Sponsored Post: MagnetStreet Weddings

I'm always thrilled to write a post for long time sponsor MagnetStreet Weddings, in large part because so many of you have piped up to say that you've had such good experiences working with them. As far as I'm concerned, good customer service trumps is hands down the most important thing you can look for in wedding shopping. Though when you add in cute affordable wedding invitations and save the dates, well, you can't loose. Plus, they are running a 20% discount on all pocket invitations through July 7th (code noted in their header) so go check them out!This time around, I wanted to talk a little bit about MagnetStreet's customizable options. MagnetStreet Weddings has introduced a interactive design tool, so you can customize your Save the Dates and Invitations with your own designs and fonts and colors, see a instant proof, make changes and then order. The really cool part is that playing around with designs and colors can make a huge difference in wedding invitations, allowing them to be painless, affordable, and still really reflect who you and your partner are.
And goodness knows, I'm totally incapable of doing a post on MagnetStreet without showing you my very favorite save the date magnet (which I always say would also be a great invitation for a low key wedding).
We've been talking about what to do with engagement pictures, and you can't loose by making them into little save the date magnets. Every time my mom gets one of these she coos a little bit about how happy the couple looks... and then it's on the fridge for life.
And finally, MagnetStreet Weddings has great little carrier cards that are designed to go with you magnets... which means you are zip, zap done. (And boy doesn't that feel fantastic...)

Things To Wear On Your Head When You Wed: The Simple Edition

So. Recently, I've been getting a little anxious about my OUTFIT, and my ACCESSORIES, which is a whole other post. But, some of my anxiety has revolved around wanting a fabulous hair piece (other than my homemade veil, which I'm starting to love). Anyway, I was reading back over Things To Wear On Your Head When You Wed, and looking at amazing handmade hairpieces and getting stressed. And then I remembered that ages ago, I'd decided to wear a real flower in my hair. Ahhhhh, yes. Real flowers. It seems so obvious when you think about it. And the cost? Free.

The one time I was a flower girl (something I had aspired to be since I realized you could get such a job) I was a little disappointed that A) My dress was not spin-ny B) They gave me flowers in a stupid basket and not a gorgeous big-girl bouquet and C) That I didn't get to wear flowers in my hair. So the next day, when I got dressed for church, I *insisted* that my mom French braid in all of my flower girl blooms into my hair.

But this time, I'm in charge*. So blush Dahlias it will be. It may not be fabulous and feathery, but I suspect no one will be *too* focused on my hair. (And actually, it will be fabulous).

*And you better believe that my dress will be spin-ny and my flowers will not be in a stupid basket.

Photo from here

Sponsored Post: Turtle Love Committee's Environmentally Friendly Rings

I continue to be thrilled to have Turtle Love Committee as a sponsor of this site, because their values are so totally aligned with mine, and each new project that they dream up is better than the last. Currently, they are working to launch a line of eco-friendly and people-friendly jewelry (called EcoTurtle, heeeee!) that is affordable and beautiful. Like this wedding ring below, which I want to tear out of the screen, I love it so much:

Turtle Love Committee is, in their own words, trying to get people to think about how to spend money on things that matter, which is something I couldn't agree with more. Wedding rings matter (for lots of people), and Turtle Love is convinced that that does not mean they need to be expensive. And they shouldn't matter just because they were expensive (if they were). Turtle Love Committee has an awesome selection of alternative engagement and wedding rings that don't cost more than $250. They're classic and gorgeous and exciting - and they're just not diamonds.

Turtle Love Committee has recently highlighted the rings in its collection that are made in ways that are particularly environment- or people-friendly, and given a description of why and how they are. Each of these rings bears the "EcoTurtle" logo, and you can check out the eco-rings here.

But, it gets better, Turtle Love Committee has gone a step further and initiated a giving program with Cultivating Community. Cultivating Community is a non-profit based in Portland, Maine (TLC's base) that provides empowerment programs for youth, food for the hungry, and advocates for the environment around food issues. You can read about Cultivating Community here and at www.CultivatingCommunity.com. A whole 5% of Turtle Love Committee's sales (not profits) are contributed to Cultivating Community, which is a freaking big deal!

Even if you don't need rings, bookmark Turtle Love Committee, or keep it in mind - they're soon to unveil a collection of non-bridal jewelry. All in line with the idea of celebrating the important stuff, cutting out the stuff that doesn't matter, and making the world a better place.

So really, seriously, what are you waiting for? Go, go, go, go, go!

*Our* Photographers

So I've never come out and said this, but about a year ago now, right after we'd booked our venue, the very first wedding elves* we booked were Heather & Jon from One Love Photo. I can give you a million reasons as to why: that I cared about photos from the bottom of my heart, their amazing work, their use of multiple kinds of cameras, or the way Heather was a straight shooter and kept saying, "I could do that, but I just don't like to rip people off." I could tell you how we were lucky booking them when we did, and how we can't possibly pay them what they are worth.

