We got married!

Check out the photos, taken by our families.

Well, we couldn’t spend our entire engagement lazing about, eating bon-bons and gazing soulfully into each others’ eyes. We finally got around to designing (Dan) and printing (Fran) our wedding invitations. It was fun!

To see the entire photo set documenting the printing process, click over to Flickr.

Well, we went ahead and did it. We got licensed to marry. Here, Dan proudly displays our new marriage license (and its accompanying certificate of marriage) on the steps of the Yavapai County Courthouse in Prescott, AZ.

After the licensing, we ate some sweet potato tempura fries and a Greek salad at the Raven cafe down the block.

As much as we loved Lake Owen (and the company of the Louis’s dogs, who followed us around like chipper little teddy bears during our stay), we realized that it’s not the ideal location for a wedding party for us, except in our somewhat swoony, romantic brains.

So it’s back to the drawing board for team Frances & Dano…

I found this photo while doing a mostly fruitless Google search for the Eagle Knob Lodge, on Lake Owen, where we’re thinking to have the wedding. When is it from?

I was late, so late. I waited too long for the D-train at Broadway-Lafayette, my heart racing because I didn’t have his phone number and if he thought I stood him up… I couldn’t even finish the thought in my head. Too terrible.

It was raining fat drops in Brooklyn. Deep rivers of water coursed around the curbs. I walked the wrong way for a few blocks, then righted myself, desperately stomping over slick pavement, pushing past umbrellas and the evening rush.

I was nearly an hour late. Would he still be there? Yes, yes!

Yes. There he was, I saw him through the steam-stained glass from across Church Avenue. The traffic blurred by and the wet night ignored me. It was like a scene in a movie, I could zoom in on him, his shock of brown hair, those gray-blue eyes looking over a Carribean magazine he’d probably picked up in the restaurant lobby. He sat at a table alone in a beige coat. He’d started to eat. I stepped off the curb.

We’re still in the throes of planning, but one possibility is that we’ll have our wedding ceremony and reception next summer at Lake Owen, in Cable, Wisconsin, where Dano spent his childhood summers, as evidenced above. Ideally, we’re hoping to plan something that includes grilling, dancing, swimming, marshmallow-toasting, beer-sipping, and boating. And, of course, Dan and I declaring our undying love for each other in front of anyone who’s willing to make the trek out to northern Wisconsin.

Should you decide you simply must send us a gift, we of course will not protest. In fact, we have set up a few registries, mainly because I love to make lists, but also because we need things like non-grime-encrusted cookie sheets. And flatware.

• Crate & Barrel
• Amazon.com
• REI

Remember, since we’ll be spending the next year in Arizona, anything you send us will be shipped out to Cottonwood.

We got our rings from the fabulous craft site Etsy. They’re oak, and were made by hand by a fellow in Chicago named Gustav. (They even came with an acorn that we can plant somewhere. Probably not in Arizona, but somewhere.)

I took this picture at the Pacific Street subway station in Brooklyn shortly after Dan and I celebrated our engagement with rustic pizzas and olive-oil-drenched artichokes at Franny’s. The blossoms in his pocket were plucked from the tree under which he asked me to marry him.