...our first look...

Edgefield has this cool little prayer chapel off the main sanctuary that DG really liked when he stopped by long ago to take pictures and drop off our deposit.  We decided back then it would be a really good spot for us to meet for the first time come wedding day.

We'd arranged for our good friend, who was also officiating the ceremony, to meet with us to pray together before the festivities of the day really got under way.  As you all know, weddings can be stressful...or even just over-stimulating...and we wanted to make sure we started out in the right frame of mind.  It was really special.

Here they are praying together before I arrived...

First impressions...

And straightening his tie...

Let the crying commence...

(All photos by Will Knowles Weddings)

...coolest bridal party ever...

So I know I'm behind.  I'm sorry.  Maybe you don't care.  But it makes me feel guilty and like a slacker anyway.

Suffice it to say there may be some really big things on the horizon for DG and me, and that has occupied all the space in my life...and my brain.

I promise I'm getting to the actual WEDDING part of this soon!!  But here comes the rest of the photos we took before the ceremony with our dearest (and well-dressed) friends.

Our Tyra poses.  Or mean muggin', as Will called it.

Silly pictures!

Do your DG impression....

(Once again, all photos courtesy of Will Knowles Weddings. Thanks, Will!)

...gentlemen...

We'd decided early on that we'd much rather have our boys in suits than tuxes.  I know this is really just a personal preference, but we wanted to be conscious of the way we were asking our friends to spend their money and felt much better about the fact that they could KEEP their suits.

The search started long, long ago.  We knew that Men's Wearhouse would be our go-to source because if you pay attention, you can buy one suit (at the sale price!) and get a second for $100.  So our man Hamilton out at the Men's Wearhouse in Cool Springs was an excellent help in finding just the right suit and then locating the right sizes, which were scattered throughout the United States of America.  We settled on a really light tan cotton suit by Jones New York.  Let me just tell you a little story.  We'd been in and out of the Cool Springs Men's Wearhouse too many times to count between the time we were engaged in September and the day we actually purchased the suits in January.  We'd hem and hawed about this and that, and all along, we kept coming back to that same Jones New York suit.  So this is how it went down.  On the very last day of the buy one, get one for $100 sale we made a trip (through the snow, mind you) out to the mall.  We'd planned to buy the suits for all four groomsmen at once (and just let them reimburse us), plus DG's suit....plus one more fabulous suit for DG since he'd lost 75 pounds and was in desperate need.  The Jones New York suit was marked at $149.99, and we were hyped.  That meant our guys would get their suits for $125 each!  We get up to the register where our good friend Hamilton starts to check us out when he realizes that the suit was originally $449.99, which meant it had been mismarked and should have been on sale for $249.99.  Bummer, right?  EXCEPT! Hamilton was so good to us (I mean, we were buying 6 suits, after all) and honored the price that had been marked since we had been coming in over and over for weeks on end.  WHAT?!  Let me spell it out for you.  We saved $1,849.97.  I could not have been happier.  $450 suits for $125.  I am a-ok with that.

So add a little more bargain shopping and we were set.  We'd really wanted 3-piece suits, so we looked and looked and looked for a vest and eventually found this really great vest from Apartment 9 at Kohl's. (Oh how I LOVE Kohl's and their sales.)  Originally $80.00, we bought them on sale for $32.  Plus I had a coupon code, of course, so with shipping and all, we paid $29.72.

Next we'd looked at this great gingham shirt and assorted matching ties by Stafford at JCPenney.  We found them when they'd first appeared in stores, so they were full price at $38 for the shirt and $30 for the tie.  I checked the website incessantly until they all went on sale, and between sales and coupon codes and free shipping offers we got the shirts for $21.84 and the ties for $19.90.  A total savings of $105.04.

We ended up with the entire ensemble for $214.63 per groomsmen.  We decided to cover most of their shirts and ties as a gift and only asked them to reimburse us $180 each.  According to the Bridal Association of America the average cost to rent a tuxedo is about $197.....and then you give it back to that nice little man behind the counter.  I feel great about the fact that our guys paid less than that and walked away with a few things that they can (and hopefully will) wear again and again.

Top it off with DG in a crisp white shirt and this perfect little bow tie (the second we'd ordered to see in person) we found on Amazon for $13.99, and you've got one heck of a group of good-looking men.

The moral of the story is this.  Start looking early on.  Keep an open mind about what you might like, and try not to pigeon-hole yourself into one look.  Be diligent in your search, and don't settle for buying something more expensive than you budgeted just because you found it.  Be patient and keep checking prices.  Guaranteed if you look hard enough, you can find something great for a great price.  Ok, ok.  Enough with the money and the bragging about the sale prices.  Here's evidence that our long and tedious search paid off...

Yes, they revert to 12-year-old boys when they're together.  I've accepted this fact.

Pretty sure it's impossible for them to be serious when they're together.

Brothers!

(All wedding photos courtesy of Will Knowles)

...30 years...

Today marks 30 years of wedded bliss for my mom and dad.  They are many, many miles away, so I can’t really celebrate with them today…but I can pay tribute to the successful marriage that was modeled before me every day of my life.  There is no measuring the kind of impact their relationship has made on me and my ability to now experience that kind of relationship with my own husband.  Luckily, DG, my baby brother, and I were at home with them last weekend, so we had a tiny, impromptu celebration and bought a card, a cake, and some balloons.  I would have loved to do much more, as 30 years is definitely an accomplishment to celebrate, but living so far away makes it a little difficult. 