But really, why bother? This picture says it all.

*We only have two sets of wedding elves, in the end: photographers and caterers. The rest is friends and family, or really, love-love-love.

Buy This Dress!

Um. Hi! I've been a tad sick today, and I might or might not have been out late last night drinking whiskey and listening to David play a little jukebox Michael Jackson tribute, so slow posting. Anyway, I'm popping my head up to say that one of you NEEDS TO BUY THIS WEDDING DRESS ALREADY. For serious. It's $335, and it's killer. And then you'll need to send me pictures. Go, go, go, go, go.

Found via the always excellent etsy wedding.

Liz and Alex's CSA Barn-Dance Board-Game Wedding

It's funny we all (myself totally included) have become a teensy bit obsessed with barn weddings, because barns are pretty and rustic, not because we have any real attachments to barns. Well, not Liz and Alex. Liz and Alex got married in a barn on the farmland of the CSA that they belong to (I knnnnooooowwwww), so to say that their wedding was grounded, was rooted in their values, well, it would be a little bit punny and a whole lot true. With that, I'll let Liz take it away:

Where your wedding was held: Our wedding and reception was held at the Byron Colby Barn in Grayslake, Illinois. Grayslake is a far north suburb of Chicago. The Byron Colby Barn was built in the late 1800s as a dairy barn. In the mid 1990s the Barn was taken down beam by beam and was rebuilt in a conservation community known as Prairie Crossing in Grayslake, Illinois. Before we decided on the Barn we started a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) and our CSA actually has farmland in Prairie Crossing. We fell in love with the Barn because it had character, it was indoors (crucial during the winter!) and we were able to hold the ceremony and the reception at the same place, which is surprisingly (for me) not common.What made your wedding creative? Alex and I did not want to break tradition too much in our wedding but we also knew that certain traditional aspects of weddings were just not us. We had a nonreligious ceremony that a friend of ours officiated. The ceremony was incredibly important to us, especially because we did not have guidelines that we had to follow. In the end our ceremony took on a traditional feel with processional in, two readings, exchanging of vows and rings and lighting of a unity candle - but we added personal touches throughout.Both of my parents escorted me in, one of our readings was “It’s You I Like” by Mr. Rogers, our vows were carefully selected, although not self-written and we extended our unity candle to our friends and family. We also kept the music in the ceremony upbeat because I did not want to sob, since I cry at everything, while walking down the aisle. Instead, I sobbed to “Here Comes the Sun” by the Beatles.We wanted our reception to be laid back and relaxing. We had a buffet line of awesome food from a great, local catering company. The cupcakes and cake were to die for; in fact people still talk about the food to this day! After dinner, we had the traditional first dance and parent dances but then we turned the iPod over to our friends. On the RSVP cards people suggested songs for the reception, which we guaranteed would make it onto the iPod and along with a lot of classics. We weren’t fussy about what songs got played when so everyone took a turn deejaying when songs they wanted to hear weren’t getting played. Alex and I also provided a handful of board games for people to play because sometimes when you’re at a wedding, you don’t want to dance but you don’t want to leave and you feel bad for just sitting around. We had games in the balcony of the barn and dancing on the main level.What made your wedding thrifty? Our wedding was thrifty because we weren’t unreasonable in our expectations and we knew what was important to us. Almost everything was DIYed and we had local wedding fairies that were not dependent on the wedding industry for their livelihood. Alex drew the robots (yes, robots) for our Save the Dates and designed our wedding invitations, the seating cards (also with robots), the programs, the tags for the root beer and the Thank Yous (again, robots here too!). We goccoed almost everything and what we didn’t gocco, we printed on our printer. We picked our own music, ate delicious food, selected our own beer and wine, drove to the wedding in my Dad’s truck and got a ride back in the hotel shuttle. We made use of our skills and resources and kept everything as sane and simple as possible.What made your wedding sane? My husband. We planned our wedding in 8 months and with less than 4 months to go I was working 50 to 60+ hours per week and I was "lucky" to be able to get the day before our wedding off. My husband made almost all of the vendor calls and we shared in the responsibility of DIYing items things. He also served as the voice of reason and helped keep our wedding practical. On the day of the wedding he was an awesome director, telling everyone what needed to happen and where things needed to go. Our wedding really felt like a team effort since it was our wedding and not my wedding. Congratulations to you both. May you remember the joy of spinning in each others arms on your wedding day for the rest of your long and happy lives together.

