My New England Vacation: A Photo Blog

So I totally failed at posting blogs while I was on vacation, but now I am back! And I figured I'd be lazy my first day and just post some photos from the trip with my sisters. My photographer sister has posted 600+ pictures from those two weeks on her Facebook, so I figured I'd steal a few of them to give you an idea of all the stuff we did. It was a busy couple of weeks!

Our first step was Lancaster, Pennsylvania, where we spent some time with family friends. I was sick the second day we were there (I suspect it was a side effect from the new meds I'd started that week) so I didn't get to do much sightseeing, but the girls went off exploring the area with our hosts.

We spent a day in Philadelphia and splurged on a carriage ride around Philadelphia. It was well worth it. The tour guide driver was friendly and informative, and it was an awesome way to see a lot of the history in the area without having to do a ton of walking.

We went and saw the Liberty Bell. It was a pretty long line, but it was nice to be able to check that off our bucket list. We got this picture when we asked a random stranger if he could take a picture of us in exchange for us taking a picture of him and his family in front of the bell.

We spent a day in NYC (or, well, two half-days), during which we went to the Empire State Building. It was foggy and rainy, but it's still a fun thing to do.

We went to see Phantom on Broadway. It was my fourth time seeing it in New York, but none of the girls had ever seen a show in New York at all, so I had fun showing it off to them. Norm Lewis was a pretty good Phantom, although he seemed to be having some vocal issues that evening, but Sierra Boggess was a great Christine. Her version of "Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again" was easily my favorite I've ever seen.

The sisters and I spent one morning at Madame Tussauds. I went there on my first trip to NYC in 2004 and really enjoyed it, so it was fun getting to go and see it all again.

After NYC, we went to Rhode Island to spend some time with my mom's family. We went to Newport, did some shopping, ate calamari, and took lots of pictures near boats.

You were supposed to have tickets to tour the grounds and the insides of these mansions, but you could kind of just walk onto the grounds. So we did, figuring that the worst that would happen was that we would get kicked out. Got lots of lovely pictures in the backyard, which was right on the water.

The aunts took us here to have clam cakes and chowder for dinner. I'm pretty sure I could happily eat clam cakes for days.

After RI, we went to Massachusetts, where the girls went to Boston and I stayed at our host home because I didn't feel like walking. But nearly all the pictures we have from that leg of the journey are from Boston.

Our pictures after this point are a little scarce. We did more driving than anything else. We drove to New Hampshire and spent the night with some friends of my mom's. The next morning, as we left, I fell on their front steps and badly sprained my ankle. This made the rest of the trip pretty quiet for me. We drove to Vermont so we could say we'd been there, then drove to Maine and stayed with another Internet friend of Mom's. (The girls drove across the Canadian border to say they'd been there, but I wasn't sure I could climb back into the van, so I stayed home. I'll go to Canada some other time.)

Then we drove back home over three days. On one of those stops, we got to hang out with our awesome NLDC friends JoJo and Jose, and we had a bonfire in the backyard.

And that was the saga of our trip.

Wedding Pictures

Last week, my photographer sister sent me all the photos she took of my wedding and the week before it. I figured this would be an appropriate time to post a few of my favorites, for those who either 1) do not have Facebook, or 2) do not feel like looking through the EIGHTEEN JILLION PICTURES I uploaded onto there. So here are some of the ones I was happiest with.

This is not a wedding-specific photo, but I love it. It's mine and Jacob's dog getting super excited as I make a sandwich. She jumped in the air the entire time I was making the sandwich, hoping I would give her some of the lunchmeat I used. I did not.

My beautiful bridesmaid Dani helped me order these button-and-fabric bouquets and then spruced them up with lace and ribbon. They looked even more incredible by the time she was done.

My mom, bridesmaid Jessica, and matron of honor Lisa pulling stuff together for our wedding feast. Lisa took charge over all the food, and she did an incredible job - the meal was so delicious.

According to my photographer sister Elizabeth, this was during the church decorating time. I had been rather seriously discussing lights and trees and decor things with people around me, and then I saw Jacob, and I did this. She showed it to me later and was like, "THAT WAS REALLY CUTE." It makes me happy - it was capturing one of those genuine moments of "oh gosh, I really like this guy I'm about to marry."

