DJing Your Wedding With An Ipod

From day one we knew we were going to DJ our own wedding, mostly because we *could.* As far as we were concerned, ipod's were a small gift from the wedding gods. Halfway through the planning process though, I started to get nervous about our ipod DJ plan. You see, David and I like to dance, or more precisely we like to daaaaaaaaaaaaannnncccceeee. If you're playing dancing music, you will not be able to get me off the dance floor. The hora? Hip-hop? The electric slide? I'm there. Heck, I'll do country line dances, and I'll lead a dance floor full of people in a funky Macarana if I'm forced into it. So I started to get very concerned, because people said, without a DJ there is no flow, without a DJ there is no energy, without a DJ people will take over your play list, without a DJ you have to work at your own wedding.

In sum: without a DJ, no one will dance. And I believe the technical term for that story is Bullsh*t.

In fact, not only will everyone dance, but you'll have the playlist for the rest of your lives (we re-lived our wedding a bit on the honeymoon by listening to our mix). But to calm your nerves I'm going to give you my best tips for DJing your own wedding. I'm far from an expert, so feel free to add your best tips in the comments.

1. Amplification matters. If I had to pick one thing that makes the difference between a successful ipod dance party, and one that falls flat, it would be this. You need your music to be loud. We paid roughly $300 to rent a professional amplification system that we could run with our computer, and it was worth every penny. Weddings I've been to where the music wasn't quite loud enough, well, I never lost myself in the music. And that's what you need.
2. Cross-fade, cross-fade, cross-fade. You can set up your itunes playlist to do this, and you should. Just like dance parties don't like quiet music, they don't like dead air. Also, if the song is endless (I'm looking at you Michael Jackson) feel free to cut out the last 8 minutes of vamping.
   
3. Play music people know. I might be the only wedding blogger in the history of time that has ever admitted this, but David and I are *not* music snobs. David's tastes run a bit towards more classic stuff, whether it's jazz or rock. As for me, when it comes to the dance floor, I'm not above Beyonce. And love to dance to some Justin Timberlake, and I'm not even ashamed of that. So our playlist was a mix of Tina Turner, Sir-Mix-Alot, Nina Simone, the Black Eyed Peas, The Beatles, Lauren Hill, Frank Sinatra, House of Pain, and yes, Dolly Parton. And people stayed on the dance floor. You may have much better taste in music than I do. You may listen to bands that don't even exist yet. But if you load up your playlist with tons of songs people don't know at all, you're going to send up with a rousing bar scene, but probably not with a packed dance floor.
   
4. Play a mix of music for all ages. Yeah, you and I might like Arrested Development, but I'm pretty sure your granny likes Billie Holiday singing the standards, so mix it up.
   
5. Think about the flow of your play-list. Cate of Project Subrosa made me think about this pre-wedding, with her talk of building it up, and easing it down, building it up higher, dropping it down, and then building it up into a frenzy right at the end. She was 100% right.
   
6. Have a music guard. Guests don't get to adjust the playlist, no, no, no. Make someone your music bouncer, and make them tough.
   
7. That said, don't be afraid to screw with your own playlist mid-stream. YOU can play with the playlist during the wedding. We had more music than we needed, so there were times when we skipped further down the list. We also got to a point in the afternoon where no one over 30 was dancing. You know what I said about mixing it up? Yeah. If you don't dance, we don't play Frank Sinatra. At that point in the day we skipped straight to the hip-hop set, and people sweat through their shirts. And let me just cut off the people who say, "See? If you DJ your wedding you have to WORK at your wedding!" We spend about as much time on our playlist as we would have spent chatting to the DJ about requests or timing. We knew our playlist backwards and forwards, and could adjust it with a flick of our fingers.
8. And finally, don't be afraid to pick a few emotional and obscure favorites. We ended our day with this medley Sam Cooke, and that was when I finally let go, tears streaming down my cheeks. Our friends might not have known the song before our wedding, but they sang with all their hearts in those last moments as they formed a circle around us, which throbbed with some of the most powerful love that I've ever felt. And you can't buy that.

Pictures: First by our wedding warrior and chief, the fabulous Kate , second byOne Love Photo (yay)

DIY, or DIT, Week

This week I wanted to talk a bit of some of the projects we took on for our wedding - in particular doing our own flowers and DJing our wedding with an ipod playlist. David said I should also talk about our wine, but I can tell you how to DIY your wine in two seconds: figure out some good affordable wine that you like, figure out about how much you think people will drink, buy wine. And NO, I don't know what kind of wine you like, so don't even ask. So *that's* covered.

But before we talk about DIY, or my favorite made-up acronym DIT (do-it-together), I wanted to parse what we mean when we say DIY. Over the lifetime of this blog, I've gotten a lot of emails saying something along the lines of, "Oh my god! You're wedding is so DIY! I could never do that..." which always left me with a bit of a feeling of, "Whhhhaaaaa???" Because here is the thing: I've never considered myself to be terrifically DIY. I have something of a creative personality, but I'm not crafty. To me a DIY wedding conjures up images of hand made bunting flags, handmade glassine envelopes with homemade confetti, and handmade stickers to affix on handmade favors. And for better or worse, our wedding had none of those things.