Your Wedding, Your Budget

Ok, off you go. Time to read East Side's little rant about how judging people because you think they spent too much on their wedding is just as bad as judging them because you think they spent too little. She says exactly what I think, and clearly. Best post I've read quite awhile.

People often take the title of this blog (which was, for the record, a happy accident,* not a manifesto) as some sort of statement that you have to have a "budget" wedding (whatever that means) or else. But your budget is different from my budget. It's based on a million factors: what you make, what you have saved, what your jobs are, if your family is contributing, how many people you're inviting, your free time, your location, your and your family's health, and just what you feel like spending, all of which are NO ONE ELSE'S BUSINESS. Period.

Because here is what this blog is really about: being grounded, being sensible, being thoughtful. And you cannot put a price tag on that.

Now GO. East Side says it better than I do.

*David had a political blog called Practical Progress. And I was starting to think much of the wedding stuff I had access to was capital C Crazy.

Love & Choice & Power

Long time reader Erica sent me an email with these words:

A Practical Wedding has helped me to keep my sister sane as she is planning her wedding. I feel like every wedding conversation I have with her starts with her seriously stressing over something silly like whether it's okay for her fiance to have a different number of groomsmen than she has bridesmaids, and ends with me telling her that there are no rules she needs to follow in planning her wedding. She can do whatever she wants.

This past weekend, my boyfriend and I got engaged. Then the barrage of questions started and the input on how we should do things began. Instead of stressing me out, they just rolled right off of my back. I know the questions and demands will only get worse, and not everyone will be happy with the non-traditional choices we make for our wedding, but now that I know there is a whole army of people out there who agree with me, and support our right to do things our way, it's not so hard to take other people's unhappiness with our decisions.

Which brings motivated me to get down on paper something I've been wanting to say about wedding planning for a long time.

First of all, lets not kid ourselves, for most of us wedding planning can be tough. There are days when nothing seems right, when everyone has an opinion, when life events make this party you are planning seem so small, when you can't figure out how to afford things, when vendors are flat out horrible to you. There will be those days. And those days are normal.

But for me, in the end, wedding planning has turned out to be all about making choices. It's about claiming the life that you want in the middle of a world that is telling you about the life that you should have. Let me say this loud and clear: No one can tell you how to live, and you pick the life you want. A marriage is, in many ways, the one of the few times in our lives when we make a big conscious decision about who we are, and what we want, and who we love. And, as much as people view love as magic, love and choice all mixed up together are a powerful powerful brew, and people are scared by it.

So they'll tell you that you need to wear a big poufy dress, or have a steak dinner, or throw a garter, and and and and and. But you don't. And you shouldn't trust people who say you need X to have a wedding, just like you shouldn't trust people who say you can't have X to have a wedding. You shouldn't trust people who tell you how much or how little you need to spend, or what you need to wear, or the vows you need to make.

If I've learned one thing planning this wedding, its this: The times that you say 'NO, that is not who we are, that is not what we want' will be vastly overpowered by the times you say 'YES YES YES, this is who we are, this is what we want, this is how we live'.

Be true to yourself, fearlessly claim the life you want. That's it. That's all. That's the solution to this puzzle.

Finally, Up The Steps To City Hall

We walked into San Francisco's city hall today, put down our bags at security, and the security guard beamed at us and said, "County clerks office is down the hall and to the left."
"We... um... what?"
(Grin) "Down the hall to your left."
"Um, we're here for a marriage license?"
At which point the guard totally cracked up, "Girlfriend, please. With a grin like that on his face? Like you could be here for anything else."

It felt like a tiny taste of what the wedding might be like, and it did feel auspicious and giddy and free. I was so excited and shaky that I made David double check my part of the form, because I was sure that I'd gotten something wrong.And then, there was a moment where it was really bittersweet. We got our number, and all I could think of was this wedding. I stood in line, feeling on top of the world, and then realized that there was a huge chunk of our community, and many of our nearest and dearest who didn't have the right to stand in the line at the county clerks office, who didn't get to be grinned at by the security guard. We got our form, and I immediately asked David, "Have they changed the forms back after Prop 8?" It turned out they hadn't. David and I each filled out our names, and then we had a choice to designate ourselves as bride and groom. We didn't. It was a small protest, but it was the protest we had available to us. We will have a un-gendered marriage. And next time someone tells me "But you *have* to, you're a BRIDE." I can say with total honesty, "But I'm not actually a bride. I'm Person A." And that feels really wonderful.

