Our Vintage Lakeside Wedding and What Started It All
A few weeks ago, when I asked you guys to chime in what you’d like to see more of on this little blog, I was really surprised that some of you wanted me to share more of the personal stuff. Somehow I get locked into “design, DIY, craft, repeat”, and I forget to take a moment to step back from that every now and then.
Several of you mentioned that I’d talked about our wedding before in past posts, but I’d never really shown pictures of it. WHAT?! How did I let that one slip by me?
Even though our current season makes absolutely no sense to share our spring wedding, I didn’t want to forget. Plus, now that our bathroom makeover is finished (eep!), I have some juicy details for our next room that I’m marinating on to show y’all next week.
If you’ve never read about Robert’s and my backstory, you can read all about it here and here. In a nutshell, God knew what He was doing when He gave me my best friend.
We got married on April 23, 2011 and it was during the wedding planning that I first started to realize how much I liked rustic/vintage decor.
I wish I could tell you that on the morning of our wedding I felt like this…
or this…
or this…
But y’all. I had a total of three hours of sleep thanks to a hopping night club next to my hotel room and was greeted by the biggest pimple on my face that I’d ever seen in my life.
And when my feet hit the floor that wedding day morning, I said to myself, “Self, something will go wrong today, but the end of the day, as long as you’re married to your best friend, the rest of it doesn’t matter.”
During our year-long engagement in the wedding planning process, a bird theme somehow morphed into place, so I fully embraced it. My mom and I DIYed almost everything- the birdcage centerpieces, the invitations, the table numbers, almost all of the decor.
And whatever she and I couldn’t make, we recuited other friends and family members to help with our wedding cake, ceremony arch, even ceremony and reception music.
A colleague friend of mine hand painted our guestbook on canvas- a tree for all of our guests’ thumbprints for leaves.
And Robert’s father handcarved and painted our cake topper.
To pay homage to my ballet dancing days, I wore shoes reminiscent of my old ones.
To help out with the budget a little, I even bought my wedding dress pre-owned at half price.
My mother-in-law gifted her sewing skills by making my garter out of lace remants from both her and my mother’s wedding dresses.
The whole first half of the wedding day involved me driving five bridesmaids from downtown Charlotte to my hometown 45 minutes away, and I got lost three times. Who let the flustered bride drive? But we survived. 🙂
The six of us got our hair done, sipped mimosas, and had a big breakfast together with my mom, mother-in-law, and grandmother to laugh and cry and laugh some more.
When we got to our wedding venue, I was not nervous at all and so eager to “do this thing”.
We all did our makeup together and my mom and mother-in-law hoisted me into my dress.
This thing weighed a ton but I never felt so pretty in all my life.
Our photographers Brandywine Photography and Cassie Leigh Photography did a beautiful job of capturing the day…like this one of my mom a.k.a. my bestie.
We took a minute to get a four generation ring shot too with my sweet 94 year-old great-grandmother’s hand on the very bottom.
Annnnnd…more pictures. These five and I had so much fun together all day long.
Meanwhile, this is what Robert was doing.
Causing mischief as usual. No one makes me laugh like him.
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But he kept his cool.
Finally, when the music started and all of the bridesmaids left the bridal room and the photographers took their places near the altar, it was just me all by myself for just a few minutes while I waited to step outside to greet my dad at the aisle.
I’ll never forget this moment that is still to this day so vivid in my mind. I closed my eyes and talked to God and thanked him for letting me marry my best friend. I prayed for a long, happy life together but most importantly asked that we honored Him through everything in our marriage- to remain forgiving and trusting and loyal. Because if He is at the center, nothing that comes our way can break it.
And when I stepped outside and hugged my dad, I couldn’t have imagined a more perfect day…
with the birds chirping, a bright blue sky, and Robert smiling up at me. For those few minutes, I saw only him and the rest was a blur.
And then my dad whispered, “I’m not wearing underwear” to keep me from crying. Job well done, Dad.
I’ll never forget that twinkle in Robert’s eye. (He swears he didn’t cry but I got a front row seat that told differently.)
We said our vows. Well…I squeaked mine out. And in our usual fashion, we made googly eyes at each other.
And then we discovered Robert’s ring was too tight and cut off the circulation to his finger. Oops. So he got a fancy pinky ring for the day instead.
Then we sealed it with a kiss…
…and some air guitar. (Although, we saved this pose for the “formal” pictures.)
We sipped sweet tea and laughed with our bridal party and I remember thinking, “No way it can get any better from here.”
Then we boarded our vintage trolley for one last photo-party-before-the-party.
We hit the reception hall and prayed, ate, hugged so many loved ones I lost track…
and then we hit the dance floor. We took a couple of dance lessons for fun to use during our first dance together. Our song was “Marry Me” by Train since the lyrics reminded us so much of how we met. (I was his waitress at a restaurant. We got to talking and somehow never stopped. The rest was history.)
Not a soul stayed in their seat the entire night. Even my great-grandmother in her wheelchair took a spin around the floor.
Our family can bust a move.
A little bit softer now. 😉
And we closed out the night with Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin'”…
and more air guitar. Because really it’s physically impossible to listen to Journey and not play air guitar and sing off-key at the top of your lungs.
In that last dance I remember trying to hold onto every second to stop the party from ending.
But then I remembered every day is a party with this guy around. (Side note: Bird seed sticks to sweaty faces like glitter sticks to glue.)
At the end of the day, I thought back to what I told myself when I first woke up that morning, “Something will go wrong today, but the end of the day, as long as you’re married to your best friend, the rest of it doesn’t matter.”
I think about that so often because the wedding isn’t the hardest part. But in our marriage, whatever obstacles we face, whatever challenges we endure, something will go wrong. At the end of it all, as long as I’m married to my best friend, the rest doesn’t matter.
If we could handle living with my parents for nearly two years when we were dirt broke, if we can handle home improvement projects with smiles still on our faces, we must be doing something right. And if an argument ever arises, the instant cure is a good laugh.
P.S. Brandy Wine Photography and Cassie Leigh Photography were our paparazzi for the day and they were amazing! If you’re in the Carolinas, I highly recommend them.
