Wisconsin, Wedding & the Windy City

Just recently returned from our visit to USA for my son Alan's wedding to the lovely Laura from Wisconsin.
Luckily we travelled back before Stormy Sandy hit the east coast of America and wreaked havoc.
So this blog post will cover our trip to Wisconsin and the Wedding, I'll save our visit to Chicago for another post (in case I bore you too much in one post).
When we first arrived in Wisconsin we stayed in a hotel in Sun Prairie, near Madison (the capital of Wisconsin) for a few days before moving 50 miles north to a little cottage on the shores of Green Lake.
The cottage was lovely, being decorated in the 'beach hut' style with lots of neat and quirky touches that made it very homely and relaxing. It was on Lake Shore Drive and the picturesque Green Lake (the deepest inland lake in Wisconsin) was only a few yards away. Here are some photos to illustrate my point:


Our Cottage on Green Lake

Lakeshore Drive in the Fall

Green Lake

Another plus point of staying in this cottage was Reilly's Pub which was at the end of Lakeshore Drive, just a 5 minute stagger home. It had great food, good service and lovely Wisconsin beer............it was only proper that I sampled the local produce on a few occasions.
My sister Florence and her husband Danny had travelled over from Alloa and were also staying nearby. They were sharing a condo on the adjacent Lake Puckaway with my other sister Mary and her husband Steve. Florence and Danny had come over to USA a few days earlier and stayed with Mary & Steve in their home in Maryland before travelling north to Wisconsin.
The condo they stayed in was very roomy with balconies, double garage and a lake-side patio, a bit too posh for me I'm afraid. Here is a photo (their condo was on the far right):


The Condo at Marquette, Lake Puckaway

Although the condo was posh it was 1980's posh (and I don't think it was retro!). This was confirmed when Steve found a couple of drinks cans in the patio area which were definitely pre-90's, maybe even pre-80's as they were before ring-pulls were invented (apologies to those of you who have never encountered drinks cans which needed a tin-opener):


Real Draft Beer in a Can?

I thought diet soda was a recent fad? How can it be draft beer if it's in a can? These are some of the questions that trouble me and keep me awake at night!!
Whilst we were in the Green Lake area we had a few trips out to local places such as the nearby town of Princeton, where we picked up some provisions at Piggly Wiggly's and explored the many antique shops (I say shops but these were mainly folk's houses which were jam-packed full of curios, trinkets and junk!) My sister Mary loves to browse amongst these type of shops and picks up a few bargains which she then sells on e-bay (She may live in Maryland but she's still Scottish at heart).
Here are the girls after a good afternoon's browsing:


Moira, Mary & Florence outside Antique Shop

The real reason we were in Wisconsin was the Wedding and it was approaching fast. We had done the 'meet the parents' bit on the Wednesday night and on the Friday we had the rehearsal at the church, followed by a grill-out at the beautiful farm house of Laura's parents. At the grill-out relations from both families who had travelled to be at the wedding got to meet each other, which is a traditional American way of doing things, and I must say it helped to find out 'who was who' prior to the wedding proper.
After the grill-out we dragged Alan back to Green Lake with us so that he could spend his last night as a single man away from the melee that was happening at the Bride's house. Needless to say I had to take him along to Reilly's for a few beers to calm his nerves, luckily it was still open and when I enquired they said it would be open until 2.30am. We did not stay that long as Moira phoned us at 1am to find out if we had fallen in the lake or not!!
The day of the Wedding arrived and we were up bright and early (brightish and reasonably early) and jockeyed for position in the one and only bathroom in the cottage for showers, etc. Needless to say there were the usual last minute hitches: like Alan's new kilt not having the tacking stitches removed; my hire kilt being at least two inches too narrow (or was I too fat?); and Moira debating whether to travel in her fascinator or not!!
Anyway we finally got washed, fed and dressed and ready to head south to the Wedding:



Moira & Alan at the Cottage

So we all piled into the car and headed down the 73 to meet the Groomsmen at their hotel as arranged the previous night. Unfortunately the Groomsmen were staying at different hotels and I chose to arrive at the wrong one, they were all at the right one. Luckily we had left in plenty of time so we quickly re-arranged to all meet outside the church...........panic over!.........well almost I hadn't a clue on how to get to the church from the hotel we were at!!.........Thank god for modern technology as Alan quickly logged on to a GPS site on his smart phone and guided me safely to our destination with time to spare.
Everybody was arriving at the church in their best togs and it was pleasing to see that not only Alan and the Groomsmen had made an effort to wear the kilt but the other Scotsmen attending had done likewise:


Men in Skirts!

The girls all washed up nicely as well, so we were all ready to go: (the one striking a pose is Mary's daughter Cathy)


Here come the Girls!

All we needed now was the Bride and her parents, who duly arrived in separate cars (have you ever seen someone driving in a bride's dress?).
I won't go into all the details of the Wedding ceremony but it was wonderfully arranged with flower girls scattering petals, nice music and singing, a lovely love story and other readings, etc. and not all formal and stuffy.....most enjoyable!
I suppose you will want to see some photos of the Happy Couple now, so here the are:


Alan & Laura with Doug & Mary Ann



With the Bride's Family



With the Groom's Family

With the Groomsmen & Bridesmaids



Contemplating the Reception Party

Wedding formalities over it was now time for the reception (well in an hour and a half's time it would be). Which gave us plenty of time to head to the hotel we were staying in overnight (there was no way I was driving an hour and a half back up to Green Lake after the reception) and park the car, get booked in and jump in a taxi to Madison.
The reception was held in the Children's Museum which was very quirky and most enjoyable, it had a rooftop garden where we were served with drinks before heading into the area where the tables were laid. Laura's attention to detail was evident everywhere, especially the little badges we got with our place settings (the badges had our favourite things on them, mine was a Dipper and Moira's was the Crow's Nest in Anstruther).
The meal was also far from the traditional steak pie and potatoes, it was a selection of tacos, tortillas, chili and various other fillings which you just helped yourself to........brilliant!!....all wedding meals should be like this.
The speeches were very funny, particularly the best man's (Ally, he's the one with the beard & kilt) and I even made a speech in broad Lowland Scot's whilst wearing a 'See You Jimmy' hat (as did all the other kilt wearers). The good folk of Wisconsin must have thought we were mad, but they applauded us warmly anyway.
Meal and speeches over it was time for the dancing, this is when I realised that the people of Wisconsin were much like ourselves, they all liked their beer (or wine) and most liked to dance.
We rounded the evening off in the traditional way with Runrig's version of 'Loch Lomond' where everybody, Scottish and Wisconsinish, got up and danced until they could dance no more.
A great time was had by all, unfortunately I have no photos to back this up as I had left the camera in the hotel, so you will just have to take my word for it.

The next blog post will cover our trip to Chicago

Take care,

Teddy Edward