Ryan and Liisa's wedding

The wedding took place at Kerimaki Church, which is the largest wooden church in the world.  

The church was VERY beautiful, but they had some odd little wooden statues inside.  They were everywhere - some looked a like little Frankensteins.  Uncle Randy spoke to one of the workers at the church and they said that some of the statues were hundreds of years old.  They all had a slot somewhere on them for coins to collect charity for the church and the poor.  

The groom's sister (also my cousin), Aryn and I have gotten to be great friends over the last few years.  She moved to Atlanta to work on her PhD at Emory University.  Its been really fun to have someone from my extended family so close!  But then I moved to London, so it was a super fun weekend for Aryn and I to catch up!

Here we are with Uncle Randy and Aunt Jo, outside before the wedding.  It was super windy - sorry Aryn's hair looks so bad.  I don't have a picture where we aren't blown away.  

The ceremony was part in English and part in Finnish.  But aside from that, it was a very traditional Christian ceremony.  

 

Leaving the church for the reception - Mr. and Mrs. Price!

I don't have any good pictures from the reception, but it was very traditional as well.  Receiving line, a buffet dinner, toasts, cake cutting, a band and dancing!  It went quite late - the couple left the reception after midnight.  Then after the reception, everyone who was left (the entire wedding party, all the younger guests and the bride's family!) went to a club and danced until the club closed at 4am!

This was on the screen at the club - I'm pretty sure that's "Congratulations Liisa and Ryan" in Finnish!

Then this happened with me and Aryn!  I had to make the picture black and white so you can see our faces.  This was close to the end of the night after wedding all day, reception all evening and dancing all night!