Ceremony

These top pics are from our ceremony. I love how our sisters matched the flowers, and stood out against the ocean tones. If you notice the top right photo, it is of our ring bearer (my nephew) trying to deconstruct the pillow. Advice to all brides, this probably isn't earth shattering, but I had never thought about it before, DO NOT HAVE YOUR WEDDING RINGS ATTACHED TO THE PILLOW WHEN IT IS IN THE HANDS OF A SMALL CHILD. At any given time, he was untying the ribbon, twirling it around, swinging it in people's faces, throwing it on the ground, you name it, if the rings had been on it during the ceremony, they would've been lost. With that said, I still recommend having a ring pillow, they are such a great element that add to your design story.


I was apprehensive about sharing the photo of me tearing up. Never in a million years did I think I would tear up, but boy did I. Here I had spent so many hours of dedication to all of the elements of the wedding weekend, but the actual ceremony I left in the hands of the Reverend. We didn't write our own vows, it wasn't something we felt the need to do. But I can't begin to tell you how profound that moment was, I didn't think I would lose it, and I did. So ladies, have your handkerchief ready, I didn't think I would cry and I did.

{photos by Anna Wolf}

design by Enise

Right before the wedding, I was on the hunt for earrings. I hadn't really put much thought into them and didn't want to spend a lot of $. Luckily, I came across design by Enise while browsing through Bloomingdales a few days before we left for the wedding and found her stuff to be gorgeous in person and very affordable. I didn't actually end up wearing the bottom pair of earrings as my sister gave me a pair of diamond earrings the day of our wedding as a surprise, but nonetheless, if you are looking for affordable earrings, Enise is great. Unfortunately her website doesn't show all of her great and affordable designs, but if you happen to be near the Bloomingdales in midtown this week, check out her stuff. She will be there personally until Thursday 6/12 selling her jewelry.

{images from design by enise and thoughtful day}

Shades of Grey

More pics from our wedding, I just happen to love this set, with all of the subdued grey tones in the photos. Our wedding was really colorful, (which I love), but it is nice to have these in the mix.

{top to bottom, l -r}

My niece and our flower girl, she is so cute! . Whatever you do, make sure the flower girl and ring bearer are happy, if that means gum, crayons, candy, whatever, just make sure they are happy.

Patrick and I holding hands, I love wearing my two eternity bands together while he is still trying to get used to wearing his band. P and his best man having a boys talk.

These last photos I absolutely love. If you want to go with portrait shots of your guests, pick a consistent wall or area and have your guests pose in front of it. Similar to a make shift photo booth, but without the set up. I personally like the clean / non textured background for shots like these. I love the continuity of the background with the different people, especially the ones of our mothers. They are just so pretty.


{photos by Anna Wolf}

Support Gay Marriage!

If you support gay marriage...

Governor Patterson has said that NY will recognize legal same-sex marriages
from other states and countries. He's doing a poll on whether people support
it. If you're interested in taking 15 seconds to lodge your support, just
call 1-518-474-8390 and say "I support the Governor's directive on
marriage," then give them your 5 digit (New York) zip code.

Send this to all your friends and progressive coworkers in New York ASAP!

Back next week!

This week has been incredibly busy for me, so I will be back next week to share more of our wedding photos. I am not done yet!

If I were to give advice to a bride...

1) Get a good photographer. Make sure you get to know them, take them out to dinner, out for a drink, whatever, just make sure they know you as a couple and it is really important to know what you want from them. We were lucky with Anna, we know her well and vice versa, but my advice to all brides, go with a good photographer, sacrifice other parts of your wedding just to ensure you have a good one!
2) Don't spend a stupid amount of money on your dress, but do splurge on your shoes.
3) Envision and plan YOUR wedding. Know what you want. Luckily no one interfered with my vision, my parent's were extremely supportive and Patrick trusted me. Except when it came to the bar, more on that later.


4) Pick your colors. Then pick your inspiration. I knew my color story before I knew anything else, it helped set the tone and feel of what I wanted our wedding to be. Light, fun, and whimsical. Above is the cover of a vintage American folk art book and to the right is our save the date artwork, it set the tone for the rest of the stationery suite.