Here is the thing. I'm a hippie kid. Long story short, I grew up without any sort of TV or VCR, and never missed it. People used to ask us, "But what do you DO?" and our response was always, "But when do you have TIME for TV?" As for what we did: we read a lot, and we made stuff. My mom sewed all my clothes when I was little, both my sister and I started sewing when we could reach the machine, my mom spun wool, my sister knit chain mail, I collaged and danced, my dad cooked. But none of us would consider ourselves crafty. In fact, we were not necessary even *good* at the stuff we did, we just grew up with the idea, "Need something? Can you make it? Cool. If you can't make it, can you afford to buy it?"

So that's how I approached our wedding. I knew I didn't need any *additional* trouble. I figured I was going to have plenty of trouble as it was. So I never took on extra craft projects. But if we needed something, without thinking about it, we'd approach the problem as, "Hum. Can we do this ourselves, or do we need to hire someone?" In the case of DJing, it never occurred to us to hire someone, because with current technology it was so easy to to ourselves. With the flowers, I knew that I wanted more flowers than I could afford to get from a florist, and flower arranging sounded fun, so done. And, well, making food for 120 people did *not* sound like fun to us. So we hired someone, and were thrilled to support a creative business.

So why am I telling you this? I'm telling you because I'm inviting us to reconsider the way we think of DIY. Because yes, the wedding industry will sell you every single thing you need, pre-packaged. These days they'll even sell you someone else's creativity pre-packaged (need someone to style your wedding, so you don't have to flex your own style muscles? Done!) None of this is inherently bad. For those of us that work long hours, some of this is a god-send.

But what if our first question was, "Hey, can I do this thing for myself, or should I hire someone to do it?" And what if we stopped asking, "Hey, am I *talented* at this thing?" and realized that the right question to ask is, "Hey, do I *enjoy* this thing?" What if we stopped thinking of DIY as crafty-crafty-madness, and started thinking of it as simple self (and community) sufficiency?

So please think of DIY/DIT week that way. Self sufficiency. Because *that* I can get behind.

G'mar Chatimah Tova

I will be taking Monday off to observe Yom Kippur. After such a momentous year, it is wonderful to get to slow down and reflect on the many blessings we received, and what I'm ready to leave behind as I dive into the new.

To all of my Jewish and Interfaith ladies (and a few gents) I wish you thoughtful reflection, moments of peace, and an easy fast. I'll see you on the other side.

Sponsor Introduction: My Wedding Workbook

Today I have the pleasure of introducing you to My Wedding Workbook, which is as far as I can tell, is the best online wedding planning software available. AND IT'S FREE. I'm not even joking. When I started poking around their site, the first thing I thought was, "Holy hell. Why didn't we use this website? Why, why, why?" Because the bottom line is, the reason I was able to say "f*ck it" on the day of the wedding, is that I was really organized leading up to the wedding. In fact, if you saw my day of spreadsheet you would probably faint. So that's me. Hyper organized. Someone who works on Excel all day long. Someone who when she sees The Knot's wedding planning software, wants to slam her head against the wall.

So let's talk about why you're going to think that My Wedding Workbook is a little free gift from heaven. First of all, you get everything there: a calendar, budgets, EMAIL REMINDERS (what? yes.), guest list planners (easy ones. Like click "yes attending" and you're done). Second of all, everything is integrated. So if you add to your budget that you've paid a deposit for your wedding rings, and the final payment is due in a month, then oh-yes, that will automatically populate on your calendar. Ahhhhhhhhh! And also ohhhhhhh!

But it's the little things that really get me. The things that are designed for real grown up tech savvy people. Like, you can export all your information to Excel in .xls format. Because that's what we do in the real world. Like, you can click a button and get a page in PDF, so you can print it out. Because, yes, that's how we roll. Like, you can manage multiple events (shower, wedding, welcome picnic) all from one guest list. THANK YOU.

And finally, you know how we feel about The Knot's "You have 150 items overdue and 22 days until your wedding" wedding-blackout craziness. Well, with My Wedding Workbook, YOU get to pick which items you would like to add to your wedding calender. So if "buy ring pillow" and "rent tuxes" don't make the list, you're not going to have some auto-wedding-robot beating you over the head about it.

So go sign up already. FOR FREE. Let me live vicariously through your well organized, lower-stress wedding planning. Ahhhhh... that's nice.

PS (oh, and did I mention that I really like the people who run it? I do. Eminently sane.)
PPS And for all you wedding professionals out there, check out My Wedding Workbook Pro

Wedding Graduate: the 'i do' chronicles

I'm so excited to introduce Sarah (remember Sarah, with the wishes and the littles?) who blogs at the "i do" chronicles, talking about her wedding this morning. I've really been delighted to share some practical, grounded ladies who had somewhat more traditional weddings this week, along with funky/quirky weddings, because there are many wise women who read this blog (and some kick-ass men, heeeey!) and some of them are walking down a church aisle and rocking it (um, for most of my life I assumed *I* would walk down a church aisle and rock it). So here is Sarah, speaking her truth (and look at her blue dress girls! Someone steal this idea please!) So, Sarah, preach it:For perfectionists, wedding planning can be as much a curse as a blessing. I found A Practical Wedding on one of those days -- an ohmygosh-I'll-never-have-the-most-elegant-original-perfectly-choreographed-wed ding day.

