Our Binary Wedding Recap
I got my pro photos back, so here is my official weddingplans Post Wedding Post, yay!
My husband and I were married in Tarrytown, New York, on Sunday, October 10, 2010. We had a geeky, personal, atheist, intimate wedding.
The day started at 6:30am, when I woke up and met my best lady to head to get my hair done. My hair took a solid two hours (and was supposed to only take an hour and a half), so we were running a little bit behind schedule later in the day. I have a LOT of hair, and she spent a ton of time curling every single strand. It looked awesome, and it stood up well, but I wish we had started a wee bit earlier. Because we were running late, I also forgot to eat - I drank a venti pumpkin spice latte from Starbucks, though, so I did have something in me.
We headed back to the venue, and were met by my amazing photographer and her husband! I had to track down my dress, then I began getting ready. My photographer took our invite, my bouquet (clay!), and our rings and they had their own little photo shoot.
I bought the box off of eBay, and lined it with some extra fabric that I used to make the pocket squares for the best men.
My dress is David's Bridal. I added the mint green sash, and had the bolero custom made on Etsy.
I sewed my purse, and the flowers that I attached to it. My veil was borrowed from my best lady - she wore it at her wedding in 2008 - and I dyed it with coffee grounds to take a white veil to a champagne one!
We read our vows from our iPhones - these were the custom cases I had made for them! Blumbriel is a portmanteau of our last names (Blum+Gabriel). You can also spy the back of our invitations, designed by my best lady, and cut on a Cricut.
In the mean time, my husband was getting ready in our hotel room, along with his bridal party and my best man. I had meant to iron his shirt, but forgot, and no one wanted to do it - thankfully, our photographer's husband, acting as a bit of a second shooter and assistant that day because she was EIGHT MONTHS pregnant, ended up ironing it for him! That's the kind of nice guy that he is.
You can see his awesome mint green socks!
My husband's Tardis cuff links (his wedding day gift!) and his best man's Star Trek cuff links.
Soon, we were ready to go meet for our first look! I pulled our cake topper out to bring with us and give to our coordinator - it says "Don't Panic," a Hitchhiker's Guide reference, and sound advice for a wedding day. Handmade by my amazing best lady.
My best lady got my veil on...
And we snuck in some portraits while we waited for the guys to show up!
And I pinned the bout on my stepdad
My flowers and our corsages and bouts were all clay, and made by DK Designs. I can't recommend her enough.
We had our first look, and then took some portraits before the ceremony.
My husband had a countdown till the ceremony start time. Less than 25 minutes to go!
He looks so handsome in this shot!
Then we headed to wait for the ceremony to begin.
These were telegrams that were sent to my great-grandparents on their wedding day, in 1907, and a portrait of my great-grandmother, on display near our guestbook (one of our engagement photos with a mat to be signed).
I asked all of our married guests to send us their favorite wedding portrait. I framed them in silver frames, added the names and wedding date, and displayed them on the two fireplaces in our venue. The center one in the gold frame has one of our engagement photos with our married name and wedding date.
Our cardbox birdcage.
Outside, our ceremony was set to go. Our beautiful chuppah, and the amazing chuppah top, knit by my best lady. The props you see are set for our unity ceremony, combining black salt and white pepper.
We presented our moms with flowers during the ceremony, as a way to thank them and honor them.
Our favors - truffles! - with the tags I made. On the other side is an engagement photo of us, and a thank you note.
One of my friends showing off our programs!
My husband walked in with his mom and grandma, followed by his bridal party (best man and best lady), followed by my bridal party (best man and best lady), our ring bearer (his adult uncle), and then me with my parents. They walked me to the beginning of the aisle, then I walked myself the rest of the way down.
Our ring bearer.
His wedding party.
My wedding party.
A shot of the ceremony location. I am a wedding officiant, so the ceremony was really important to me. My colleague April Beer wrote and officiated the ceremony.
My best lady holding my bouquet. Her flowers were real, and I think they went really well with mine, which were clay.
We read our vows from our iPhones.
His vows were funny.
We each stepped on a glass at the end, because it's fun, and also as a way to "stamp out" and shatter marriage inequality, something we feel very strongly about. You can see my green crinoline under there, too.
Married, yo. This is one of my favorite photos.
Immediately after the ceremony, we were supposed to go inside and have a little bit of time to ourselves, but since we hadn't gotten to any formal photos aside from our portraits, we just stuck around near the chuppah and took photos. Later, I found out that this was actually us being distracted while my husband's father, who was an uninvited guest who had shown up for the ceremony, was asked to leave. Thankfully, no one told us about the drama until after the wedding, and he did not cause a scene. Nothing like a wedding crasher to really make your wedding day.
My grandmother's reaction to my flowers! I also took extra fabric and lace from her wedding dress and wrapped the bouquet in that.
Posing with our Celebrant. During formal photos, I dropped a piece of blue cheese in my champagne glass, so I didn't get to finish it. Oops.
Wonderful formal shot with our bridal party.