5) Let me preface this next one with the fact that I am a product designer, then maybe you won't think I am crazy. CHAIRS - Think about them. The chairs that came with the resort (and free) were your sub standard banquet chairs draped with slip covers. NO WAY! So we had to rent the silver chivari chairs for the reception and the white folding chairs for the ceremony. I didn't want there to be a sea of white fabric, the landscape and natural setting was just too beautiful to be overwhelmed with more white than what was already on the tables.
6) Let your groom have what he wants (here and there). For Patrick, it was the bar, it had to be premium, top shelf liquor.
7) Music - If you have a DJ, like we did for the reception, make sure you go over what kind of music you like with him. Patrick and I are bit fanatic when it comes to music, so the control freaks we are, sent down multiple dvds full of music, labeled with dinner music, dancing music, etc. The DJ played everything we loved, with one exception, "Sweet Caroline" by Neil Diamond, one of Patrick's least favorite songs.


8) Table settings and flowers. Pick out your inspiration and go with it. Go with your gut, your first instinct is always right. I loved this Rebecca Thuss image so much that I had to have lemons somehow be a part of our floral arrangements. Going with the lemon theme, I had lemon drops as the candy favors. Chargers - The chargers the resort used for weddings were black and white, I happened to see the silver chargers at one of the restaurants and asked to have those instead.
9) Make sure you and your groom are on the dance floor for the last song of the night. It was probably one of my favorite moments of the night, most people had already left, and it was just Patrick and I dancing, a nice little moment after all that we worked so hard towards was (for him, finally / for me, sadly) over.
10) Don't waste paper! In our welcome totes we refrained from printing out activity booklets. There would have been about 20 pages of stuff to do in and around the resort, so we made a pdf of everything and sent it out to our guests a few weeks prior to the wedding. It worked out great.


11) Last but not least, every cake needs a cake topper!

Daytime Activities

Here is my last post of our wedding photos for a while, some will definitely pop up in the future, (okay near future! maybe some dance floor action?) I can't help it! These are just some random photos throughout the weekend, I can't begin to tell you how awesome it has been to go through all of these. Anna, the rock star that she is, somehow documented what all of our guests did throughout the long weekend! People rode bikes, drove golf carts, the resort is huge (which we loved, it never felt crowded) so this type of transportation was necessary to get around. We went swimming with dolphins, played golf, chess, you name it, there was a little something for everyone. Patrick and I had the time of our lives, our closest friends and family, down in paradise, for our wedding. It meant the world to us, it was truly a dream come true.

Have a wonderful weekend!

{all photos by Anna Wolf}

Hair Accessories

Taking a break from my own wedding today, I will post more photos tomorrow, mostly celebratory, dancing, fun photos Anna took randomly throughout the weekend.

In the mean time, check out New York Mag's hair accessory round up, prices starting at $40 up to $14,500 (!?!).

{images from new york magazine}

Welcome Reception Photo Booth

Here are a few photos from the welcome reception night. Anna and Mike put together a little makeshift photo booth and all of our guests got to let out their inner superstar! This is a great and creative solution to the standard photo booth and seems to be a trend, Vané even had one at her wedding. What better way to make your guests feel like stars for the night? So many fun photos came out of this shoot that Patrick and I are planning to put together a book!

{photos by Anna Wolf}

More Wedding Details

Last week I posted photos of the reception details and here are some more of the design elements from our wedding. In the first set of photos are the welcome totes I designed for each couple, with Jenna Hein's calligraphy gracing each welcome tag. Below are the custom made ceramic tags by Paloma's Nest that were enclosed in each little hand stamped pouch. I had a couple of stamps made for the wedding; they are such an easy and cost efficient way to carry your theme throughout all of your wedding details, a no brainer if you ask me! The following photos are part of the stationery suite I designed, I had so much fun designing my own invites that I started helping and designing other bride's stationery. Thanks Vané for the shout out last week!

Over the next two days I will be posting more of our wedding pics, then that is it. I PROMISE!