Like many couples out there, we're a pretty traditional pair of people who had a pretty traditional wedding. Over our 18 month engagement, I slowly accepted that our day was for us. I got over whether I was being practical enough, thrifty enough, enough like a Martha Stewart spread. Couples sometimes need a reminder to be true, not put on a performance. For Patrick and I (ok, mostly for me), finding this truth was a journey.

There were so many parts of our wedding that we “owned.” We did some things that are the norm and other things that just felt right. Anything that didn't fit, we dropped.

Our ceremony was held in the same Catholic church that I grew up in. One family friend wrote in her card about remembering me in my first communion dress and veil walking down the same aisle. It was very special. (Though, honestly, it’s not what we originally had in mind. One thing brides should know is that sometimes keeping family peace and honoring your upbringing was as important as the wedding-in-a-field that I might have been picturing. … That’s another story!)
When the doors opened for me and dad to walk down the aisle to Patrick, the weight of the love in the room erased any doubts about the merits of a big wedding. Joyful tears wet my cheeks and neck. By the time I took Patrick's hand, I was wiping snot away with the hanky.We celebrated at Laurel Hall, a restored Jacobean-style mansion with a sloping lawn, dark woods, stained glass, and an awesome patio. It was a dream! (And I can’t believe I just typed that, but it’s true.) The pastor’s prayer opened with a thank you to my parents for having us to their “house.” So funny, but it actually did feel homey and warm. It was the one over-the-top part of the whole affair, and it was worth every penny we pinched on other details. It’s exhibit-A for the A Practical Wedding “sometimes pay full price” mantra.

You can have a Catholic wedding and a traditional party and still make it personal. Some of our favorite details: My brother played a Nickel Creek song, “When You Come Back Down” during the ceremony that we wove into the sermon and our programs. It meant so much to us. And my "something blue" was a group of 13 very special women who wore blue to "stand up with me in spirit."
There were other wedding-y things. We hired a local baker to make pies like grandma (with LARD! AWESOME!) and served them “help-yourself” style. We served a hearty, simple buffet even though the dinner was in a fancy mansion. We did a wish jar instead of a guest book.
You don't have to spend under or over a certain dollar amount to do it "right." We made a commitment to each other at the very beginning to be out of credit card debt (we had a chunk, but not too big) before the wedding instead of IN debt because of it. But we still had a damn good party. And we still spent some change (sigh … parties are expensive).

My parents helped a ton (thank you!), and for the rest we really held each other responsible. We truly splurged only on a few things: venue, open bar, and my dress.

We had a small wedding party (8 people total), a small cake, simple arrangements on the tables, and no flowers in the church. We hired an up-and-coming DJ and one-man local catering company. All of these decisions actually made our wedding BETTER, in my opinion. (For evidence of the happy results, see the photo below.)

The small wedding party allowed me to have my cherished “something blue,” and I loved the intimacy of just having my sisters beside me as maids of honor. The food was fantastic! We ran out of pie… not a slice left! And that DJ had people on the floor until they shut him down!
Lean on loved ones. Ours came out of the woodwork to help. Invaluable. A friend (love, lillian weddings & events) coordinated the day, put out fires, and helped our parents enjoy hosting while we danced away! To me, a coordinator is a no-brainer investment. Another good friend (Photography by Shea) shot our amazing photos (including those with this post and our totally awesome slideshow). I was honored to have my dad design custom invites, and we hired a family friend to print them. All of our vases were all ball jars from Patrick’s grandma’s farmhouse basement. So, our details took on real meaning.
When it comes to staying sane, all I have to say is: pre-canna. This is the Catholic pre-wedding counseling. It helped us to stay centered. Most valuable was the weekend-long retreat we took away from cell phones, computers, TV, and wedding checklists.

We learned how to argue (and boy do you need that in the process of wedding planning). We made a covenant with each other about how we would lean on faith and each other on the wedding day and in the future. We talked about real-life things people just sometimes forget to hash out when they're engulfed by wedding-stuff: kids, money, religion, holidays, fears, in-laws, life goals, communication styles, name changes.

It's so important remember the groom as a part of the wedding … which in today’s bride-obsessed wedding industry is unfortunately easy to do. During the retreat we were "required" to write a love letter to one another. Wow. Talk about getting back to basics.

I think it's because we felt so reassured by the counseling and planning for our real lives that the Saturday before our wedding, I was able to relax. We spent the morning running errands and the evening swinging on our tree swing, snuggling and talking about how we weren’t nervous.

You must carve out time on the wedding day to spend alone, which for us included 15 minutes after the ceremony. We disappeared in the limo and shared a beer and giggled like little kids! We felt so present in the day. We remember sooooo much of it. All of it, actually. We just smiled and smiled and smiled.

I was moved in ways that words cannot explain. Overcome by optimism and joy.
We had snafus, and some things did not go perfectly. But, here's a secret to share with all those brides-to-be: the "perfect" wedding is one that finds you waking up next to a man who is whispering "Good morning, wife." You reach for his hand, feel the ring, and realize -- this is my husband.

