The Final Wedding Post

I have made a few blog posts with some of the DIY projects from our wedding, but I wanted to make one last wedding related post where I could combine some of the pics with the story of our wedding.

The Plan

Shortly after we got engaged I decided that I wanted to use peacock feathers as a central theme in our wedding.  Although I do love how beautiful and ornate peacock feathers are, I have to admit that I had an alterior motive for choosing to use them.  We were going to be working with a very limited budget for our wedding (less than $2,000) and I knew that I could use feathers as a cheap alternative to flowers in centerpieces and other decor.  I have have a deep rooted love for vintage things and knew I wanted to use a lot of lace, mercury glass, and vintage looking brooches to add a vintage feel to our wedding. 

The Invitations

I was so lucky to find these invitations on clearance at Michaels.  They were $15 for boxes of 30 invitations!  They were the kind where you print your own information so I was able to customize the font and colors the way I wanted.  The invitations came with a pale blue ribbon but I wanted to bring in more of the teal color I love so much so I bought some lace ribbon (it was actually flexi-lace hem tape from Jo Ann's, although I have no idea what you are really suppose to use it for!) and tied the invitations with that instead. 

The Church

We were so fortunate that the family of one of my closest friends (and bridesmaid) from my hometown allowed us to use their church.  It was a gorgeous old-fashioned little white church that was the perfect setting for our wedding.  It was one of the biggest money savers of our wedding.  We live about three hours from the church so it made wedding planning a little difficult but was absolutely worth it.

The Decorations

The church was so beautiful on its own that I didn't want to do too much decorating and take away from the its natural beauty.  So I kept it simple by putting a few large green vases with blue hydrangeas and teal votive candles in the outer windows and putting a collection of three small vases with white roses and hydrangeas in the middlde windows.  I made the pew bows using some teal ribbon I found on clearance at Wal-Mart after Christmas and glitter tulle and lace from Hobby Lobby.  On the altar I used candles, hydrangeas and roses, and a mix of mercury glass pieces that I had in my house.  There was an awkward raised wooden piece in the middle of the altar (for a Bible) so I covered it with a piece of teal fabric I had gotten out of the remnant bin at Hobby Lobby and glued brown satin ribbon on the edges.  In the middle of the fabric I hung a monogram "E" that I had printed on some beautiful scrap book paper I had found.  The guest book/gift table was set up in the entry way of the church.  I decorated it with a bird cage that served as a place for guests to leave cards, some hydrageas and calla lilies, and a beautiful sign with our name and wedding date that my mom ordered us from Etsy.

  The Photography

 We also lucked out with our wonderful photographers.  One of my bridesmaids is an amazing photographer and I really wanted her to take some of the wedding pictures for me, but since she was in the bridal party there was really only so much she could take.  Since our budget didn't allow us a lot of money to spend on a second photographer I contacted a friend of my sister's who was doing photography on the side and she agreed to do some of our pictures for us at a very affordable price.  She coincidentally has a similar vintage style to mine!  These are some of my favorite images that they captured on our wedding day.  Looking at them makes me smile and I'm sure they will for many, many years to come!  :)  So I would like to give an enormous "thank you" to Heather Wright and Rebecca Clifft for their amazing work! 

The Reception

We had our reception on the land where the church was located.  Unfortunately, we had some rain showers before the wedding and had to take everything down and then set it back up, only to have another rain scare (which luckily did not happen) and have to take everything down again right before the ceremony started and then set it back up again in just a few minutes after the ceremony.  So everything ended up having to be thrown together with the help of some wonderful friends and family.  Everything didn't end up where it was orignally suppose to (something that this slightly OCD girl struggled with for a few weeks after the wedding) and then it was so hot and humid that the icing on our beautiful (and soooo delicious) chocolate wedding cake that my husband's aunt made for us started melting almost instantly.  I'm not going to lie and say that it wasn't a little disappointing seeing 6 months worth of hard work fall apart, but in the end I'm just thankful that we were able to share such an amazing day with some of our closest friends and family and that I now have an incredible new husband.  And no amount of misplaced centerpieces or melted icing made the day any less special!