The Glorious Debris

I just got back from LA, and the somewhat painful confluence of helping to take care of my mother who is just out of the hospital, and my family bridal shower. It was so many emotions all at once that I think I need to take a nap for a week. On the flight home, I picked up an Oprah magazine so I wouldn't have to think, and was confronted with this quote that sums up what it's like to get married when you're dealing with other life events, with feelings of grief and fear, or goodness knows what else:

"Every one of us is called upon, probably many times, to start a new life. A frightening diagnosis, a marriage, a move, the loss of a job... And onward full tilt we go, pitched and wrecked and absurdly resolute, driven in spite of everything to make good on a new shore. To be hopeful, to embrace one possibility after another - that is surely the basic instinct... Crying out: High tide! Time to move out into the glorious debris. Time to take this life for what it is." - Barbara Kingsolver, High Tide in Tucson

So that is for each of you, who like me, are having complicated journeys to the altar. Or in other words, "A difficult beginning is a good sign."

In Which Desaray Explains Engagement Pictures

Desaray just pointed out:

The point of engagement photos is to look at them a.) and think, "I am so cute." b.) then think, "We are so cute." c.) Then think, "We are so totally together that we hire professionals to take pictures of us together." and d.) then look at them again. I think that's it.

Except that's not totally it. I think the point *really* is to keep them till you are old, and then follow the above steps again. I think that's what we'll do.

We're Getting Married Pictures

You guys! I'm late posting today, but it's ok, because I have something really cool. David is making me stick to my guns and not do a big reveal of what we actually look like until the wedding, but. Today, I'm authorized to show you my smile (David is totally smiling too, but you can't see that bit.) Ta Da:We never had any plans to take engagement pictures, mostly because it just seemed like one more thing, and I had zero idea of what I'd do with them.* But, this last weekend we met up with APW sponsor Emily Takes Photos in the city, and she shot some really beautiful pictures of us a a gift. Really, these feel like We're Getting Married pictures, because the engagement was so long ago. I'll show more pictures the shoot the week before the wedding, but untill then, I'll leave you with a picture of Emily and her boyfriend Ed, taken by David:Mmmhummm, that's how we roll.

*Guys! I still don't really know what we're going to do with these pictures, and they are SO. COOL. Ideas??
PS you can see me modeling baby clothes for pirates right here. Because yes, that was part of our 'photo session.'

Musings On Marriage: Leaps Of Faith

Reader Lizzie sent me this fantastic passage by Jewish feminist writer Anita Diamant from her book "Pitching My Tent." In this passage she discusses the reasons why she married her husband, and had a wedding - not just courthouse vows. It is so lovely and wise that I had to share:

Why marry? Because marriage publicly affirms the possibility of moving toward another person without reservation. With that momentum, we are propelled toward the center of the heart, toward the center of the universe, and however far that gets us is farther than we'd otherwise go alone. Why marry? Because every wedding enacts a personal connection to the universal story of the human hope for wholeness. Because by stepping into the hyperbarically charged space on the altar (in front of the priest, under the canopy), the bride and groom join in a dance that goes all the way back to the beginning of memory. Getting married is an attempt at turning air into matter, transforming the ineffable workings of the heart into things that are "real": the invitation, the dress, the ring. The words that constitute a wedding are magical incantations of the highest order. In the presence of witnesses and voiced by a vested authority, two people are pronounced a single unit. Ta-da! And by the way, the legal arguments for extending the marriage franchise to queer couples simply acknowledge that gay men and lesbians are members of the human family, complete with photographers, caterers, and the challenge of juggling Thanksgiving between two families of origin. Every wedding is an invocation of peace and wholeness and connection and joy. Good wishes flow from family and friends, through history and community, with wings and prayers and everything that might turn out to be holy in the universe. So that's why Jim and I got married --- to receive that shower of blessings, hoping with all our hearts to make them last."

So please. Next time you feel guilty because you are stressing out a little about your dress, or your invitations, or your rings, trying to get them to be *right* for you both, and someone asks you "Why?" or "What are you doing?" Tell them you are attempting to turning air into matter, and will they please let you concentrate??

PS All you smart Jewish wedding ladies - go leave a comment on Ms. Diamant's blog. Tell her how much you appreciate her work, because I think she'd like that (and I know you own and love A New Jewish Wedding.)

Wedding Graduate: Ellie Of Mint

I'm fantastically excited (and a little bit honored) to introduce our newest wedding graduate, Ellie of Mint. Ellie is, in no particular order: a graphic designer, a resident of North Carolina, and a possessor of exquisite taste. She also has her head firmly planted on her shoulders, and I like that in a girl. Her wedding graduate post is one of those that I read and kept nodding "uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh," because she gets it exactly. She gets being practical by knowing that you want to have *everyone* you love at your wedding, even if that's a lot of people. She gets knowing that sometimes you need to spend, and sometimes you need to save. And she gets that planning a wedding is about learning to make your own choices and stand by them. So, ladies (and a few gentleman) I bring you the fabulous Ellie:

Although Brendan's proposal was technically a surprise, we had dated for over six years and marriage was something we talked about very openly. We even had a rough wedding date in our minds. So, even though we were only "officially" engaged for about ten months, I had plenty of time beforehand to sneak peeks at wedding magazines and subscribe to more than a few wedding blogs.