Wedding Graduate: Happy-Zen Lauren

Today's wedding graduate is Lauren! Lauren, who got married the same weekend we did (remember?), Lauren who has been super honest walking this path along side me and sharing the parts that SUCKED, Lauren who loves being married as much as I do, Lauren who didn't even screw around and sent me her wedding graduate post before I had time to ask (thank you!!). Her advice is so wise - like the inviting everyone you love bit. The only thing we disagree on is the being tired after the wedding (we were not, oddly), but different perspectives is what makes Team Practical work, no? And now, with love, I give you Lauren and her best advice...

1. Do what feels right to you, and hold your ground...
We had no formal wedding party-- Jeff's oldest and best friend was our best man, and I had a bevy of non-bridesmaids who hung out with me that morning.My brother gave the maid of honor toast, and he walked my mom and my grandmother down the aisle as my wedding party. We had an ice cream sundae bar and a giant pile of snickerdoodle cookies (baked by three of my non-bridesmaids) instead of a cake. There were no favors. My mom and I made hundreds of paper flowers to decorate the ceremony and reception sites. I didn't wear a veil, even though this made my mom cry when I told her. I got my dress for $250 at the Filene's Basement Running of the Brides sale. We spent months crafting our ceremony and vows, but hired an MIT grad student to DJ without ever meeting him. I created a playlist for the chapel to play while everyone was waiting for the wedding to start. We recessed out of the chapel to "Signed, Sealed Delivered" by Stevie Wonder.I wore a flower in my hair that two of my friends picked from a garden outside the hotel. Oh, and um, our reception was in a bar. And it was fabulous. All these things made my wedding thrifty, creative, and sane (for me!)2. ...but be open to surprises, and the fact that your mind might change.
There were two things that were absolutes for Jeff when it came to our wedding: we were going to leave the reception early, before everyone else, and we were not going to have a brunch the next day. To Jeff, that was OUR time to be married, and be with only each other. But then, the wedding day came, and not only were we having lots of fun at our reception, but there was barely enough time to talk to everyone who was there as it was-- there was no way we could leave early and give up precious time with family and friends who had travelled great distances to be with us. We never discussed this, it just happened. And walking back to the hotel at 11pm on a Sunday night through the empty streets of Boston with the last few guests at the wedding was wonderful. And then, after going to sleep at 2am, we both found ourselves WIDE awake at 7am, and Jeff rolled over and said "Hey, isn't everyone meeting for breakfast?" You guessed it- we ran down the street and spent two hours at a Panera where about 50 people from our families showed up out of the blue. And that was one of my favorite parts of the wedding weekend. So, make decisions and hold your ground, but be open to following your heart if, in the moment, you find yourself craving something totally different.3. Do not underestimate how tired you will be after your wedding.
Between wanting to see everyone who was in town and an out of control excitement level, I barely slept on the days leading up to the wedding. And even if I had slept, the emotional exhaustion that happens after every single person you love is in the same place for a whole weekend is something I can't describe. I've never been so tired in my whole life. We didn't go very far away for our honeymoon, and only spent four days, but our schedule involved three meals and three naps a day, in addition to 9 hours of sleep every night. I know everyone says "take a honeymoon, take a honeymoon," but the whole time that we were gone, my husband and I really just wanted to be in our own home, napping on the couch with our cat. I would never, ever, have considered going home for a week instead of going away for a honeymoon, but in retrospect, going home was our favorite part (and that's when our marriage became real.) So I really encourage you to self-evaluate here-- my husband and I love to travel, don't get me wrong, but post-wedding all we wanted was comfort and sleep. Some people get that in hotels, but me? I just wanted my own bed. Don't be afraid to tell everyone in your life that you'll be gone for a week, and then sneak back to your home and enjoy every second of the reality of your new life.4. Stick to a budget (if you have a budget) for as long as possible.
Why? Because when it comes down to the weeks leading up to your wedding, you might want to employ a sanity-saving solution I call "throwing money at the problem." I had planned on doing my own flowers for a year leading up to the wedding, and then, three weeks before, I couldn't fathom the thought of spending part of my Saturday in my hotel room cutting flowers when I could be hanging out with my friends and family. So I went to Whole Foods and ordered my wedding flowers. I had a hair trial at a salon convenient to the hotel, and it was awful, so, two weeks before the wedding (note: don't wait this long to do your hair trial!) I booked my regular hairdresser, and paid for a trial and day of with her (far more expensive than the convenient place). If I had giving in to spending temptations earlier, I might not have felt comfortable exceeding my mental budget for things like flowers and hair when it really mattered- two weeks before the wedding when I didn't have time to stress over it. Although, if someone had told me my #6 (below), I might not have worried about hair and flowers at all!5. Don't be afraid to invite everyone that you love.
There are people who tell you that a wedding bigger than 25, or 50, or 60, or 80, isn't intimate, or as much fun, or is too overwhelming. I think this is crap. There was no way that we were going to let an opportunity for our large families to be in one place go by, so we invited everyone, and 105 adults and 16 kids came. And were there a lot of people to spend time with? Of course. Do I wish I'd had more time to spend with each and every person who was at my wedding? Absolutely. But what mattered was that they were there. In the months leading up to my wedding, I imagined myself crying through the whole day. I tested out countless waterproof mascara in anticipation of this. But then, over the weekend, as more and more of my friends and family started to arrive, I just felt myself bubbling over with joy. And then, I was standing behind the doors to walk myself down the aisle, and they opened, and there was this collective intake of breath, one or two people clapped, and the love that rushed out of that room completely blew me away. And I laughed my way down the aisle-- there was no other way to express what had just hit me. I don't know if I would have felt the same way if I'd limited my guest list to what someone else thought was a good size for a wedding.6. I promise you, on your wedding day, you won't notice.
The day before my wedding, I went to get my nails done. As I was sitting in the salon, it occurred to me that there was nothing that could possibly matter less than if there was nail polish on my nails the next day. Now, getting my nails done was a great time because I went with one of my non-bridesmaids who was in town from Arizona and it was the only one-on-one time I had with her, but the point is that we could have gotten coffee and nobody on earth, including me, would have noticed my nails. The same goes for virtually every aspect of your wedding. Don't want to do favors? (I didn't!) Nobody will care. Worried that the flowers you ordered two weeks before the wedding showed up and are kind of crappy? It just doesn't matter. I was supposed to get my makeup done at an Origins store, for free. Yes, they do this for anyone, if they remember. The people at my Origins store did NOT remember, however, so all my non-bridesmaids pooled their makeup supplies and one of them did my makeup, and we had way more fun. Jeff and I had planned to each dance with our moms- we had picked out songs and everything- and then all of a sudden it was 9pm and the DJ hadn't played one slow song all night, because the dance floor was packed with people who wanted to boogie! So we nixed the mom songs (our moms were on the dance floor and never noticed). I had planned for a year to make a seating chart, and then a week before the wedding, the venue (being a bar/restaurant that doesn't normally do weddings) said that they didn't know what the table configuration would be like until that day, so there was no way we could assign seats. This caused me no end of stress (what would people DO? Where would they SIT? What if someone was LEFT OUT?) but on the day of the wedding, guess what? Everyone found a seat, ate from the buffet when they were hungry, danced when they wanted to dance, and met new people (or not!) It is hard to let things go in the weeks and months leading up, but I assure you, that if it doesn't matter, you won't notice. I don't think my husband and I broke eye contact for our entire ceremony- he was the only thing I could see, and I couldn't stop smiling. My nails, my bouquet, and the music certainly could not matter compared to that.