My best lady and I! Love her tights :) We asked the girls to wear a cocktail dress in black, with purple accents. I gave them black bird cage veils and a hair flower and a purple shawl to wear, too. The guys were asked to wear any black suit, and a cream shirt (our ring bearer wore grey, and that was fine). I'm not a picky bride when it comes to this kind of stuff at all. We gave them purple socks, a purple pocket square, and a tie that we got from CyberOptix, too.
Delicious cake!
I switched to a birdcage veil for the reception.
Our first dance was a lot of swaying to "Beyond the Sea." I am SUCH a bad dancer. We even took dance lessons. I just can't do it.
Afterwards, everyone danced before dinner was served.
The reception rooms. You can see our sweetheart table with my flowers in the lower right corner, too. I love that one of the rooms was a library with books and shelves of random stuff.
Next we had toasts: my stepdad, our ring bearer (husband's uncle), and our bridal parties. Even though I had emailed him at least six times over a period of 18 months telling my husband's uncle that he was doing a speech, he never read my emails all the way through and was surprised when we called him up. Oops.
Then we ate, then we cut the cake, then we danced!
No wedding is complete with a Red Sox fan rocking out to Sweet Caroline...
We had a smaller wedding (about 50 guests), in a slightly weird lay out for our reception room - dancing was in a separate room. Both my DJ and my videographer seemed concerned that no one was dancing, but we had three or four really solid, good dance songs. Which is just fine with me. Both my husband and I are not big dancers, so it wasn't a huge deal for us at all, and people seemed to have a good time with it all.
In the end, our wedding was perfect for us. It was sweet and small, but it was HARD to be the center of attention for that long! I'm a very shy and private person, and it was definitely weird. I think my favorite part of the day was our ceremony, during the vows, and hanging out with our friends who stuck around after the wedding in our hotel room.
We were engaged for SO long - over two years of planning went into the wedding, so I had a ton of little projects. I was happy that our venue coordinator was very on top of everything, and really made me feel confident that everything was being taken care of, which was really nice.
All in all, my advice: have the wedding that you want. Celebrate yourselves. Celebrate your love. Eat tasty cake and dance even if your feet hurt.
Even more photos are on my Flickr page, if these aren't enough for you.'
Our Wedding Pros.
Ceremony and Reception at the Tarrytown House in Tarrytown, NY
Photographer: Sarah Schulte Photography
Celebrant: April Beer
Videographer: Creative Unlimited
DJ: Carol Moore from A Starry Night
My Dress: David's Bridal!
My Husband's Suit: Men's Wearhouse
His Tie: Toybreaker on Etsy
Florist: Real Flowers: Diana Gould Ltd.
Clay Flowers: Diane of DK Designs
My Bolero: Porshes' Place on Etsy
My Earrings: Lulu Splendor on Etsy
My husband and I were married in Tarrytown, New York, on Sunday, October 10, 2010. We had a geeky, personal, atheist, intimate wedding.
The day started at 6:30am, when I woke up and met my best lady to head to get my hair done. My hair took a solid two hours (and was supposed to only take an hour and a half), so we were running a little bit behind schedule later in the day. I have a LOT of hair, and she spent a ton of time curling every single strand. It looked awesome, and it stood up well, but I wish we had started a wee bit earlier. Because we were running late, I also forgot to eat - I drank a venti pumpkin spice latte from Starbucks, though, so I did have something in me.
We headed back to the venue, and were met by my amazing photographer and her husband! I had to track down my dress, then I began getting ready. My photographer took our invite, my bouquet (clay!), and our rings and they had their own little photo shoot.
I bought the box off of eBay, and lined it with some extra fabric that I used to make the pocket squares for the best men.
My dress is David's Bridal. I added the mint green sash, and had the bolero custom made on Etsy.
I sewed my purse, and the flowers that I attached to it. My veil was borrowed from my best lady - she wore it at her wedding in 2008 - and I dyed it with coffee grounds to take a white veil to a champagne one!
We read our vows from our iPhones - these were the custom cases I had made for them! Blumbriel is a portmanteau of our last names (Blum+Gabriel). You can also spy the back of our invitations, designed by my best lady, and cut on a Cricut.
In the mean time, my husband was getting ready in our hotel room, along with his bridal party and my best man. I had meant to iron his shirt, but forgot, and no one wanted to do it - thankfully, our photographer's husband, acting as a bit of a second shooter and assistant that day because she was EIGHT MONTHS pregnant, ended up ironing it for him! That's the kind of nice guy that he is.
You can see his awesome mint green socks!
My husband's Tardis cuff links (his wedding day gift!) and his best man's Star Trek cuff links.
Soon, we were ready to go meet for our first look! I pulled our cake topper out to bring with us and give to our coordinator - it says "Don't Panic," a Hitchhiker's Guide reference, and sound advice for a wedding day. Handmade by my amazing best lady.
My best lady got my veil on...
And we snuck in some portraits while we waited for the guys to show up!
And I pinned the bout on my stepdad
My flowers and our corsages and bouts were all clay, and made by DK Designs. I can't recommend her enough.
We had our first look, and then took some portraits before the ceremony.
My husband had a countdown till the ceremony start time. Less than 25 minutes to go!
He looks so handsome in this shot!
Then we headed to wait for the ceremony to begin.
