Slice of Wonderbread: 4 years of marriage

4 years ago tomorrow... in a small ceremony, in the Little Church of the West in Las Vegas, we were married. We eloped to Las Vegas from London where we were living at the time, it was November and rainy and cold in London so we thought that the 4 days we were spending in Vegas (the only days I could get off work) would be nice and hot... we were wrong. The dessert was colder than it had been in 20 years or something the day we arrived and it was raining.
We arrived around midday after an 11 hour flight already tired. We had set the date for the wedding on the 22 of November and the 21st when we arrived was a Sunday. We checked in to our hotel (The Bellagio) and then decided to make our way to city hall to get our marriage license. We tried walking but it turned out that Las Vegas is much bigger than we thought and the cold and the rain and the jet lag was not helping so we got a cab. The cab driver was insane. He started asking us lots of questions and when we told him we were getting married he insisted on driving us to this nice chapel he knew, that would give us a good price, once we got our license. We declined his offer and insisted on paying for the cab before going inside so he wouldn't wait for us like he was insisting on doing. Inside as we were getting all the papers signed and talking to the clerk the driver actually comes inside to check on our progress. We were getting a bit freaked out by this guy so we told him to leave and once we got out we told him we were going to walk back to see Las Vegas. He looked at us in complete disbelief and I can understand since the rain was heavy and it was very cold outside. We started walking and as soon as we were out of sight we jumped in the first taxi we saw. Unfortunately this was not the only crazy taxi driver we encountered on our trip.

The second crazy taxi driver I didn't actually meet myself only my then future hubby had the pleasure of his company. We were getting married in the evening at 7.30 p.m. and I was getting dressed at the church so hubby wouldn't see me in my dress before the ceremony. I had already got my hair and make-up done so all I had to do was put on the dress. So we get to the church and I go to the changing room while hubby is sorting out the papers and paying for everything. I'm almost done when hubby knocks on the door and tells me he forgot the marriage license on the bed at the hotel where he put it so he wouldn't forget. So he's rushing back to the Bellagio to get it so we can get married. The 20 minutes he was gone were the longest ones in my life, I was sure he just took off and left me at the altar and I was freaking out. For hubby the story is a bit more exciting. He's running back towards the hotel and tries to flag down a taxi as he goes but there are no taxis to be found but he does find a limo and knocks on the window and offers to pay the guy twenty bucks if he'll drive him to the Bellagio. The driver agrees and drops him off. He rushes upstairs grabs the papers and rushes back down again. Outside the line up for the taxis is huge so he shouts to everyone. "I'M GETTING MARRIED IN 5 MINUTES I NEED TO GET IN THE NEXT TAXI PLEASE!" Everyone starts cheering and clapping and he gets to jump the cue and gets in the taxi. The taxi driver starts asking lots of questions like where he's from and stuff and my hubby is answering while repeatedly asking the driver to hurry up. The driver misunderstands my hubby when he says he lives in London but he's really from Canada, he thinks hubby is British so he starts quizzing him on British history and the royal family. Everytime hubby doesn't get an answer right he slows down to explain it to him. At the church he locks the doors and won't let hubby out until he finished explaining something about King Henry or something. When he's finally let out he goes back in to finish the paper work and then a couple of minutes later I get a knock on the door and the lady tells me to go up to the church.

I have a very vivid memory of that walk, which I did all by myself, it was so cold I could see my breath and my heels were very high and when I got in hubby was already at the front waiting for me with the priest. It was very intense and the commitment felt a lot more real and serious than I thought it would. My only regret from that day is that the photographer didn't get a full body photo of us.

...and yes the candles in the back are fake.

So here are a couple of photos of me and hubby.