Planning A Indie Wedding - With Your Family Too

There seem to be two predominate ways of dealing with one's family during the wedding planning process that you hear about on the web or in wedding magazines. One, I'll call the traditional approach, which seems to be, very loosely stated: Dad pays, Mom helps you plan each little detail, and the wedding is very traditional and proper so that no ones friends or family are at all shocked. Two, I'll call the indie approach, again loosely stated: the bride and the groom pay, the parents don't have very much input, the wedding is non-traditional and a beautiful reflection of the bride and the groom.

Both of these approaches sound fine. In fact, many days I wish we were planning one of these ways because they sound sound so straightforward! But, neither idea comes anywhere close to what our wedding planning experience has been like. David and I are doing most of the planning for our wedding, we're working hard to make it a clear reflection of who we are as a couple, and in many ways it is not terribly traditional. That said, we're both close to our families, and we know that our wedding day is important to them too. Each time we make a decision, we run it by our parents. They are not pushy, so as a result, if they express concern over something, we listen to them, and see what adjustments we can make. This kind of wedding planning involves lots of compromise from everyone. In a sense, no one person is going to get their dream wedding, but we're creating something real and messy and complicated, just like a marriage.

Sometimes I wish we could just make every decision on our own. Our wedding would be somewhat different if we did it that way, probably smaller and more informal. But that wouldn't reflect our parents wishes or really include our extended families, and in the end that wouldn't feel quite right to us. On the other hand, there are days that I wish someone else were paying for and planning the whole day, and I could just sit back and not worry too much. "I'd like the bridesmaids dresses to be dark blue," I'd say in this fantasy, "not light blue. But everything else looks great. Carry on!"

I don't understand why there is so little discussion of this middle ground of (indie) wedding planning. Is it just too complicated to talk about, or too boring? Is anyone else trying to have their cake and eat it too - planning a wedding that is a reflection of both who they are and who their families are, with everyone helping out and paying a bit?

A big happy indie wedding family, via coach_stacy on Flickr

Wedding Music?

Emily of Emily Style wrote a post recently about picking wedding music, and suddenly there I was googling "wedding music" and pondering what they heck we were going to do about it. Thankfully, we have lots of time to think about it, because it seems like it's not going to be tremendously straightforward. First off, our venue does not allow amplified music at our outdoor ceremony location, which means we need a live musician or two. In theory, I love this idea, in practice it might be tough to keep this within the budget. Secondly, have you looked at wedding music? Apparently, once you cut out music relating to Jesus (most everything), as well as Wagner (a known anti-Semite, and Hitler's favorite composer) who wrote 'Here Comes The Bride,' you've significantly narrowed the pool.

Lots of people are using popular music for their wedding music these days, which can work really well. In our case, though, it doesn't feel quite right. At the same time, using a typical classical piece would feel odd as well, since we are not huge classical music buffs (at least, compared to the rest of my family). So, here is a short collection of some rough ideas I've had:

• The first song I heard that made me sit up and say "Oh! I would love to walk down the aisle to this!" was the lovely Falling Slowly by Glen Hansard and Marketa Irgolva from the Once soundtrack. It's evocative, simple, and haunting. The one problem? Somehow the lyrics (Take this sinking boat and point it home/ We've still got time/ Raise your hopeful voice you have a choice/ You've made it now) are a little downbeat for a wedding. I love bittersweet and evocative, but I'm not sure even I can pull this off. That said, I'm still pondering what this tune would be like played on a single violin.
• On the classical music front, I've loved Pachelbel's Cannon since I was a little girl. But of late it's become *the* song for bride's to process too. I want something that feels a little more personal, so that is off the list.
• My favorite Opera is Bizet's Carmen, and the aria "L'amour est un oiseau rebelle" (love is a rebellious bird) is particularly lovely, and the lyrics are poetic and dangerous. But, it's been so overplayed culturally, that I'd feel like I was walking down the aisle to a coke commercial. Plus, while the tune is nice, it's a aria, spectacular when sung, and we're not hiring a opera singer. That is not in the budget.
• Then there is the Klezmer violin option. In a funny reversal of fate, I cut my teeth on middle eastern music - hanging out with serious violinists in my teens - and as a result I feel a great affinity to Klezmer music since it has similar roots, while David doesn't feel very strongly about it. I really like the idea of hiring a klezmer violinist to play our wedding ceremony. I've heard that there is a traditional klezmer bridal march that is "regal and dramatic, happy and sad at the same time, as all Jewish music is supposed to be." This sounds right up my alley. Unfortunately I can't find any evidence of it online. It's sounds like I have some research to do!

