That's MRS. McPie to you

Sweetie McPie and I visited Quebec City a few weeks ago for vacation, and while we were there we got married.

Wait, that makes it sound like a spur of the moment thing. Rather, we went to Quebec City for the purpose of wedding. And to enjoy a honeymoon, of course. We'd been planning it for a few months, after deciding earlier this year that it was the very thing we wanted to do.

Technically speaking, I suppose you could say we eloped. In fact, the only person who knew we were going was the friend we asked to sign the application form as a witness. We hired an officiant, and he brought along two witnesses.

We had a most wonderful weekend. We stayed at a lovely Victorian Inn right in the main part of the old city, just down the street from the Chateau Frontenac. We arrived on Thursday night, and spent Friday morning choosing the park for our ceremony. Our officiant had suggested two parks near our Inn, and we chose the quiet secluded one on top of the hill - the Parc du Cavalier du Moulin.

Then we spent some time shopping in the Lower Town for wedding essentials like a purse (for me), a belt (for McPie), and shoes (we both got some). In a pleasant surprise one rarely experiences while shopping, McPie found earrings and a bracelet that would go perfectly with my dress. Lucky me!

After stealing an hour in our room to write down our "readings" (since we had no guests to impress, we planned to replace the typical wedding ceremony readings with an exchange of thoughts and sentiments); we hadn't had time to do it before then! Then we got dressed up and headed out to meet Rev. Lafrance. (It was hot hot hot and sunny, so McPie decided to eschew the new suit he'd gotten for the occasion, and went with the linen shirt and pants he'd packed in just in case. It worked out perfectly. All linen, all around.)

We met Rev Lafrance and the witnesses Claire and Michel (both also officiants) behind the Chateau Frontenac, and slowly walked the block up the hill to the park. It was breezy and shady up there (but still hot!).

And we got married. It was a wonderful, peaceful, moving moment.

After everything was signed and sealed, we sent the Reverend and his fellows on their way. We stayed in the park for awhile, taking some pictures and enjoying some quiet time. Then we walked back to the Inn, and sat in the beautiful lounge enjoying some champagne. We'd planned to take a caleche ride before dinner, but it was so hot they'd taken the horses off the roads. We were ok with that, being quite content to just relax and enjoy our drinks. We decided to saunter over to the Chateau for a proper pre-dinner cocktail.

Our very attentive concierge, however, let us know that the horses were back on the streets (it was after 6 PM), and so we did both - a horse and buggy ride around the old city, and then "Danny" dropped us off in front of the Chateau.

A Long Island Iced Tea and Negroni later, we stumbled down the big hill to dinner (did I mention the champagne? Actually, the stumbling was mostly high heels + steep hill + plantar fasciitis - lovely, I know).

Dinner at Toast! was amazing. We ordered the tasting menu and spend the next five hours amusing our bouches with the tastiest of tidbits, each of which came with a "matching" wine. The walk home may have been stumblier, but I was not aware of whether or not the cobbles hurt my heel-clad feet!

We spent the rest of the weekend touristing around the old city. Some highlights included:

• Our Inn, the Clos St. Louis, was perfect. Totally friendly, lovely, clean, good breakfast (a choice, and not too much food to tempt us into over-indulging too early in the day). They offered us the lounge for our ceremony if the weather was bad; luckily, we didn't have to take them up on it.
  


• Enjoying the drenching downpour from the comfort of the Café St. Malo - a cozy country-French restaurant where we ate on Saturday. It rained so hard the mice ran in and took shelter under our table. Also, the cassoulet was almost as good at McPie's.
  


• A Ghost Walk tour, which ended inside an unlit church at 10:30 PM - very spooky! It was the best way to get a real "feel" for the city's past.
  


• Going for a run on Sunday morning along the Dufferin Terrace, around the Citadel and Plains of Abraham. It's nice to conquer those fusty old icons of the history books with your sneakers.
  


• A picnic in Artillery Park, during which we watched a re-enactment of a 19th century military firing drill (completely coincidental). On the advice of the concierge, we visited J.A. Moisan, "the oldest grocery store in the city". It was a gourmet food/grocery store, and we got lots of yummies there, including chilled white wine which did not last long while we sat in the hot park.

When we returned home, we had a backyard barbecue with the kids and the other Moms, and we told them the news. They were all thrilled and supportive. The Moms were not really too surprised (they'd suspected that at the very least one of us would be proposing on this weekend away.)

It was hard to decide how to let the rest of the family and our close friends know. We didn't really want to put anyone on the spot by cold calling. So we made little announcements to send out, which we did last week, just before we went away to Nats. Apparently, there was a bit of a weekend rumour mill going, because the family in Ontario found out before the family in Nova Scotia (Mom! Sister!) See, even when you downplay everything as much as humanly possible, wedding drama is always unavoidable. Sigh.

We already felt like a family, which is why it made perfect sense to us to go all official. A quiet, private celebration felt the most suitable for us. We've been private, quiet, and celebratory all along. I didn't think it would be possible to feel like MORE of a family, but it already does. The happy surprises just don't stop around here.

If you want to see some photos, click the picture below... I'm hoping to upload more shots from the rest of the vacation soon.



[edit: I have no explanation for the strange spacing change in the body of this post. I've fiddled, and can't fix it. So be it.]