mrs. cupcake's wedding blog: Love is All About "We": A Grand Entrance (and A First Dance)

All photos below by The Wiebners unless otherwise noted. We purchased a disc of all unedited images from our wedding day, so some post-processing has been done by me for the purpose of sharing the photos with you. Click on any photo to enlarge.

After our sneak peek at our beautiful reception space, we snuck out of the ballroom while our guests started making their way to their seats. We lined up with our parents and bridal party for our grand entrance and really didn't care that we had just spent the last 45 minutes or so chatting with our guest — it took none of the excitement away from the fact that we were about to be introduced as husband and wife :-)

Since this post contains lots of pictures of us swaying back and forth, I've added in some musical interludes for your enjoyment!

First up: our parents and bridal party enter the ballroom to applause and the sound of the Bay City Rollers — a special request by Mr. Cupcake himself! He made very few requests throughout the planning process, so I couldn't deny him this request. And you know what? It was an awesomely fun song to get things started.

Momma and Stepdad Cupcake

Daddy Cupcake

FIL and MIL Cupcake

Brad and Chrissy

Jeremy and my cousin Michele

Mr. C's Uncle Kevin and my cousin Coleen

Brother and SIL Cupcake (John and Kim)

Matron of Honor Kelli, Best Man Ryan, and Maid of Honor Nicole

Once our parents were at the head table (where they would sit with us) and the bridal party was standing at the end of the dance floor, the DJ transitioned into one of our favorite songs... "Gimme Some Lovin'" by the Spencer Davis Group. You may remember this song from the awesome scene at the end of Notting Hill when Hugh Grant and his friends pile into their car to speed through London to get to Julia Roberts' press conference. Mr. Cupcake is a big fan of old school Steve Winwood, and we both get a little pumped up when we hear this song.

We had nerdily requested that the DJ let the beginning of the song build up a little to get people excited :-) But let's be serious — I don't think anyone was more excited than us. As the music started to build before the "HEY!", The DJ started to announce us as "the new Mr. and Mrs. Nick and Brooke Cupcake" and we made our way out of the shadows and through the ballroom doors. I honestly don't think I could ever really explain that moment, the feeling of hearing our names and then walking through those doors hand-in-hand to see everyone we know and love, up on their feet and cheering for us. It was the most heartwarming feeling ever — and it was spectacular.

As you can tell, we were all smiles!!

Before our first dance song began, we had an impromptu little twirl on the dance floor as we sang along with Stevie Winwood.... "and I'm so glad you made it... so glad you made it..."

{ photo by SIL Cupcake }

Then, it came time for our first dance — the song we chose is the namesake for all of my recap posts :-) The song is "We" by the one, the only — Neil Diamond. We had been torn for a while over what song to choose, but ultimately, Neil's crooning won the prize. (C'mon... if Mrs. Strawberry can admit to loving Neil, how can I deny it?) "We" is light-hearted, wouldn't make us cry, isn't too long, has a perfect slow-dance tempo without being dreadfully slow, and it is just very "us"! Old soul-ish, not-too-serious, goofy, schmoopy, madly in love "us." (Or, shall I say, "we"?)

The dance floor lighting that we had sprung for definitely made a difference, and I was really glad we had decided to make that addition. An abstract peacock feather pattern was projected onto the floor and added a warm glow around our dancin' feet :-)

{ photo by SIL Cupcake }

While many couples choose to do a choreographed first dance (and I took dance for years and certainly wouldn't have objected), Mr. Cupcake was more comfortable doing the standard "sway" move; we decided that we didn't want any added pressure on our first dance. We had taken a few dance lessons so he would feel more comfortable on the dance floor (while all eyes were on us), so we weren't worried about stepping on each other's feet and we could enjoy our moment!

Mr. C sang along to Neil...

... and made me giggle. No surprise there!

At one point, he gave me a very quick spin — so quick that not even a speedy Wiebner could catch it with their camera! Alas, our guests still cheered us on and I said over the music "that's what we learned in dance class!"