Once we were truly engaged and I started thinking about the money side of things, I got pretty panicky. And stayed that way. I remember running across the "$10,000 only" blog early on and thinking, $10,000, are you kidding me? I could have a hell of a party for that! Innocence is bliss.

Our parents were very generous, but I still worried about every single penny and whether it was wise to be spending it on one day of our lives. I worried that my idea of a perfect wedding wouldn't match my family's, or Brendan's family's. (And since they were paying for the majority of it, their opinions certainly mattered to me. A lot.)I am a details person, and very visual, but fortunately my idea of a perfect wedding was casual and simple. I had no interest in things like wedding favors, signature drinks, or anything else I felt was cooked up by the wedding industry. I did, however, want a big wedding where we could invite the majority of our friends and large families.One of the first things you'll read in wedding books and magazines is that you need to make priorities and figure out where your money should go from there. If you're like me, this does not work, because how can you say that your dress is not important? The food? The music? It all seems important! Thinking vaguely was not helpful; I needed numbers. I took a budget out of some wedding book, and started adjusting. For example, if I knew I wanted to help pay for my bridesmaid's dresses, that meant I needed to subtract a few percentage points from somewhere else. There was a lot of pushing and pulling, until I felt like we had a number that I could work with for each category. This is where some categories got dropped completely. (Champagne toast? Day-of Coordinator? Professional makeup? Dropped).From there, I put a lot of thought into who we knew. At first, I thought we didn't know anyone who worked in the wedding industry. But once my parents and I sat down and thought about it, we realized that we knew someone who arranged flowers out of her home, we knew a photographer, I had crafty friends who could help me with invitation-printing or luminary-making, my mom had a friend who knew someone who made cakes out of her home, I had a hair-dresser friend, etc. Things started falling in to place. We really didn't interview any vendors at all.

How we got creative with our money:

• We rented a space with benches and rocking chairs, that was surrounded by beautiful scenery. This meant fewer decorations, and our guests could eat on their laps instead of at tables. This saved money on rentals, centerpieces, and even food. We served things like chicken fingers, finger sandwiches, and pasta. Anything that required two hands or a knife was out.
• We worked with a caterer who was OK with us supplying our own non-alcoholic drinks. My Dad stocked up at Costco, we set up some coolers under a table, found a friend who didn't mind keeping an eye on ice levels, and at the end we returned the bottles we didn't drink! It was easy, and saved us hundreds.
• My mother-in-law bought flowers from Costco for the rehearsal dinner (did you know you can pre-order ahead of time?) and got her family to help arrange them. The next morning, they took them to our reception location. The florist arrived with extra stems, and spruced up the arrangements. That way, we had lots of flowers for a whole lot less money. It's important to work with vendors who are flexible in this way!
• We loved the idea of driving away in an old car, but our budget was right around $100. We didn't have any friends with old cars who could drive us, and so we called Vintage Car Clubs. We found a couple who just enjoys driving people in their car, and drove us for a $100 donation to a charity.
• A friend did my hair, and my bridesmaids did their own. Everyone did their own makeup. I figured anyone who cared about their makeup would know how to apply it, and those who didn't would feel more comfortable without it anyway!

It was a lot of work, but what kept me sane was thinking creatively about every single line in our budget. It meant being practical, and thinking about which things our guests would even notice. It meant forgetting about some details that only I would remember. If I didn't feel like making something, it didn't get made - or bought.I approached our wedding the same way I approach my life, like one giant design project. Spending my Saturday night tying ribbons on programs was a perfect Saturday night. Making birdseed packets, a joy. But, I guess the main thing I really want to say is: if tying ribbons to programs sounds miserable, then for God's sake don't do it! If you're a chef and you care about how things taste, then forget about the tissue paper pom-poms! If you have the money and want to spend a million dollars on your wedding, then I think you should do it. Hate writing? Don't write your vows. If you want to (and can afford to) splurge on signature drinks, you should. And don't feel guilty about it.

At some point you have to stop reading (or listening) to advice and start doing what feels right to you as a couple and (maybe) as a part of your growing family. For me personally, if I hadn't put so much creative energy into our wedding, then it wouldn't have been our wedding - something would have been just wrong! And if I hadn't compromised with our families here and there, that wouldn't have been right for me either.

The best compliment we got after our wedding was that it was "real." So, think about what feels real to you and your partner... come up with a budget that doesn't keep you up at night... and learn how to say no.
Congratulations Ellie and Brendan! And hooray! Now if you want to read more about this wedding, go check out Ellie's posts on Mint. Go, Go!

