The day was hot but the night was hotter as the dance floor lit up!

We finished the holiday weekend with Reneé and Erik’s wedding & reception at Meadowlark Botanical Gardens in Vienna, VA. The glass walls enclose lush vegetation and an indoor stream, and look out over the beautiful ornamental gardens beyond. It was a nice way to have the feeling of an outdoor event with the blessing of air conditioning on an unusually warm early summer day. The AC was especially welcomed by the wedding party and their guests after the sun-soaked (i.e. very warm) outdoor ceremony on the adjacent patio.

Reneé’s background in jazz dance was on display during Reneé & Erik’s well-choreographed first dance to Frank Sinatra “Fly Me to the Moon.” After hearty applause for the bride & groom, no one expected the show-stopping father-daughter dance. Tossing the sentimental slow dance tradition out the window, André & Reneé threw down some terrific choreographed dance moves to the jump-blues of Louis Prima “Pennies From Heaven,” complete with a father-over-daughter leapfrog!

After a lively dinner and toasts from André (father of the bride), Jake (Erik’s brother and best man), and Ashley (Reneé’s sister and maid of honor), dancing got started with some deft blends of classics from Queen, Wild Cherry, Bee Gees, and Creedence Clearwater Revival.
Then the floor really lit up for the dance pop that dominated the playlist: Jennifer Lopez & Pitbull “On The Floor,” Usher “DJ Got Us Falling In Love,” Taio Cruz “Dynamite” (complete with everyone’s hands in the air), Rihanna “Only Girl In The World,” and Duck Sauce “Barbra Streisand” were all huge.

Erik’s dad Jerry Servinsky happened to be celebrating his birthday, so we gave him a shout-out and a Frankie Valli number to dance to with Erik’s mom Laurie.

One of the big highlights of the reception was a Polish wedding tradition. When a younger brother is married before his older brother, the older brother has to dance in a pig trough. Erik’s father and uncle brought out the trough—handmade from pine expressly for this occasion—and his brother (and best man) Jake proceeded to roll up his pant legs and do a jig to “Cotton-Eyed Joe.” To fully ensure good luck, the dancer is supposed to completely destroy the trough, which Jake did handily and to uproarious applause.

After “Cotton-Eyed Joe” faded out and the pieces of trough cleared away, the dance floor filled up to stomp along to John Denver “Thank God I’m A Country Boy,” and later getting into George Michael “Faith,” Michael Franti & Spearhead “Say Hey (I Love You),” and Joan Jett & the Blackhearts “I Love Rock’n’Roll.”

The energy level stayed up throughout the night and probably hit a peak with a polka (by request; this was a Servinsky wedding, after all), an impromptu hora, and that all-time classic from The Isley Brothers, “Shout,” leading into a rough-but-enthusiastic line dance to “The Cupid Shuffle.”

And finally after getting an extra fifteen minutes on the dancefloor (big thanks and applause went out to Sean and his outstanding team at Meadowlark), it was great night for everybody involved!