As always, I love to hear how you are navigating this challenge. How are you working to finding personal and evocative music for your wedding? Anyone know of talented and affordable violinists in the Bay Area?

Photo by the talented Jessamyn Harris

Short! Dress Love

I love this bride in a (very) short and sassy lace dress with bright shoes, from Australia's Wedding Style Guide. The dress is by Collette Dinnigan.

Walking The Tightrope

We got back from a meeting with a delightful cooking wedding elf this weekend, and I climbed straight into bed and pulled the covers up over my head. After a while a squeaky shaky little voice piped up from under the covers:

"Why is everything so expensive?*" I said plaintively.
David, of course, did his bit to calm me down, "Well, we live in a expensive area, and we're doing our very best."
"Oh." Said the squeaky little voice. Then I thought for a while, "Maybe we could just have a little wedding and just invite 40 people or so?" I offered.
"Well, that would really hurt the feelings of a lot of our close family members and friends that we couldn't invite."
"Oh." I said from under the covers. "That's true. But some people say you should just do exactly what you like for your wedding, and to heck with everyone else?"
David sighed, "We could, but that wouldn't be very nice, and we probably wouldn't be very happy with it in the end."
"Oh." I said "That's true. But maybe we could just have the wedding be like a dinner party, and we could cook for all 125 family members and friends?"
David, who is the person who does cook for our family and friends at dinner parties, suddenly sounded a little stressed. "No," he said "absolutely not. You clearly need a nap, and I might need a drink."

So, I took my nap (I was under the covers already anyway) and when I woke up nothing seemed much clearer, but I went back and read this post, and it helped a little. Sometimes, planning a wedding feels like walking a tightrope with about 10 ropes tied to you, each pulling in different directions. Your job is to figure out which ropes are the safety ropes, and you should keep connected to you (even if you loosen them a little bit), and which ropes are the trick ropes, that are trying to pull you off balance. All of that, while you are trying to hold hands with your partner, and keep your balance.

*Nope, no budget busting here. It's just that sometimes, the budget we actually have seems like a CRAZY amount of money, even if it is way under the average.

Photo via Happy-Dee-Dooo's flickr stream

Vintage Tea Length Wedding Dress

Speaking of short dresses, on of my very favorite blogging brides, Guilty Secret, has been doing great posts about wedding fashion through the decades. I've been waiting with baited breath for her 1950's post, and then yesterday, she posted* this dreamy dress from vogue. Swoon.

Happy weekend all! And special happy wishes to Cara and Aimee on their wedding days (gasp) today and tomorrow.

*Please ignore all the nice things she happened to say about me when posting, they made me blush and shuffle my feet nervously.

Little Girl Wedding Dreams

It's weird how we get wedding fantasies set in our heads when we are little girls. Everyone always says that they never thought about their wedding until they got engaged, but I'm not going to lie to you. I started dreaming about my wedding as soon as I could talk. When my mom gave me my first piggy bank at four, she asked me if I'd like to save for college. "No," I told her "College is boring. I want to save for my wedding." I still remember the horrified look on my feminist mother's face. "But..." she said weakly, "You know that girls can do anything! What would you like to do?" "Save for my wedding dress," I said firmly.