Eight Weeks Out, And I'm Feeling FIIINNNEEEE

So I just looked at my wedding list today, which I carry around with me everywhere, in a tiny notebook where I also keep all my post ideas, that looks like this: but blue, and very beat up. Anyway, I looked at the list and realized we could get married tomorrow and everything would be fantastic. I don't mean this in the theoretical sense, like, all of us could go to the courthouse and get married tomorrow, and hooray! I mean it like, we could have our very own wedding, the one we've been planning tomorrow, and everything would be effing-fantastic. Yeah, I'd stay up a little late tonight whipping up a veil, yeah we wouldn't have programs, and we'd have to get a Hebrew literate guest to write up a ketubah on scrap paper really quick, but we'd be set. The beer would arrive, we'd have a ceremony, I'd have a dress, we'd have two rabbis, we've even practiced the electric slide.

This is what you call being Type-A Squared and front loading your stress.

So from here on out, my attitude is the wedding industry and all it's crazy minions can shove right off, because we're getting MARRIED, kids.

We've got family to help us, bridal brigade, fantastic friends, and a blog-torage. That, and we've got each other. So the details, the WIC, etc etc etc? F* This.

P.S. of course I'll get stressed again, but whatever, it's going to be awesome.
P.P.S. If you're feeling stressed, embrace that too. Tell people you feel how you feel, and they can shove right off.

L'Dor V'Dor

It's been a hard weekend here - there has been a family emergency, and I'm having a hard time summoning my words. It did, however, seem to be the perfect time to post this picture by Our Labor Of Love, which moved me beyond words.

I talk a lot about how I want our wedding to feel like a joyous party. In fact, our wedding invitations actually say "Wild Celebration To Follow," and oh, it will follow. But when David and I sat down to write what turned out to be our wedding mission statement we said that we wanted a simple religious ceremony followed by a joyful celebration. In the Jewish tradition, your wedding day is a personal Yom Kippur, a day of atonement. It's a day you approach with deep internal meditation, making yourself right with the world, and with whatever your concept of the universal is. You apologize to those you have hurt and you try to approach the day and your marriage with a clean ethical slate. There is a particularly lovely Jewish tradition that a bride, on her wedding day, has God's ear directly. In some communities it is traditional for people to pass along prayers for people in need of healing to the bride, and she prays for their healing before she walks down the aisle.

The point of all this is not that the wedding day needs to be a religious one. It is that, for me at least, the importance of our wedding ceremony is that it ties us to something far greater than ourselves: to our histories, to our traditions, to our families, to the pull of the universal. I hope my wedding day feels like this picture: deep, rich, human, with the hands of many generations, the hands of love on my shoulders.

Picture by Our Labor of Love, see the whole wedding on the new Once Wed here, here, here, here, and here

Nathalie & Cory's Green Picnic wedding

If I were getting married in the Maryland area, I can say with absolute certainty that we'd be being photographed by Jocelyn of Studio Matthews Photography. You might think this is because she takes really stylish wedding photographs (true). But that's not really it... the real reason is I *like* Jocelyn. She's been a sponsor of this blog for a long time now, and she even wrote a little article for the site on negotiating with vendors. But really, she's talented, she's kind, and she's really down to earth. She also shot Nathalie & Cory's stunning green wedding, and you guys are going to love it. The bride, Nathalie, wrote up all the details for you, including a plethora of etsy links. Natalie, take it away....

Cory and I were married on a hot Sunday afternoon in the Hemlock Grove of Woodend Sanctuary in front of 60 guests.Where your wedding was held: Woodend Sanctuary is an old mansion built in the 1920s that houses the Audubon Naturalist Society, the largest and oldest independent environmental organization in the Washington, DC region. Woodend Sanctuary also strives to be as green as possible in their practices.What made your wedding creative: I am a full-time graphic designer and am also lucky enough to work at Gilah Press + Design, a letterpress studio located here in Baltimore, so of course I had to design all of the paper goods in the ceremony!Some other creative touches: Writing our own vows the night before the ceremony. After the rehearsal dinner we holed ourselves up in our hotel and wrote them next to each other. We tried reading them to each other over and over again so that we couldn’t cry at the ceremony (we’re very emotional people) but we still could barely get through them during the ceremony. The tears were non-stop!We wanted some sort of photobooth after seeing a similar setup in Lena Corwin’s wedding. We found a big patterned fabric of green berries at our local thrift store, tied it to rope that spanned across two trees and used that as the backdrop. Our wonderful photographer, Jocelyn of Studio Mathewes set up lights and wrote down times on a chalkboard that let guests know when they should show up at the booth to get their photo taken. As the night went on and people drank a little more, the photos turned out even more hilarious.

