The Day Before!

Hi, friends! It’s almost been a month since our wedding weekend, and I’m finally getting around to writing this blog post. I thought it would be appropriate to start with the day before (because chronological makes sense, right?).

Saturday morning of Labor Day weekend was hectic! I was manically crossing off some things off my to-do list last minute (i.e. wrapping used books I was gifting to my friends) and everything started to feel really real because we were loading the car to leave the house for the weekend.

We made it to downtown Durham right around noon for a quick rehearsal at Motorco, our wedding venue (more on that later), and then headed straight across the street to Fullsteam for our welcome party.

Our rehearsal dinner was family only so we wanted to create some time to see our friends before the wedding, especially the ones who traveled from out of state/town. Since Fullsteam has a full kitchen, we had some snacks catered, including two kinds of deviled eggs (because #priorities).

(FYI if you RSVP’ed and didn’t come to the welcome party, you are on my list.)

During the hour or so in between the welcome party and rehearsal dinner, we checked into The Durham Hotel where we were staying for the weekend. I thought we were going to have time to rest after checking in but I was very wrong because we ended up leaving Fullsteam later than planned and we barely had time to change and leave for Vin Rouge!

Vin Rouge is one of my favorite date night spots, and we had actually considered it for our wedding in the early days of planning. Ultimately, it was a little too small for what we wanted, which I was devastated about. Rex’s parents generously hosted our rehearsal dinner and made my Vin Rouge dream come true!!!

I really wanted to be out on the patio which was a somewhat controversial decision but everything was perfect. Though our rehearsal dinner was family only, with me and Rex both being one of four children, we were a decent size group. Vin Rouge partitioned the patio with a curtain, which worked well for us.

There were appetizers, including a seafood tower, followed by family-style dinner. I don’t know why but Rex and I thought the food was even better than expected. Everything was SO good.

Some of our family members were meeting each other for the first time on this day so the intimate rehearsal dinner felt right, and it was so special to see our families mingle.