Wedding Wednesday - Personalizing
*Disclaimer* In case you couldn't tell, this is a wedding centric post. If you are not interested, please move along and I will see you next time. <3
I used to get this question a lot and I still see it popping up weekly on at least one of the wedding groups I am in - how do I make my wedding more personal?
The answer is - any way you want to.
If you've been on Pinterest for a minute, you are inundated by one beautiful wedding after another. And while I can't pretend to be as on top of wedding trends as I once was, I can tell you that Boho Chic is definitely a popular vibe right now.
So. Much. Pampas Grass.
Yes, the weddings are lovely. No one is denying that. But I see so many photos that the only thing different is the wedding party. It's almost like someone is just photoshopping different faces.
I'm not trying to make fun of them. I can't deny how beautiful everything is. They just lack personality to me. But I am also basing that strictly on the photos.
I wouldn't say there was a lot of personality in my first wedding. It was fairly standard issue at the time. It was small - maybe 40 people. Lakeside ceremony, cake and punch reception on the lawn. A violinist for the ceremony - and then we probably just played a mix tape for the reception. Honestly I don't remember.
The wedding cake was a basic basket weave (white frosting) with fresh flowers. Centerpieces were some faux flower arrangements I bought very inexpensively at MJ Designs. It was all perfectly lovely and definitely fit within our meager budget. It was perfect for us.
But there was no personality in it really. I guess the main way I personalized it - which literally came to me as I was typing this - was I had the corsages made with each woman's favorite flowers and their spouses boutonnieres matched.
My second wedding was chockful of personality. Our ceremony prelude music was piano versions of favorite movie songs. Our ceremony was not only written by me but included the "mawidge" bit from The Princess Bride. Our recessional music was from the medal ceremony at the end of Star Wars, and our cake cutting song was "To Be In Love" from Robotech (IYKYK). Instead of flowers for centerpieces we used candles and starfish. The wedding cake was blue icing...we had a choreographed first dance...and karaoke instead of dancing. I made our invitations with a little (lottle) help from Sabrina.
I'm sure I am forgetting something but you get the idea. Basically everything I could put my own stamp on it I did. And it was a gorgeous, fun party. I loved every moment of it. It was so us.
See no one ever really looked back on my first wedding and reminisced about any aspect of it. It was pretty to look at and it definitely accomplished our goal of being married but that was it.
But that second wedding? Still gets talked about. Literally - my niece, who was my flower girl the last time around and all of 5 years old - was just talking about the cake from that wedding when I was at her graduation party two weeks ago!
That's a lot to live up to. I set a very high bar for myself.
Now I don't want to give everything away because I'm pretty excited by the plan for this one. But the invitations just went out and they already show a spark of our personality. I did not make these invitations - that was a template from zazzle (with an assist by Misty for finding them).
Sidebar - can I just tell you how long I searched for the perfect invitations? Months. I mention it to Misty and she finds the perfect one within an hour. Ask for help when you are stuck.
The personality is in the form of our stamps.
I bet you weren't expecting that, were you?
Most couples tend to go with some sort of love theme or floral stamp for their wedding invitations. Not us.
I can tell you that I have personalized the grooms party, the cakes, the table decor, and the little bit of "florals" we are doing. The ceremony will definitely be personalized. And we have something really fun for reception planned. But you will have to wait until probably October for those details.
Don't worry, time is flying by. You won't be in suspense much longer.
#stilllucky #infinitelybetter #maturebride #maturegroom #secondtimearound #thirdtimesthecharm #marriedafter40 #marriedafter50