These were telegrams that were sent to my great-grandparents on their wedding day, in 1907, and a portrait of my great-grandmother, on display near our guestbook (one of our engagement photos with a mat to be signed).
I asked all of our married guests to send us their favorite wedding portrait. I framed them in silver frames, added the names and wedding date, and displayed them on the two fireplaces in our venue. The center one in the gold frame has one of our engagement photos with our married name and wedding date.
Our cardbox birdcage.
Outside, our ceremony was set to go. Our beautiful chuppah, and the amazing chuppah top, knit by my best lady. The props you see are set for our unity ceremony, combining black salt and white pepper.
We presented our moms with flowers during the ceremony, as a way to thank them and honor them.
Our favors - truffles! - with the tags I made. On the other side is an engagement photo of us, and a thank you note.
One of my friends showing off our programs!
My husband walked in with his mom and grandma, followed by his bridal party (best man and best lady), followed by my bridal party (best man and best lady), our ring bearer (his adult uncle), and then me with my parents. They walked me to the beginning of the aisle, then I walked myself the rest of the way down.
Our ring bearer.
His wedding party.
My wedding party.
A shot of the ceremony location. I am a wedding officiant, so the ceremony was really important to me. My colleague April Beer wrote and officiated the ceremony.
My best lady holding my bouquet. Her flowers were real, and I think they went really well with mine, which were clay.
We read our vows from our iPhones.
His vows were funny.
We each stepped on a glass at the end, because it's fun, and also as a way to "stamp out" and shatter marriage inequality, something we feel very strongly about. You can see my green crinoline under there, too.
Married, yo. This is one of my favorite photos.
Immediately after the ceremony, we were supposed to go inside and have a little bit of time to ourselves, but since we hadn't gotten to any formal photos aside from our portraits, we just stuck around near the chuppah and took photos. Later, I found out that this was actually us being distracted while my husband's father, who was an uninvited guest who had shown up for the ceremony, was asked to leave. Thankfully, no one told us about the drama until after the wedding, and he did not cause a scene. Nothing like a wedding crasher to really make your wedding day.
My grandmother's reaction to my flowers! I also took extra fabric and lace from her wedding dress and wrapped the bouquet in that.
Posing with our Celebrant. During formal photos, I dropped a piece of blue cheese in my champagne glass, so I didn't get to finish it. Oops.
Wonderful formal shot with our bridal party.
My best lady and I! Love her tights :) We asked the girls to wear a cocktail dress in black, with purple accents. I gave them black bird cage veils and a hair flower and a purple shawl to wear, too. The guys were asked to wear any black suit, and a cream shirt (our ring bearer wore grey, and that was fine). I'm not a picky bride when it comes to this kind of stuff at all. We gave them purple socks, a purple pocket square, and a tie that we got from CyberOptix, too.
Delicious cake!
I switched to a birdcage veil for the reception.
Our first dance was a lot of swaying to "Beyond the Sea." I am SUCH a bad dancer. We even took dance lessons. I just can't do it.
Afterwards, everyone danced before dinner was served.
The reception rooms. You can see our sweetheart table with my flowers in the lower right corner, too. I love that one of the rooms was a library with books and shelves of random stuff.
Next we had toasts: my stepdad, our ring bearer (husband's uncle), and our bridal parties. Even though I had emailed him at least six times over a period of 18 months telling my husband's uncle that he was doing a speech, he never read my emails all the way through and was surprised when we called him up. Oops.
Then we ate, then we cut the cake, then we danced!
No wedding is complete with a Red Sox fan rocking out to Sweet Caroline...
We had a smaller wedding (about 50 guests), in a slightly weird lay out for our reception room - dancing was in a separate room. Both my DJ and my videographer seemed concerned that no one was dancing, but we had three or four really solid, good dance songs. Which is just fine with me. Both my husband and I are not big dancers, so it wasn't a huge deal for us at all, and people seemed to have a good time with it all.
In the end, our wedding was perfect for us. It was sweet and small, but it was HARD to be the center of attention for that long! I'm a very shy and private person, and it was definitely weird. I think my favorite part of the day was our ceremony, during the vows, and hanging out with our friends who stuck around after the wedding in our hotel room.
We were engaged for SO long - over two years of planning went into the wedding, so I had a ton of little projects. I was happy that our venue coordinator was very on top of everything, and really made me feel confident that everything was being taken care of, which was really nice.
All in all, my advice: have the wedding that you want. Celebrate yourselves. Celebrate your love. Eat tasty cake and dance even if your feet hurt.
Even more photos are on my Flickr page, if these aren't enough for you.'
Our Wedding Pros.
Ceremony and Reception at the Tarrytown House in Tarrytown, NY
Photographer: Sarah Schulte Photography
Celebrant: April Beer
Videographer: Creative Unlimited
DJ: Carol Moore from A Starry Night
My Dress: David's Bridal!
My Husband's Suit: Men's Wearhouse
His Tie: Toybreaker on Etsy
Florist: Real Flowers: Diana Gould Ltd.
Clay Flowers: Diane of DK Designs
My Bolero: Porshes' Place on Etsy
My Earrings: Lulu Splendor on Etsy