Not Your Typical Bride...

You know that feeling you get at Christmas time? You plan and anticipate and then it’s all over in the blink of an eye. This is how my wedding day was.  We worked, planned, stressed, laughed, and anticipated for months. Every detail had to be perfect and it had to represent us.

For Troy and I planning a wedding was different than most people experience. It wasn’t just about cake, flowers, and guests. It was a process. It was something we considered a preliminary test of our life and proof of what we could accomplish together. It was for us and no one else. It was the platform upon how we wanted our marriage to start, and a celebration of the life we have ahead of us. 

We dreamed big and did one little thing at a time. We (and by WE I mean ME) kept precise lists of what we’d spent and what was still needed. We prioritized things and amazingly kept finding ourselves checking things off of lists. We loved every second that we got to spend together creating this party. We had many people ask us what they could do to help but we just wanted to do it ourselves. Our intentions were not to exclude anyone but merely to work together and see what we could accomplish.

It was amazing to stand there that day and see our vision come to life.  It was surreal, amazing, and stressful! While it was a fabulous day it was also exhausting.  I didn’t exactly feel like your typical bride, and let’s be honest, I was far from it.

The diaper box in front so accurately symbolizes this untraditional wedding.

Trying to keep calm minutes before we started.

Instead of spending the morning pampering myself I spent it picking up flowers, setting up pictures, and arranging endless amounts of pink candy. After deeming the venue and its décor perfect we raced to get ready. You women know how stressful is it to just get yourself ready when you need to look fabulous. Let’s just say the typical bride does not have to worry about seven other people looking and behaving their best. Lucky for me Troy is a saint and got the boys ready while I worked on getting a hairdo worthy of a wedding day.  (Thanks to Abbie for your bobby pin expertise on the back of my head!) My awesome sister put her own primping on hold in order to do our two little bridesmaids hair. (Kudos to Stacey for creating awesome hair that day!) After making sure the boys were dressed (All except Grayson who literally got tossed into his clothes 20 minutes before we started.) Troy was able to quickly get dressed and out the door we went. We had only a few mishaps on our wedding day. Here are a few of them…          

·        When I went to pick up the flowers they were totally different than what I had pictured in my mind.  (I mean seriously…shouldn’t a florist be able to see the picture in your head without you accurately describing it? Sheesh. ) With a little more time, communication, and baby breath we were able to make the flowers workable. Troy had to run to a few more florists for more baby breath and spent another hour arranging flowers to look the way we wanted. Stacey helped too. Thanks sister!

·        Oh, I can’t forget that the flowers didn’t even all fit in my vehicle. Thanks to James for saving the day and picking up the rest!

·        The flowers on the girls’ dresses were pretty heavy and kept flopping over. I’m not sure who helped but I know it took a team of women to get those flowers pinned on properly. They sure were cute though!

·        While getting ready we realized that we had forgotten a belt for Kyle. Luckily Seth was in need of a belt also and so he was able to rush to the store and take care of that for us. Thanks Seth!

·        Kassidy’s dress sleeve ripped before the reception even started. We finally located some safety pins and got her taken care of. Thanks to my BFF Mel for taking care of that little problem for me!

We had practiced and gone over with the kids multiple times how this event was going to go down. They had to walk down the aisle, hold my hands, and sit down in chairs at the end. Simple enough right? Obviously we hadn’t practiced with me in my enormous dress so walking ended up being a little problematic. Especially with two little boys who kept tripping over layers of taffeta. Grayson was at a standstill when he saw all of the people. He had practiced running up that aisle like a champ and was the cutest little thing ever. However, the crowd confused him and Kassidy had to help nudge him down the aisle. It was crazy, a little chaotic, and completely us. I was elated when that part of the day was over and I got to stand there and marry Troy.

While Troy and I planned and put this wedding together ourselves we could not have pulled it off without the army of people that helped us that day. Alana Lange Photography did an AMAZING job on our pictures, Kim Hardy with Unforgettable Weddings set up our tent, pink fabric and lots of finishing touches and the crew at Ivy House made sure we had everything we needed.

Our families were the key to this day being successful.  They helped us set up, took video for us, chased kids, shooed kids away from the candy table, and most of all took down the entire thing and cleaned up for us. Thank you to everyone who helped us make memories that day. We may not have been the traditional bride and groom but for us it marked the beginning of our lives together. We are so proud of what we accomplished and excited that we get to share these memories forever.





Together we make a FAMILY