My number one favorite wedding detail had to be the guestbook that my co-worker Whitney and her husband Jacob created for us as a wedding gift. I had no say in the design of the book since it was a surprise and it completely blew my mind. Jacob used a salvaged piece of wood that he refinished and hand-carved our monogram into for the cover. They hand-cut all of the tags that slipped into light brown coin-sized envelopes that are glued into the book and tied the ends of them with organic cotton yarn. Guests were able to slide the tags in and out of the envelopes to either sign their name, write a little message or get creative. It is an incredible piece of art.What made your wedding thrifty: We used Etsy for some of the major parts of the wedding. A local Baltimore crafter named SmittenXOXO on Etsy created my birdcage veil and headpiece.My dress was custom made by Amanda Archer in San Francisco who always uses natural-fiber fabrics in her work. I gave her photos of a Priscilla of Boston dress I loved but definitely couldn’t afford and she went to work recreating it and making it her own.Beth Cyr, created our rings. She specializes in custom-made jewelry inspired by nature. We found two gorgeous rings in her store that have a beautiful patina bark texture to them and had them made for us in our ring sizes. They are one of my favorite parts of the wedding and I couldn’t believe how well priced they turned out to be.Along with Etsy, we tried to do as much as possible ourselves. For our centerpieces we used Cory’s mother’s vintage salt and pepper shakers, wood slices that Cory’s father created for us using fallen logs from his backyard, wood numbers we purchased and stained for the table numbers, and dozens of mason jars that we scored off of Craigslist that held bunches of herbs, plants and local, in-season flowers that Ellen of Local Color Flowers put together so beautifully for us.What made your wedding sane: Starting the wedding planning process well in advance was a huge help. It helped us concentrate on smaller details once the wedding date got closer and closer. But even with such good planning, I had to let go of a lot of projects I wanted included in the wedding. In the end we really just want everyone to have a good time while celebrating our love for each other.

A lot of my friends wanted to assist us with anything they could the day of, and boy, were they a big help. A few of them brought over the cupcakes, others escorted guests to the ceremony and brought gifts inside the mansion, and family members were always on hand to keep us stress-free and make sure we were having as much fun as possible. I don’t know what I would have done without them.

Musings on Marrage

As our wedding day approaches, I'm finding myself wanting to write about marriage more and more.* To muse on why we do this - why we put ourselves through shoe buying and guest lists and what kind of a dress we want. Because while all this stuff can be both fun and maddening, it's not the point. This wedding planning is just a snippet of our lives, it's a moment of transition between one phase and then next. We're struggling to find our way out of our cocoon, exhilarated and terrified to unfold our new wings.

This snippet on marriage is from a Real Simple article (Febuary 2008) called Love Letters - two letters written by writers Cathi Hanauer and Daniel Jones, after fifteen years of marriage. It is such a honest portrait of what I hope married life will bring us, that I clipped this article and re-read it from time to time. So now, I'm sharing Cathi Hanauer's words with you:

As Rickie Lee Jones put it in our wedding song, "If you fall, I'll pick you up/ pick you up" - and so far you do. To me, that's what married love is. I love you for continuing to love me despite my contradictions, for finding me endearing when others might find me impossible. And I love you for sharing my life vision, even if I am a little more restless while you're happy to stay home and build a stone wall in the front garden, like you did last weekend. A pretty little wall to go with the patio you laid out back two summers ago. So there it is. The nice house, the nice life we've build together - these days full of kids and pets and books and sports and artwork and music, with just a little bitching now and then.
Here's to the rest of it.
Love, Me

*Don't worry, we're still going to talk about weddings too, silly buttons.
(apologies for not linking to the whole article, which you all would love. It does not appear to be online.)

Michelle and Andrew's Santa Cruz Celebration

Where your wedding was held: We wed on a huge enclosed lawn at a public park in Ben Lomond, California. We knew we wanted to have our ceremony and reception at the same place, and the Highlands House and Park in Ben Lomond was perfect because it was affordable, and we could start outside and move inside as the notoriously chilly Santa Cruz evening came upon us.We advertised the wedding as a wedding weekend, hoping that since it was being held on Memorial Day weekend, our family and friends could make a mini-vacation out of it. After the wedding, those who were staying in town met up on Pacific Ave. in downtown Santa Cruz, where we began a post-wedding pub crawl (and made it to last call!). The next day, we all relaxed on the beach playing more games and visiting. It could not have been more fun or more perfect.