 

Today I am especially grateful for having had the privilege to grow up in such a loving home.  I really believe that the best thing husbands and wives can do for their children is to love each other well, and Mom and Dad have certainly done that.  Their journey has not been absent of a few bumps here and there, but their deep commitment to each other and to our family has brought them thus far.  I can honestly say that 30 years later, they are still very much in love.  And in a world riddled with dissension and division, I count myself blessed to have learned how to love DG from the way Mom and Dad have loved each other.  There is something to be said for staying the course and working at a relationship, communicating through the difficult situations, and ultimately growing closer through the conflict.  So often we give up when things become uncomfortable and take the easy way out, and for many couples, marriage is no different, but I have a lot of hope for my own marriage.  I learned from the best. J

Congrats, Mom and Dad!  I am so proud to know you as mine.  You are a shining example of what love looks like in the midst of this too often dark and lonely world.  I love you!

June 7, 1980

In  honor of Mom and Dad’s anniversary, I’ll briefly interrupt the chronology of our recaps to bring you evidence of the happy home they created. J

I know, I know.  I look just like her.  I take that as a compliment.

Our family...new addition and all!

(All photos courtesy of Will Knowles Weddings)

..my lovely ladies..

My bridesmaids’ dresses were one of the few details I decided to brag about prior to the wedding.  (You can read about all the decisions leading up to this point here, here,  and here.) 

My girls were amazing and the whole time we were taking pictures, I really just couldn’t stop saying how hot they were!  I was so pleased with the way their dresses went together and helped to tie in everything else.  I could continue rambling…but I’ll let Will’s photos speak for themselves…

Ugh.  See?  Sooo hott.

And cute!!

 Most adorable flower girl ever. 

Seriously.  You wish she was your flower girl.

Pretty just like her mommy.

I might have wanted DG to let me keep her...

Bestest MOH. Ever.

My favorite Canadian.

DG's big sister/My former roomie.  LOVE her.

DG's little sister.  Love her too!

Sisters!  So maybe I just claim them as my own.  Sorry, DG.  They're mine now.

Five of my favorite people in the world.

Just goes to show you that sometimes thinking outside the box really pays off!  I thought my girls looked gorgeous!  And I don't think any of them paid more than $100 for thier dresses.  That strapless number was something like $30!!! 

...one-month-iversary and the dress...

I suppose it’s only fitting that on our one month anniversary I actually start writing about the wedding.  I know you all are anxious to see pictures, and I have been selfishly holding out on you.  Well, that stops today. J

I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about how to showcase all of our hard work, and I’ve decided that I want to walk you through all of these little details step by step.  There are a whole lot of things I didn’t blog about prior to the wedding because all of our guests were invited to read along, and I didn’t really want to spoil the surprises.  So this is my chance to talk about all those little decisions along the way….and show you how we arrived at what we did.  We’ll do a budget recap later on, but right now, we’re estimating that we spent 25% of what this wedding would have cost us if we’d paid retail for everything.  And just one note regarding that giant savings:  WE COULD NOT HAVE DONE IT WITOUT THE CRAZY, UNMATCHED WORK AND SUPPORT BY OUR DEAR FRIENDS AND FAMILY.  Seriously people, we were amazed.  I cannot explain to you how blessed we are to have such amazing, willing and capable people around us.  We are so grateful.

Anyway, so where to start?  Where better than the dress…

Before I moved back to Nashville about a year ago, I had been living back home in Missouri.  We all knew that my engagement to DG was impending, and Mom and I wanted to have a chance to do a little shopping together.  So back in April of last year, right before I moved back, I got to have the pleasure of explaining to that nice commissioned consultant lady at David’s Bridal about how I wasn’t engaged yet but I was going to be, etc.  Her there-went-my-sale face was pretty great.  She humored us, but seemed more than annoyed.  (Guess that’s David’s Bridal for you.  I know, I know.  I sold out…but you can’t deny the affordability of their gowns.  Just sayin’.)

Anyway, we tried on a handful of dresses that day.  By the time we left, I was fairly convinced that when the time came around to actually purchase my dress, this would be the one I bought.  (Please ignore that very strange look on my face.)

At one point I had pictures of the other dresses I tried on, but that’s been some time ago and I really don’t know where they’d be now.

Moving on…later on in July, my mom came to visit for a weekend so we packed up my MOH and went shopping again.  This time, we stumbled upon my dress in the front of the store.  I was really drawn to it, so I decided to try it on in spite of the fact that I was pretty sure I wanted something done in mostly lace.  Boy was I wrong.  As soon as I tried her on (I use “tried her on” loosely here, as the largest size they had in the store was still four sizes too small…so really more like “held her up”), I knew she was made for me.  I also really loved the high collar in the back.  My mom’s wedding dress had a similar high collar and neckline when she and Dad got married back in 1980, so I particularly liked our dresses would have that in common.  I didn’t buy the dress that day, but waited until DG and I were later engaged and I could actually put the dress on and zip it up.  You know, details. 

Once my dress arrived, I was fortunate in that very few alterations were necessary….at least at the time.  I spent a little extra on the French bustle so as not to detract from all that pretty stuff happening there in the back.  About two weeks before the wedding I randomly decided to try it on again, and to my surprise, the top had become really loose.  Guess that hot yoga was working better than I’d thought.  I got stuck paying a rush fee to have it taken in with such little time to spare, but in the end, Coco out at the David’s in Cool Springs did a WONDERFUL job and it fit perfectly.

So!  To show off the dress that I absolutely loved, about which people are still giving compliments, here are some of my favorites from the solo shots Will did before the wedding.

All images courtesy of Will Knowles Weddings

Just a note…

I know that from this point forward that dress is just going to be occupying space in our little house, and I am not really all that sentimental about it, so I’ve decided to sell it to another budget conscious bride.  I would have loved to buy it used in the first place, but it was still a pretty new style when I first bought it.  If you happen to be interested, check out my listing on Recycled Bride.