Donia & David Part II - The Doing

And now I bring you Part II of Donia's wedding essay. The one that answers how they managed to feed 300 people on $8,000. So let Donia inspire you to break free, dream big, and DO:

Part II - The Nitty-Gritty and What Really Matters
1. Maintain a healthy and realistic perspective. We had limitations (monetary, time, etc.) - all of which helped design and shape our wedding. Limitations aren't bad and stressing about it never helps anyone.

2. It never hurts to ask. Enlist your friends, family and loved ones. You won't be surprised, or maybe you will, that you have gifted, talented, and resourceful people who are eager to show their love and support for you. Our loved ones felt more connected to David and I because they participated in our wedding planning, etc. even if it was a mere word of advise about our wedding. We found our wedding location, photographer, videographer, flowers, invitations, desserts, deejay, reception entertainment (my father and our good friends sang songs to us while everyone ate), set-up crew, and tear-down crew all through our friends and family. We were either given the above mentioned items for free or paid cost and a little extra for our friend's kindness.

3. Research, research, research. Check, double check, and compare rental company prices, catering, photography, etc. There's really no excuse to do some basic research with the internet and a cell phone at your fingertips. If you're reading Meg's blog, then you must already be a wedding researcher.4. The more energy you put into your wedding, the more rewarding it becomes. The small details you add to your wedding absolutely add value and meaningfulness to your wedding. David and I (along with our friends) did almost everything by ourselves. We did our own invitations; I bought two sample dresses for super inexpensive and combined, cut, and added my own touches to make my dream dress a reality; David and his friends essentially became groundskeepers and made our wedding location accessible and beautiful for our guests; David and I wrote a song that we sang together at our reception; the details really are endless. Preparing for your wedding with your future husband creates a special bond between the two of you too...it's worth it.

The things that ended up being most important:

David and I wanted to be physically, emotionally, and spiritually present the day of our wedding. So, however cuckoo we were leading up to the wedding, it didn't matter as long as we were focused and all about love the day of our wedding. We didn't just want that for ourselves either, we wanted it for every wedding guest. We are so happy we did our best to be present for our wedding day. Creating the ceremony with the man who married us ended up being super special to David and I. The wedding was over so quickly and as David and I drove away, we began recording our conversation about the wedding.We have continued to be happy we took some time to do informal couple's therapy. It's pretty great to try to meet regularly with some married couple you look up to and ask a thousand questions about how they've made their marriage work. Besides our own beautiful memories, our pictures, wedding video, rings, and wedding garb are the only physical things that remain from our wedding. We are happy to have spent the time and money particularly on our photos and video. It's a lot, but it's worth it. Make it your own and don't buy into the idea that you have to have a wedding that looks like anyone else's.