At four, I was perfectly sure of the wedding dress I would get. One that was big, poofy, and looked as much like Glenda the Good Witch's dress at possible. Over the years my idea of a wedding dress slowly scaled back. A five years ago, I was sure I'd get married in a elegant lace sheath dress, and over the past few years I grew to love short wedding dresses too, but I was sure they were not for me, since I would want something 'more traditional.' But each time I've put on a big dramatic wedding dress - the kind I thought I was going to love- it felt like I was in some sort of wedding dress costume. I just didn't feel like myself. And I wanted full range of motion, I knew that much! So, slowly, I've started to think that a short dress is for me. I've tried one on now, and even my mom, who was not on board with the idea, fell in love with it.

The other evening, we were driving by the Legion Of Honor while a formal wedding was going on. The bride walked out on the patio in a full ballgown wedding dress and veil. "Ohhhhhhh...." I said. "Look at the beautiful bride! One day soon I'll be a bride and look just like that." And all my hard wiring* kicked in, and I thought to myself - "I have to get a dress like that! It's my one chance to wear a dress like that!" And then I realized I really didn't want to wear a dress like that.

I do wish my brain would learn to agree with itself. At the very least. Any childhood wedding dreams you just can't shake?

*And for the record, my mom only dressed me in blue when I was little. No pink. And overalls, not dresses. And we had no TV for gender programing. The hard wiring is all mine.

A Wedding With Kids

I love this picture of Ember and Ben's wedding, and after the comments about there being very few resources for parents getting married, I just had to put it up. This casual, spontaneous, loving moment during the vows made me so happy.

Photo by One Love Photo

Ember & Ben's Bainbridge Island Wedding

As you might imagine, I see a lot of wedding pictures these days. But some weddings take my breath away. When I was reading about this wedding, I kept having to stop, because the tears made it hard to see! Ember and Ben's wedding was thrown together in a month, and was shot by the bride's best friend, the super talented Heather Gilson of One Love Photo. This wedding between two long time partners and parents was a celebration of an existing family, which is such a powerful reminder of what weddings are really about.
This picture sums up the way I feel about this whole wedding! Me too, Ember, me too!
Ember and Ben said their vows a day earlier then planned, when they discovered the day before the planned wedding that the judge wasn't free the next day. This took some of the pressure off the vows, which were held in the backyard of a house they had rented for friends and family for the weekend. (talk about delightful imperfection).
This is, officially, my new favorite wedding photo. Their son Finn held the flowers they picked up at the farmers market that morning.
I'm not sure if there is a better picture to sum up family, love, and commitment.
Ember and Ben decided to finally get married after they saw the Bloedel Reserve on Bainbridge Island, Washington. I assume they felt what we felt when we saw our venue, that profound feeling of arriving home after a long journey. The only problem? The Bloedel Reserve does not allow weddings. But, our bride did not see a road block! The rented a house down the way where they said their vows (a day early, whoops) and then they dressed in their wedding finery, gathered their guests, and took a wedding walk.
Their son Leo was extremely excited by his bow tie.
And of course they had cake.
Here is to love, to family, to friends, and to knowing what matters!

Now go read all about this wedding, as written by Ember's best friend, Heather.

Modern Jewish Wedding Traditions III

Here is the final set of jewish wedding details from Amy & Andy's wedding:

Yichud (private moment between the Bride and Groom)
Immediately after the ceremony, Andy and I stole away for a few moments alone together. Our caterer put together a “moment platter” so we could enjoy all the hors d'oeuvres that were served at the cocktail hour while we were inside, and of course, some bubbly. I highly recommend taking the time to do this, even if it’s just for a few minutes.

Mezinka (celebratory dance for parents who marry their last child)
Andy is the last of his siblings to be married (his older brother is married to the lovely Lara of Southern Weddings), so we honored his parents with a mezinka. We had wreaths made for their heads and everyone danced around them to special music.
Birkat Hamazon (grace after meals)
During the reception, those who wanted to participate stepped away from the campfire and s’mores to say the traditional post-meal blessing. We honored 7 people by asking them each to say one of the sheva brachot (seven wedding blessings), which are repeated during the birkat (blessings) at weddings.

