greeted by tearful family and apologizes about them getting off the island. Four family members and 2 friends left wedding day to escape the storm. I am grateful they were able to get off and would never hold that against anyone! She had been upgraded to a category 5 hurricane and that’s nothing to be messed with.
But…The show must go on! Get the champagne! Pack my dress! Where’s my shoes? To the salon we go to beautify me before I greet my groom ❤

Tomorrow?!

This has been a super trying and difficult few weeks with hurricaneS, a wedding, and 25 family and friends. However, I would like to preface this with the fact that I am not a writer, nor do I pretend to be. I am just a girl telling my story.

I don’t even know where to begin. If you have read my previous posts you know that I am a physical therapist living on the island of St Croix, planning a wedding to my best friend, Blake.

Bear with me as a backtrack a few weeks….September 5th, our sister islands, St Thomas and St John were devastated by Hurricane Irma. we did not know why or how, but St Croix was spared the devastation. Even though we did not get as damaged or destroyed from Irma, we still had some difficulties resulting from her. Blake and I did not have power from September 5th until September 17th. During which time we slept on couches to be near the door to get some air flow, showered in buckets, made any and all food on the grill. Yes we had a roof to live under, but life was far from easy.

 

The light at the end of the Irma tunnel was the fact that September 16 was the start of the much awaited “wedding week” . September 16 we slept in a king sized bed, September 16th we slept with air conditioning, September 16th  we took showers and didn’t worry about running down the generator. September 16th we thought our problems were over and our biggest worry was how we were going to get all the family from the airport.

We did get all family members from the airport to Carambola Resort on North shore where all the family was staying to celebrate the unity of Blerin.

As soon I returned from my last run of guests back to the report, I find my fiancé at the bar and this is when I learn the Maria has turned into a Tropical Storm. The ever optimist in me says “Tropical storm, we can do, tropical storm may get us wet, but it won’t stop our wedding”.
Maria gets pushed out of the mind and the two families get to enjoy a nice family dinner together…not knowing that this would be the only one of the week.

I did not sleep at all that night. I was monitoring Maria’s every move, hoping, praying, willing Maria to move from the current path of hitting St. Croix dead on.

September 17th makes its appearance and I start the day with a morning walk with my parents on the beach collecting seaglass. It was such a beautiful morning, exactly what I envisioned our first beach day with the family to look like.

I rush to get my suit on and get down to the beach to enjoy every minute of this gorgeous day, knowing in the back of my head that this may be it for the week.(Of course I am annoyed that my rhinestone bride bikini had not yet arrived in the mail…a detail that will seem minute in a few days).

I get a few games of paddle ball in with my mom, dad and siblings . A game that is a staple in all beach adventures with our Davidson family of 5. While playing a three way paddle ball game with  Colin and my dad, I get called over by a family congregation of girls. Among which is my grandma, mom, soon to be mother in law, and aunts from both sides.

During an intervention of sorts… the idea of moving the wedding to TOMORROW (September 18th) was presented to me.

TOMORROW? I did not mentally prepare for tomorrow. Tomorrow is not what I planned. Tomorrow is too soon!

Tomorrow it is.

Let’s get married…she says.

Hi! It’s me., Erin. It’s been a very, very long time since my last post. I have no real excuse besides the fact that I got lazy and stopped. I could say life got busy, or work was stressful, or I simply did not have time… but that would be a lie.  I was just plain lazy.

I’m currently “inspired” to write this post, due to some very unforeseen and upsetting circumstances. As Tropical Storm Maria decides what she is going to do with this island I call home, I have a lot of thoughts running through my mind.
Let’s take a step back…

November 13, 2016.
“Erin, will you marry me?”

This it the simplest question I have ever been asked. A question that I answered, without hesitation.. “yes!”.

While I have SO many stories leading up to this day, September 16, 2017, I find it most appropriate to simply start with TODAY.

I spent the majority of the day picking up and excitedly greeting my family and soon to be family. While jokes of hurricanes were thrown around, it wasn’t until about 5pm when I realized our jokes…may actually be reality.

Enter Maria

“Don’t get married in September, its hurricane season.”

“September?! ohhhh”

“Oh…wow..good luck!”

All statements Blake and I heard when we  excitedly announced our very special wedding date of September 21, 2017.

For 10 months, I, with the help of MANY, have planned, plotted, coordinated, created every minute detail to make this day absolutely perfect for me and Blake. It’s kind of funny how you get SO wrapped up in the details and then a potentially devastating, uncontrollable event threatens to arrise and none of those details matter anymore. Instead, I sit here thinking….I don’t care if I don’t have the special roses I ordered, or the guava filled cupcakes we loved, or if we even get to dance to “our” song…instead I sit here wondering….will we even get to be married? Will our Island be ruined? Will our family be safe?

 

Perspective.

 

More on #OfficiallyBlerin to come.