Donia & David Part I - The Dreaming

So Donia and David's wedding first hit my radar screen via the fabulous East Side Bride, and then lovely Kathryn over at Snippet and Ink shared the whole shebang. I loved it. So creative, in a totally original way from start to finish. And the picture of Donia, as a bride, playing the piano at her wedding, creating art and sharing her true self while a marriage was born? well that image helped buoy me through the last months o wedding planning. So I'm excited to share Donia's beautiful essay on the ways she thoughts about creating, in this case creating a wedding. I love that this is coming the day after Leah's wedding, because they are both weddings that make me shiver with joy, but their approaches to the day were so different. As someone who's approach to our wedding was half 'honest creative endeavor' and half 'f*ck it,' I appreciate both weddings, and wise brides, so much. So today I bring you Part I of Donia's thoughtful words, with Part II coming tomorrow.
I'm a dreamer and visionary by nature and even to me, the wedding David and I planned seemed almost impossible. Almost. But, to all of you who believe in positivity, our wedding became everything we wanted and more. So Part I is a description of our wedding, how we did it, etc. To those of you who are more practical like my husband David, Part II highlights how we planned an under-$8,000 wedding without compromising meaningfulness in two months and then what we found to be important to us after our wedding was over.

David and I are busy like the rest of the world seems to be. When David proposed to me in September of 2008, we knew that even if we planned, plotted, and charted a beautiful wedding two years from the date of our engagement, we still would be scrambling to put together something nice. More importantly, we both did not want to wait any longer to get married after dating for six years. So in the middle of my final year of graduate school and a new job for David, we decided to plan our wedding in two months. It was probably the first, best decision we made as a soon-to-be married couple.

Part I

Do you remember the five senses you were taught in elementary school about the human body? Yeah, they were a great guide for us when planning our wedding. The sixth sense I would add is emotion or spirit. Sight, Hearing, Smell, Taste, Touch, and Spirit.
Sight: We wanted our own aesthetics to be the stamp on everything we touched for our wedding. To begin, we had the most incredible outdoor property to work with...a reed-filled pond with a gigantic oak tree and cabin right next to it, rolling hills with broken down farm equipment, and basically, 26 acres of the glorious, great outdoors for us to form our wedding around. Light and the reflection of light became one of our symbolic and physical themes. We had candles in mason jars hanging in most all of the surrounding trees (I wanted the illusion of fireflies, the only pre-conceived idea I had for our wedding), bulbous Christmas lights strung around the trees and in the barn, luminarias lining the walkways, creme-colored enormous balloons also lining the walkways. It felt like most everything in sight had David or my touch all over it. I hand-painted our directional signs, our invitations were printed on organic muslin and hand-sewn onto this origami-square shaped cardstock by David, myself, and a troop of dedicated friends. We wanted people to see a manifestation, representation, or what-have-you of what David and I envisioned for our day of love and in honor of our guests.Hearing: Music is a huge part of mine and David's life together and individually. We became friends because we played music together, fell in love during that time of a budding friendship, and we continue to enjoy singing and playing songs together. Beyond the natural sounds of creaking oak branches, crunchy leaves being stepped on, and ducks swimming in the pond, we invited our musical friends to play during our ceremony. David worked with them on an interpretation of Clair de Lune which happens to be my favorite (albeit cliche) piece to play on the piano. During our reception, my father sang a tear-jerker of a song to us, we had our other friends play some music, and David and I wrote and played a song together. When it was time to boogie down we had another dear friend who loves to spin as a deejay get the party started...

Smell: I write this next part without wanting to sound even more mother nature-ish. But, I've got to say, the outdoors smell the best after it has rained...we did not plan for Southern California to be hit with a week's worth of torrential rain right before our wedding (my parent's home got 6 feet of snow!). It stopped however, a day and a half before our wedding which was a good thing because we hadn't rented a tent, but more importantly, the rain gave us an even better gift of well-fed green plants and the good earthy smells that only exist in the aftermath of rain.

Taste: Problem: 300 wedding guests = a lot of mouths to feed = a lot of money we no longer had. Solution: we found a local Taco truck that was willing to feed all of our guests for really inexpensive. The taco stands gave our guests delicious, ultra tasty, and warm food while we also helped support a small, local business during a time of economic hardships. Instead of having a traditional cake at our wedding, we enlisted all of our family members and friends who we knew to enjoy baking and asked them to bring enough of their classic desserts to feed 1 or 2 dozen people. For beverages, we asked people to bring a bottle of wine if they wanted more alcohol than what we provided with the Trader Joe's wine, the amazing berry-filled sangria I made the day before, and the coffee and tea. It all came together.Spirit: We wanted to be able to invite everyone who mattered to us. For us, that was a lot of people because we met at age 17 and had the support, encouragement and love of so many different spheres of people. We knew our relationship was supported and made in part successful because of our loved ones and so a wedding ceremony that included our community was essential. However, we had a very limited budget. We weren't about to, nor could we even if we had wanted to, spend an exorbitant amount of money on our wedding. Our limited budget forced us to enlist our friends and family for help in every part of our wedding. Without their help and resources, we could not have had a wedding. Their support for our special day became an intrinsic part of our wedding "spirit". All of the "senses" came together to create the spirit of our wedding. Each sense played an important role in creating what became the best wedding David and I could have had.

