excuse of a post to show you lots of pretty pictures

once upon a time, many moons ago, i and a bunch of equally dorky french students signed up to live in the French House in college. i was randomly assigned to live with a girl named kristi:

..who wasn't actually wearing that outfit at the time. she was totally neato and we got along swimmingly. we lived together for the next 3 years, including when we both studied abroad in Montpellier, France. i also got an excuse to go to japan after graduation since she was there teaching english for three years. now she's back in va once again, not too far from me.


and this weekend, we all went back to williamsburg for her wedding :-)

she and her husband are adorable. he's an alum as well - and i can practically count him as a roommate too at this point - and i couldn't be more happy for them. we have this very lovely bridge on campus that has a lot of lore associated with it (example: if you walk over the bridge with your boyfriend/girlfriend, you are then bonded for life, and the only way to break this bond if you want to end the relationship is to throw the other person over the side of the bridge). aside from the weird rituals, it's a very romantic place, and it's where tom proposed to kristi:
williamsburg is actually a pretty nice place, if you don't mind 103 degree heat and 8 million percent humidity (a real treat in satin, i can tell you!). there is this faaaaabulous shop in town called the cheese shop, which i highly recommend if you're ever there:

as well as a really awesome old-timey candy shop that has caramel apples and fudge and truffles and deliciousness:

there's also this place called sno-to-go, that OH MY GOD, you need to go to. they make shaved ice that is LAYERED WITH SOFT SERVE ICE CREAM, and if that didn't just make your head explode from the sheer bliss of those two combinations, then you will just need to traipse on down to williamsburg RIGHT NOW YOUNG LADY/MAN and get yourself one, because dude.

there is a slight possibility it's so good that some of us maybe sort of briefly left the reception to get some before it closed for the weekend.

but! anyway! the whole weekend was excellent, despite the overwhelming heat and humidity. know what's maybe not a brilliant idea? playing ultimate frisbee at noon when it's 100+ degrees and the air is so thick you get sort of out of breath walking to your car. turns out we're not brilliant though.

explaining the rules to the bridesmaids and groomsmen

why am i so awesome? booyah.

one of the fun parts about being a bridesmaid is obviously the part where we get all gussied up. i got my first pedicure ever this weekend!

...and a pretty neat updo:

we make a pretty good looking group, if i do say so:

turns out i'm not so good at staying classy for long though, especially when very strong rum and very warm reception halls are involved. i, uh, have no idea who these people are in this photo or what's going on, except to say that there's a possibility that the pocket knife i got at luray caverns maybe was a fortuitious purchase:
later, when we may or may not have continued the reception at a bar, we also may or may not have taken our updos out and got to work finding alternate uses for the 8,283 bobby pins that had been used to lock our hair into place.
clearly, everyone involved in the wedding was good people.

congratulations kristi and tom! thanks for the awesome weekend :-)