Chuppah (Jewish wedding canopy)
We kept it simple, and used a tallis that Andy received from his aunt & uncle as a wedding gift. He wore the one he received for his Bar Mitzvah during the ceremony. We drilled holes through the tops of birch poles we purchased from Nettleton Hollow, and secured the tallis to the poles with the skinniest bungee cord we could find, so there was some elasticity and movement to it. Our florist tied some arrangements onto each pole. We honored 4 people not in the wedding party (my friend and cousin, his friend and sister-in-law) by asking them to carry the chuppah out and hold it throughout the ceremony. I love the symbolism of the chuppah, and especially that those 4 people were the support and pillars of the symbolic home where we began our marriage.

I want to give a huge thank you for Amy and Andy for so generously sharing their wedding, and to Amy for writing such a fantastic summery of all the Jewish wedding traditions they used in their ceremony. This is very helpful to me, as we plan our wedding, and I'm hoping it's helpful for some other brides out there, and informative for many more. Mazel Tov to you both!

Photos by Joseph Milton Photography.

Modern Jewish Wedding Traditions II

Here are more details from Amy & Andy's wedding:

Ketubah signing and Badeken
Before the ceremony, we did the traditional ketubah signing (Andy’s groomsmen had a Wii sports tournament to determine which one of them would be the witness!) and the veiling (badeken). After we signed the ketubah, our rabbi had our parents physically hand it to us to symbolize that they bless the marriage. I’m not sure if this is commonly done, but it was a beautiful moment.



Ceremony: chuppah, circling, glass breaking
All that traditional stuff. It was pretty straightforward! Also, we each had both parents walk us down the aisle.
Photos by Joseph Milton

Modern Jewish Wedding Tradtions I

Today I have such a treat in store for you! I'm pleased to introduce bride extraordinare Amy - who will be guest blogging throughout the day about Jewish wedding traditions. Amy emailed me about her beautiful chuppah design, and her wedding slide show moved me to tears! She generously wrote an explanation of each of the traditions they used in their wedding. I've added definitions for you, and informative links, should you want to read more. This is unbelievably helpful to me, since I come from a non-Jewish background, and we are having a full Jewish wedding. It's funny, I've posted before about our approach to traditions we are ditching and traditions we are keeping, but we are actually planning on having a ceremony that is rich with tradition. You'll see how many we have to draw on today. Thanks to Amy, and I hope you all enjoy these posts as much as I do!

Entertainment
I have to write about this first, because it was absolutely the most spontaneous, thrilling moment of the day! It’s traditional at Jewish weddings for guests to entertain the bride and groom (in fact it's considered a special honor blessing - a mitzvah) but it’s my understanding that this is mostly done in Orthodox weddings, and we hadn’t planned it into the evening’s happenings. Our guests completely took us by surprise and put on an incredible show! They sat us in the middle of the dance floor and did all kinds of magic tricks, juggling, chicken fights, dancing, and even push-ups in between rounds of the hora! The energy and love was so incredibly festive and celebratory and joyful. All 150 guests were cheering and laughing and it totally epitomized what I had hoped the day would be like.

Ceremony Music
Another one of my very favorite things about the day. Andy’s father is a well-known Jewish composer (I knew his music growing up, and even had it on my Ipod before I met Andy!). The ceremony centered around original music he wrote especially for our wedding. It was played by graduate students from the music department at the University of Oregon, and was conducted by Andy’s cousin. It was such an immense honor to have the traditional words and order of the Jewish ceremony set to this music.

Reception Music/dancing/hora

We brought in a Klezmer band from Seattle for the reception, Shawn's Kugel. The music really provided the festive, celebratory vibe we wanted. I was skeptical about having organized Israeli dancing, but it was a huge hit…people are still talking about it!
Photos by Joseph Milton

Break a Leg Cara and Aimee!

Two of my favorite brides in blog land - Ms. Peonies and Polaroids and (one of my first readers ever) Aimee are getting married this weekend. I wish you both the most delightful, joyful, and imperfect days. May they truly be the first of many days together filled with joy.