What made your wedding creative: Leading up to the wedding, we would often get a kick out of relatives who would tell us how much they were looking forward to this “interesting” and “different” wedding. I suppose what they were referring to is the fact that we didn’t go with traditional simply for the sake of being traditional.
We asked our two best friends to officiate the ceremony together because we wanted it to be personal and we so admire their marriage. We opted to see each other before the wedding (gasp!) and take our portraits then so we would not lose time with our friends and family after the ceremony. Rather than have our guests sit and patiently small talk while waiting for us to finish taking photos and make a grand entrance, we joined them on the lawn to play games, snack and visit before dinner. And we let our small wedding party wear what they were comfortable with. My sisters both chose dresses that were completely their own individual styles, and Andrew’s buddies brought khaki pants and a white shirt with coordinating ties.

When it came to “traditions,” we defied wedding website advice and just let things happen naturally without a schedule (how it probably used to be not too long ago!). As dinner wound down, my dad spontaneously made a beautiful toast. We had our first dance because we moved inside the house and Sarah McLachlan’s “Push” was playing. And there was no cake cutting since the cupcakes were devoured immediately after we moved the party inside.As for the details, my artistic medium of choice is paper, with wood coming in a close second. We designed our invitations, welcome fans (programs), drink tags and all of the instructions signs, which were placed in photo frames I already owned. Armed with scissors, decorative punches, cardstock and scrapbook paper, stamps, ribbon, double-stick tape, and a very compliant home laser printer, we cut, folded, and taped until our fingers were sore.One of the aspects that took me the longest but was completely worth it was scanning in about 100 old family photos and using a web program to turn them into vintage polaroid-style images, which we hung on a line in the entrance to the house. Those were the source of much laughter and reminiscing throughout the evening.What made your wedding thrifty: I am the queen of recycling and reusing! I did not want to spend money on things that felt wasteful or bad for the environment, so I made an effort to use things I already had around the house or could borrow from someone else (lots of baskets, serving platters, photo frames, mason jars), and when I had to buy things, I tried to only buy things I could reuse or sell after the wedding. And I scoured the thrift stores and the flea market before I would pay full price for anything!

From the get-go, I tried to steer clear of any business that had the word wedding in its name. We cut back on vendors big time, only using our rental company for things we couldn’t buy practically (silverware, glassware, market umbrellas). Our tables and chairs were provided by the venue, and I bought bulk fabric at $2 a yard to cut into tablecloths. We ordered most of our food from a nearby BBQ restaurant, then made what we knew we could – a green salad, corn muffins, lemonade and iced tea, snack foods that didn’t need to be prepped (like grapes and strawberries, cheese and crackers, and Goldfish crackers!). My kid sister made cupcakes in lieu of a wedding cake. Dinner was served family-style, and all of the serving dishes came from a local dollar store. And instead of hiring help from a company, we posted to the UC Santa Cruz job board and got four amazing college kids who worked their tails off prepping the food when it arrived and making sure everyone was fed and happy.My aunts made my dress from fabric bought at a discount fabric store in San Jose. Andrew’s jacket came from one store on clearance and his pants from another. I made his tie out of excess dress fabric, a sewing project that only took about two hours. Our photographers, Jenny Lin and her team, are art students who graduated from the high school where we teach. We opted to play music from an iPod instead of hire a DJ. All of the flowers for the wedding were bought at Trader Joe’s for less than $100, and my sisters and I made the bouquets in less than an hour the day before. All included (even rings!), the wedding cost us just under $6,000.What made your wedding sane: First and foremost, knowing that we were not spending a lot of money that we didn’t have kept us really sane. We had been together nine years to the day on our wedding day, and one thing that kept us from getting married earlier was the feeling that weddings were a waste of money. At the end of our wedding weekend, we both agreed that it was totally worth it, but I’m not sure we would have felt the same if it had left us with debt.

The second factor in staying sane was getting help and being flexible. My sisters, parents, grandparents, and aunts were a huge help in the weeks leading up to the wedding. They were willing to take ideas in my head and turn them into tangible things, which was great.

On the day of, we had two major crises. The first was traffic and miscommunication that led to our set-up team arriving late. Instead of freaking out (too much, anyway), we rolled up our sleeves and got to work. I ran around the venue in my dress setting up chairs, arranging tables, and unpacking stuff. The second crisis was leaving both my iPod and computer at my grandmother’s house 45 minutes away (Hint: put your system and your backup system in separate boxes). We ended up using one of our groomsmen’s iPod for the ceremony and my cousin’s iPod for the dancing afterward. Since it wasn’t our playlist, she volunteered to be our unofficial DJ for the evening and it worked out just fine.The last thing is almost a Team Practical cliché, but it is so true. We decided at the very beginning which of those wedding things were important to us (a meaningful ceremony, having fun, good food, feeling comfortable), then we cut back on all the rest. At every stage of the process, we asked ourselves, “Is this necessary?” I think that practice, not only in wedding planning but in marriage, helps to keep you sane, or should I say, practical.