Part II to come...

Photos by Ira Lippke

Sponsor Introduction: BrideShare

I thought the week I posted about Team Practical's dress sharing was a great day to introduce APW's newest sponsor: BrideShare, the new wedding networking site. BrideShare was founded by a blogger many of you know and love, Dana over at The Broke Ass Bride. The concept is simple and brilliant. You sign up, create a profile, and then find other brides who you can share resources with. Polaroid camera? Pass it around. Candles? Well, you don't need 200 of them after your wedding. Decorations? Share 'em. More than saving money and being green, sharing wedding goods adds a bit of love and care to your wedding. All of the objects that I loved the most at our wedding were ones that had been shared with me. So go, connect, share.

Leah and Omid's Low-Stress, High-Fun Wedding

I'm so lucky to be sharing multiple weddings this week from members of Team Practical that found their photographer(s) through the site, and who I think are fantastic people as well as being fantastic photographers. And Leah is also... just great. She donated her wedding dress through the site, because it was more important to her to share with the community than to keep a really emotionally loaded object for herself. So, it's no surprise that her wedding was amazing. Beautiful not only in looks (because it was) but in spirit. So, so, beautiful in spirit. (And for those of you who've been asking me for some non-DIY weddings already - and I *hear* you - this is it):Location: Ceremony at San Francisco Institute of Art, Reception at Zarzuela
What made our wedding creative wasn't the crafts or the details because there weren't many of those. In fact, as my wedding approached I had a couple of minor meltdowns about the lack of personality in our wedding because there weren't programs or favors or cute DIY projects. I realized that I was looking at it wrong. Our wedding was something that I never thought would happen. Omid had repeatedly stated his views on marriage, the fact that he didn't think it was important or necessary because we had already made a commitment to each other. What changed his mind is his love for me. He realized how important it was to me and he has always done everything in his power to make me happy, so this was just another one of those things that he did. His willingness meant the world to me and I didn't want him to wonder what made him change his mind so I did everything I could to make sure the wedding reflected us, his anti-wedding attitude and all. We focused on food, family, friends and our love for each other. He didn't want a stressed out bride so I threw a lot of the traditional stuff out the window. No cute DIY projects, no programs, favors, flower arrangements, or anything like that. There were times when this was hard for me but sites like this one helped to remind that our wedding was about us and our love for each other.Another way that we made the wedding more personal was having it at our favorite tapas restaurant, Zarzuela, where we picked every dish served. We had our favorite waiter there who helped make our day memorable and sang us a traditional Spanish wedding song that is passed down among his family. The best man found a flamenco group to perform.Our reception won't win us any spreads in magazines but it was everything I could ever have possibly hoped for.I should admit that we didn't have a budget. We thought of our wedding as a wedding week and we had things planned for many different days and we just tried to stay reasonable about our spending. When we tried to do a budget we both got super stressed and stress was not something that we wanted to be a part of our wedding. However, there were things that we did that helped us save money. First, we got rid of a lot of traditional wedding items. Second, I went to a bridesmaids store, Bella Bridesmaids, to find my dress. I knew I wanted it to be affordable and I was planning on getting something short with a poofy skirt. I didn't get that but I still found a dress. I didn't think it was perfect, perfect would have cost a lot more, but to keep it in budget all I was looking for was something that I felt beautiful in and I found it. Third, we kept our wedding small, 40 people including us. And last, we hired an amazing photographer, Emily of Emily Takes Photos, who happens to be incredibly affordable.

What made our wedding sane was the overwhelming amount of love around me that day and the days leading up to the wedding. Leading up to it, my sister did a wonderful job of being nothing but positive and supportive of our plan. She was there whenever I needed something. The whole thing reminded me that it is great to have a sister, even better to have one who is also my best friend and biggest fan. On the day of not everything went smoothly or looked the way I wanted but I could feel the love for my husband and family trying to burst through every part of me. Most of my wedding pictures show me laughing because I was just so incredibly joyous. We also made sure to spend a lot of time with everyone (before, during, and after the wedding) which didn't leave much time to stress out about stuff. I had a bad day or two but overall I was relatively calm about the whole thing. It was amazing to be surrounded my so much love and support. It was like I was cocooned in a giant security blanket and I was floating on a high from it for days after.Other than our friends and family, a key part that helped us stay sane was that we had a cocktail party that night. We had a lunch reception that we had purposely kept small and low key but there were people we still really wanted to be part of our day. We decided to hold a cocktail party and invite the wedding guests and friends and family that we hadn't been able to invite to the ceremony/reception. It also fixed one of the other problems I had been having with our wedding plan, no dancing. Not only did we host our event in a small restaurant but my grandfather seriously injured himself a month before the wedding and he was in a lot of pain at the time. I knew that if there was dancing he wouldn't be able to stop himself from getting on the dance floor for at least one dance with me. So in the interest of space and my grandpa's pride we nixed dancing. I was bummed about the lack of a first dance and not being able to dance with my dad but the cocktail party fixed it. Granted, I was dancing in a cocktail dress I had borrowed, with shoes that didn't match because my feet hurt, on a wooden deck to teeny bopper music on my neice's ipod but I was also dancing with my husband, my dad, my mom, my sister, my neices, friends, and new in-laws under the stars on one of the happiest days of my life and it just doesn't get any better than that.One thing that surprised me was how happy being married has made me. I've always valued the the commitment inherent in a wedding and wedding vows but Omid's attitude and my tendency towards cynicism made me wonder, at times, why we were doing it. I didn't expect to feel any differently but I did and still do. I was nervous, I had butterflies in my stomach, and the moment of our first look it was like my smile was trying to escape my face it was so big. I couldn't stop looking at my husband-to-be and I felt like the luckiest girl in the world. Cliche but totally true. There was so much love it was like I was floating the whole day and I don't think I ever stopped smiling or laughing. I still giggle when I call him husband and when he calls me wife it makes me just as giddy as on our wedding day. After all the talk about how weddings weren't as important these days, about the politics of marriage and the injustice that forbids some people from marrying the people they love, I expected to be underwhelmed by the words and the sentiment. I wasn't, they did matter. They settled into my skin and my being and the fact that I am spending the rest of my life with this amazing man by my side became very very real.Photos by Emily Takes Photos, of course.