For Peony and the Boy:
Two such as you...
Cannot be parted nor be swept away
From one another once you are agreed
That life is only life forevermore
Together wing to wing and oar to oar.
-Robert Frost

And for Aimee and Minh:
For love in infinitely strong,
Many waters cannot quench love;
No flood can sweep it away.
I am my beloved's and my beloved is mine.
- Song of Songs

I'm posting this a few days early, because I know it's the only chance that my wonderful ladies will get to see it.

Photo by Lillian and Leonard

A $2000 Wedding

If you haven't been reading 2000 Wedding what are you waiting for? While I can safely say that we are spending well over $2,000 on our wedding, I really respect and admire the thoughtful way Sara and Matt approached their wedding. I'm finding Sara's recap of their wedding planning process to be one of the most thought provoking pieces of wedding writing I've read in a while.

Ring Pillow Alternatives

Devon has been posting about her vibrant wedding over at In This Instance, and this detail made my heart sing. They tied their rings to a brick that was originally part of their house.

Solid, practical, home.

DIY Floral Supplies

On Sunday, (which was our minus-one anniversary of the start of our honeymoon!) we went to see a Giants game. By some cool act of fate, we ended up sitting next to Emily and Rob of Emily Style, for half of the game. Before I moved to San Francisco, I imagined that it was a magical world full of good weather, delicious food, and bloggers who all knew each other. As far as I can tell, all of my preconceptions are true.

Emily and I spent part of the game chatting about doing our wedding flowers from scratch, and she gave me tips about the San Francisco Flower Mart, which we'll be using for our dry run next week. Even more valuable, she told me about Jamali Garden Supplies, which she described as being "as cheap as those online import shops, but with taste." And indeed it is! If your looking for affordable vases, ribbons, sea shells or willow, go check it out. Being your own florist is a huge money saver, and pretty fun at that.

364 Days To Go

On Saturday David and I celebrated our minus-one anniversary with dinner at the legendary Chez Panisse Cafe. I surprised David with the dinner, and I think it was one of the better gifts I've given him! I've been hearing about Chez Panisse - the birthplace of California cuisine, and the local and organic food movements as we know them - for my whole life. Naturally, I was worried that dinner wouldn't live up, but ohhh it did! I'm still dreaming about the tastes. It was a particularly romantic spot for us because it's where my parents had dinner after their wedding, and it's were we plan on having dinner after ours.

People often imply that long engagements lead to lots of wedding stress, but I firmly believe it depends on the person. I like careful long range planning, and I hate being rushed, so the year and a half wedding planning time line is perfect for me. That said, on Saturday, when I fully realized that the wedding was now a year away, I pondered freaking out, but decided against it. We're close to signing lots of our major contracts, or have opted out of them all together. We have a good idea of where we want to go, and freaking out is only going to ruin the journey.

Just remind me of that in 11 months.

Photo via Flickr

Barefoot Wedding

Since the pool of inspiration so often runs dry on Friday, I'm leaving you something that is inspiring me. This is one of my favoriet wedding pictures of all time, and it captures exactly the feeling I'd like our wedding to embody. Joyful, carefree, and a little bit wild at the edges.

So many people post about wedding shoes, but almost no one posts about getting married barefoot. Since barefoot is my preferred state, I'd love to get married just in my painted toenails. I probably won't... especially since I might wear a short dress, but you can bet you'll find me dancing barefoot by the end of the party!

Wishing you happy barefoot weekend travels! And for those of you getting married this weekend (it's wedding season) we're all wishing you the best. May your day be magically imperfect.

Photo via ultrasupergenius on flickr

Low Key Brooklyn Wedding

In case you didn't see this low key Brooklyn wedding on Brooklyn Bride today, you must go check it out. It's making me palpably homesick for Brooklyn.
Stunning images by Daniel Krieger

Simple Backyard Breakfast Shower

I wanted to share these pictures with you, because I found their simplicity inspiring, even though this is not technically a wedding. Ok, you've got me. It's not a wedding at all. This adorable backyard baby shower thrown by photographer Loren Weltsch, but I think that these ideas could be used for a wedding shower, or (if you dial down the pink a bit) a simple backyard breakfast wedding. She served breakfast food, decorated with peonies and paper lanterns, and designed adorable invites to echo the theme. The best part about a breakfast shower or wedding? Simple easy food that you can cook yourself!