My mom and dad at the church while we were decorating. A friend of mine commented on this photo on FB saying, "Kate, you and Kevin are just so awesome, precious, and inspiring. I love how you love each other." I really could not have had a better example growing up of what a healthy, loving marriage looks like. I love you, parents :-)

A group of us at my quasi-bachelorette party, all making confetti and paper streamers and pom-poms. I love all the people in this picture a lot.

My three littlest brothers were my ushers, and they each dressed up as one of the latest incarnations of the Doctor from Doctor Who.

My wedding hair, as done by the wonderful Breana, who used to do my hair for me in most of the shows we did together in college.

Mom zipping up my wedding dress.

Just about ready to go here. This one has my sister's photography business watermark on it, because she edited the photo before she uploaded it. That's why I'm a little glow-y. I love it. :-)

Jacob and I met up for some just-us time in the church sanctuary before the ceremony began. I told Elizabeth she wasn't allowed to be there, but she could take pictures through the door.

Me and my beautiful girls. From left to right: my wonderfully funny NLDC friend Jessica, my online friend and sister-at-heart Dani, my former roommate and BFF Lisa (and then me, but if you weren't sure which one I was, you might not have been paying attention), my sweet sister Bethany, my college friend Breana who is good friends with both Jacob and me, and my faithful NLDC friend Carissa. These girls are my very favorites.

I wanted individual pictures with all of my girls, but I think this is one of my favorites. I have no idea what Lisa and I are laughing at, but we're clearly having so much fun and being so happy.

Actual ceremony pictures: My father and I walking down the aisle together.

 

Jacob and me reading the vows we wrote for each other.

Unity Play-Doh! We combined two different colors of Play-Doh (yellow and red) to make a fun orange, representing the new family that is us, and then we made a dinosaur. Or we tried. It was a lot of laughing and conversing and saying, "Does he need a tail? Does he need more horns? We have some left over. Let's make a tree."

Le kiss.

What? What are you talking about? I didn't trip on my dress as we were leaving the ceremony. Doo doo doo...

Mr. and Mrs. Keefer, leaving the ceremony.

The entire Megill+ clan - me, my siblings, my parents, and Jacob!

"So, um, guys, we're married now. We have these rings and everything."

Just us. Bein' married. And stuff.

I really enjoy these photos, because there's no chance I'm ever going to look this photogenic again...

I really love this picture of Jacob and his sisters.

Our first dance (to "Skullcrusher Mountain," one of our favorite songs). Neither one of us are dancers at all, so it might possibly have been the most awkward thing ever, but, hey, we had fun with it. :-)

After I danced with Jacob, our wedding flower boy came up to me and whispered, "I wanna dance with you!" It was completely adorable.

And me and my father during our dance. I chose "You Ruined Everything" by Jonathan Coulton as the only sweet-but-not-disgustingly-cheesy father/daughter song I knew. It worked out quite well.

For much of the dance portion of the evening, I was bombarded by these young girls, none of whom I knew, who all wanted me to dance with them. (One told me, quite seriously, "I am going to dream about you tonight." I suspect she is yelling at me in this photo to follow the moves she's making up for the song.)

It was weeeeirdly difficult to cut the wedding cake. The cake and the plastic did not meet where you would expect, so we definitely cut into the plastic base a bit.

I really love this picture. Me, my sisters, and my mom. (The one in the middle is the one who did all my photography.)

Getting our marriage license signed, whooooo! Makin' it official!

A couple friends put a Star Wars-themed "just married" message on our car. (One side says, "Once upon a time in a galaxy far, far away..." the back says, "We got married!" and the other side says,"This is our Millennium Falcon.")

I kept forgetting about it and then we'd get people honking at us as we drove and I'd be all, "WHAT DO THEY WANT?" and Jacob would be like, "Um, they're excited we got married," and I'd be like, "Oh. Well, that's cool."

Bouquet toss! My friend Ashley caught it - go her! :-)

Loved seeing some dear online friends I hadn't seen in a while - so glad these Rinkies made it to the wedding!

Us leaving the ceremony. Clearly having confetti thrown at him was Jacob's favorite part. :-)

Silly Picture Saturday!

Well, I may be doing rather an awful job about updating this blog (I keep having blog ideas but then no motivation to write them) so here's some fun pictures.