On August 7th and 8th in the year 2009, our little family had the great honor of celebrating a long awaited wedding between our friends Steffen & Steffi. As a matter of fact, they got engaged in 2005 at the very same tent where we all threw back a couple maß of beer together this year at Oktoberfest. And none of us will ever forget that crazy night when they got engaged–or that great weekend when they got married!
This particular wedding lasted two days; something that isn’t that uncommon in Germany. Some day I’ll even tell you about our own two day wedding. Friday was the civil ceremony in the courthouse to make everything official. And because they live in Bavaria, they came in traditional tracht (lederhosen & dirndl). This photo was taken after they’d said their “I do’s”–don’t they look happy? 🙂
Mackenzie was also pleased. It was her debut in her dirndl and as always she had her game face. Look, she didn’t even have upper teeth yet!!
After the ceremony at the courthouse, the wedding party proceeded (read: walked down the middle of the street behind the wedding car because it was only a few blocks away) to a nearby restaurant where we ate some of THE BEST Bavarian food EVER! We have already requested to go there the next time we visit the happy new couple in Erding because the food was just that good. Sorry I didn’t take any photos — we were so starved when it arrived that I completely forgot. But I had a duck breast with red cabbage & a dumpling (blaukraut & knodel) and it was probably the best I’ve ever eaten. Even Mack thought it was fantastic and she polished off a whole slice of duck herself along with a bunch of my cabbage and dumpling. Yep, we definitely have a half-Bavarian little girl on our hands!
Who’s the tiredest mouse of all in this picture? Definitely Mackenzie. It was very hot that day and her little dirndl was so warm. So we took it off (and I forgot I was prepared for everything and even had shorts for her in her bag) but she just hung out in her onesie instead. All the excitement of the day had taken its toll and a nap was long overdue. But even when she’s super tired, she’s still not nearly as fussy as most. In fact, I’m probably worse than she is when I’m tired or hungry! 😉
On Saturday, the real wedding kicked off complete with church and reception. I got a little artistic with Mackenzie while I was changing her diaper in the car. She’s not too sure what I was shooting for there…but she’s always looking in the camera. 😉
This is the restaurant part of the farm where the reception was held. The place is called Gasthaus Rauch. It was a lovely hof and although way too huge for the three of us, we would have loved to have it ourselves! I didn’t get any good photos of their wine bar but I wanted to pack it up and bring it home with us! SO nicely done. You can see it on their website under “Unser Haus” -> “Weinstadl”
One of the really practical things about this place is that it’s a family establishment and because they have smaller kids, there were TONS of things for the younger wedding guests to entertain themselves with–even a trampoline! I wish Mack was a little bigger because we would have had a great time jumping on that! Here’s one of the guests taking a ride in this very cool tractor. Nice shades on the little guy, don’t you think? I’ve never seen the farmers around here looking that stylish in their tractors!
Mackenzie thankfully took a nap on the way there and finished it up after we’d arrived. She was just wiped out from all the excitement so I was quite thrilled that she finally caved in to the sleep…we would have had a very grumpy mouse on our hands otherwise! If she’d known there was lots of cool stuff to play with around there, we might not have been so lucky.
The reception was just beautifully done and the food was fantastic. No smearing cake in each other’s faces here although there was discussion about it. 🙂 Instead they nicely fed each other before digging into their own slices…getting married builds up quite an appetite!
Mackenzie approved of all the food, especially the cake. She would have been happy to wear cake on her face all day, but we managed to keep most of it in her mouth. She even got fed a little by the groom himself. He’s one of her godfathers so he gets that privilege. 🙂
One of the traditions of a Bavarian wedding is the stealing of the bride’s bouquet. Once it has been stolen, the bride and groom have to purchase the bouquet back which often requires a promise of lots of food and drinks. The fee for this particular heist will be a huge BBQ with a keg of beer for the group that was involved in stealing the bouquet…but the bride and groom really didn’t seem too sad about having to throw another party for their friends so soon after the wedding. 😉
One more thing that often accompanies Bavarian weddings are skits and plenty of moments to make you laugh. The friends of the wedding couple had the opportunity to send in their favorite photos and memories about Steffen & Steffi and they made a cool little magazine out of it. They also included a few sample advertisements like this one…
Stefan had to take a photo of Steffen during the wedding with the same expression and in 10 or 20 years another comparison will be made of the hair. 😉
And speaking of skits, I won’t share most of the photos since they just won’t do them justice but family and friends set up all sorts of things that had tears of laughter streaming down our faces. Everything from a mock driving school (because Steffi is a driving instructor) to a game which required couples to pop balloons placed in strategic locations (I’m happy to report the wedding couple won)–it was a great night. But one of the events which could not be overlooked was Steffen and his Karnival group performing to Eric Prydz Call on Me. You know, the video with the aerobics workout chicks in thongs? Yeah, it was really special. And to be honest, they did a great job!
I’d like to once again wish Steffi & Steffen all the happiness in the world and may they get to spend the rest of their years together, living blissfully side-by-side. Whatever comes their way, let them handle it with grace, peace and love. Congratulation again and we love you two!