Simple Traditions

Here in the more indie wedding community, it's become really fashionable to say, "Forget tradition, we're not doing anything traditional in our wedding. We're doing it all our way!" Now, anyone who reads this blog knows how much I support having a joyful wedding that represents your most vibrant self, and to heck with the cookie cutter wedding. But I think that mindlessly ditching tradition can be just as bad as mindlessly following it.

When we ask my dad his opinion on various wedding related ideas, some of them non-traditional (or not traditional for our family, as we work to blend two faith backgrounds) he always tells us, "I'm not too worried about it. You can do what you want, because in the end, tradition always wins at weddings, because wedding are by nature traditional." He has a point. David and I have chosen to get married, as opposed to staying domestic partners, because marriage is powerful act of tradition and ritual, that links us to generations and generations before us as we make a meaningful and new life commitment.

As we construct our wedding, we try to look at each tradition thoughtfully, to decide what choices we want to make.

• The first thing we look at is "where did this tradition come from?" Lots of things that are currently thrown around in the world-o-weddings as being absolutely set-in-stone traditional, are actually relatively new inventions. The Unity Candle, for example, started in the 1970's, and seems to have had its geniuses on a soap opera. Now, if the Unity Candle is a meaningful tradition for you there is no reason not to use it. But, given how new it is, I'd venture to say *not* using a unity candle is MORE traditional. Which is to say, don't take people at their word when they say "But you HAVE to do this thing, it's traditional!"
• The second thing we look at is: Is this tradition meaningful to us? Does it have powerful symbolism? Is this symbolism something that we are comfortable with? As I've mentioned before, I am relatively uncomfortable with the idea of being walked down the aisle by just my father. I am however, very comfortable with being walked down the aisle by both of my parents. It's a great symbol of the joining of two families, and coming from my family of origin to create my family of choice. Luckily for me, this is the Jewish wedding tradition. But if I wasn't having a Jewish wedding, it's a tradition I'd feel perfectly comfortable with adopting.
• And finally, we ask ourselves if the tradition is meaningful to others. Weddings are, after all, not just for the couple. They are powerful moments in the lives of our families, and usually they take place in front of our community. Early on in the process, my mom mentioned that she'd like me to have a cake that "looked like a wedding cake." Wedding cake was not something I had strong feelings about, but since it was somewhat important to my mom, we decided to go with a more traditional wedding cake. The great thing about that choice is it allowed us to incorporate another family tradition that was important to me. My parents, like my grandparents before them, cut the first slice of their wedding cake with my grandfathers Marine Corps sword. It's an old military family tradition, and it makes for some really neat pictures. We are doing the same, and it is one of the wedding details that I care the most about. I'm proud that this will tie us to two generations of long and happy marriages, and will honor my grandparents, who didn't live to see their grandchildren married.
  

What traditions are you thoughtfully embracing for your wedding day?

Picture: Martha Stewart Weddings, Summer 2008

Rose & John's Do-It Together Wedding

This wedding has such a amazing spirit, it shines right through the screen. It was shot by A Beutiful Day Photography, out of Seattle, and took place in the bride's families 100 year old camp in Mendocino California. This wedding speaks to my hippie-kid upbringing in a way that just warms my little soul. For lots of people small church weddings remind them of childhood... but for me, it's weddings with hay-bales.
Everyone helped set up the wedding, and you know how I love that!
Tents! Tents! Tents! I love a wedding with tents. I love communal camping, period.
Yay for friends and family helping with the flowers, that is our plan as well.
And check out the cute feathered wedding dress.
Hay-bales!
You so rarely see a moment of serenity in the middle of a ceremony like this, and its what I hope for most of all on our wedding day.
The party went on long into the night. Any party with a campfire is a good kind of party.
A band on the porch, and a moment in each others arms... what else do you need?