Dress, Given IV

Drum-roll please............ Leah's beautiful dress will find it's next home with Sam. Sam, who is wearing her mother's dress for the ceremony, but needed a dress that wasn't fragile to dance in (but it just wasn't in the budget). Sam, who has exactly the same measurements as Leah. Sam who had a pricking in her fingers that this dress was for her. I wish you as much joy as Leah felt in this dress on her wedding day. And you *better* send me pictures.

Annnnndddddd... Leah's wedding is up tomorrow, and as you would imagine, it's wonderful. Cheers to Team Practical, and your endless generosity with each other!

(Send me an email Sam, and we'll make it happen.), Photo by Emily Takes Photos

Dougie and Danae’s Scottish Pink Lego Candy Wedding

What to say about this wedding? First of all, it was shot by Peonie & The Boy, the photographers behind Lillian & Lenord, and they found through APW, which I love! Last time I posted about Lillian & Leonard I mentioned that I'd had many a virtual drink with Peonie. Well, *now* I've had a real-life physical whisky with both Peonie and The Boy, and um.... UK couples? Yeah. They are your photographers. Really, done. I. Adore. Them.

And Danae and Dougie? The first I heard of them is when Peonie told me that she had shot her first practical bride, and it was one of the most joyful, beautiful, and just plain fun weddings that she'd ever gotten to shoot. Then Danae sent me some words about her wedding and (whispers... I think I LOVE her). When I started looking through the pictures and I felt like my heart was going to break from the sheer joy of it. I wanted to share it with you so you know... this is what a wedding feels like. It doesn't feel pretty, it feels like unadulterated joy. What made your wedding creative? I'm not an elegant woman and Dougie isn't impressed by anything too fancy, so from the get-go we decided that we shouldn't try for a "classy" affair -- why pretend to be something you're not, when you can have a lot of fun instead? We focused on the things that make us happy, and built everything around that.Dougie loves Lego, so we peppered it throughout the wedding, from putting it out on the tables for guests to play with to putting little Lego men in the buttonholes.I love 50's style, so I worked with an amazing dressmaker to create my own personal hot pink retro dress. We both love anything vintage, so we bought up tons of crazy glass dishes at a furniture salvage yard and used them for our food and candy. We got lucky with the trampoline - it was already at the venue! Although I don't think our venue owner believed me when I told her we'd be jumping on it!What made your wedding thrifty (whatever that meant for you)? Our wedding wasn't cheap, but we only spent money on the things that mattered to us.Instead of doing printed invitations, we used e-mail and set up an RSVP form on our wedding website. We didn't bother with printed table cards, a sit-down dinner or a band, and our little placecards for the guests were a pack of Moo.com cards for £12. Instead, we spent our money on putting up our far-flung families together at the venue, on making sure we had plenty of cheap booze for our guests, and on a ridiculous amount of candy!We also relied on the talents of our wonderful friends and family - my mother in law made our wedding cake, our friends and family made all of the other desserts, my florist friend George did our incredible flowers, and our friends acted as our DJ for the evening. My favourite thrifty items were our table card holders, which Dougie made out of Lego the night before the wedding, and my 99p shoes that I got on eBay!What made your wedding sane? I think we stayed sane by not taking it all so seriously. My mantra was, "this isn't a classy wedding, this is a fun wedding.At a fun wedding, who cares if _________?" Who cares if a hot pink dress and tangerine roses and bright blue ties don't match, we like those colours! Who cares if we're serving crisps with bubbly after the ceremony, everyone likes crisps!I still got stressed about things, but Dougie was always there to stay practical, keep the (incredibly useful) budget spreadsheet updated, and offer much simpler and creative solutions than I could come up with.The other thing I kept telling myself was that I didn't have to be the most beautiful that I would ever be on the day -- there is so much pressure on a bride to have the Best Looking Day She'll Ever Have, and I think it's nonsense. I did go to a lot of trouble to look good, but my goal was to look happy and pretty and to feel confident, not to look like a magazine model that nobody would recognise. Brides, please don't succumb to the pressure to re-make yourself for your wedding, it will make you so much happier!
All images are by Lillian & Leonard, of course.