Our Winter Wedding

Yesterday was a light, breezy, sunshine-while-its-raining kind of day. It was the Yeti and I's 6 months-of-being-married-aversary! :D In honor of these past six lovely months, I wanted to do a post featuring all the details of that crazy beautiful day in December, where we stood before each other and promised to never let go.

Most of you by now have heard the beginning of our love story. If not, look back through the posts, you'll find it :P So I'll start this story with a sunny day in October 2010. The Yeti told me he wanted to go on a walk up to a little mountain spot we'd discovered that summer. He said he wanted to take some pictures since we were gussied up for our 10 months-of-dating-aversary. So we get up there, I set the camera's timer and skip to get next to him for the photo, and to my surprise when I look over, he's on one knee! :D



Progression of extreme happiness.

It was so darn exciting! I was totally surprised, and now we have pictures of that moment forever. My mister did good :) In all of our wisdom, we decided that we just neeeddeddd to have our wedding be on exactly one year from the day we started dating, which would fall on December 14, two months from then.

A little wedding sounded easy enough to do in two months, but boy, those two months were stressful!

First, I found my wedding dress online at PoshGirlVintage.com

I wish I'd saved the original listing, as it's long been removed by now, but just take my word for it, it was stunning. A vintage 1950's creme and lace scoop-necked beauty. I was terrified ordering online a vintage dress I couldn't see and try on first, but basically our whole wedding/marriage theme was to dive in head first, so I clicked order. A few weeks later it showed up, and fit like an absolute dream.

Original crinoline! :D Yes please!

I also ordered a vintage crystal brooch online which I put in my hair, some skyscraper high creme heels with pearl accents, and my very favorite of all, a little pearl and wrapped wire bird's nest necklace from Lan0Crystal's Etsy shop.

While I was busy ordering and fretting away, my Mom helped tons by researching venues and planning decor. I wanted to go with a rustic vintage bird theme, but I didn't really know how to pull it off. She did wonders and found a crazy beautiful location in Manitou Springs called the The Cliff House at Pikes Peak.

The view there is breathtaking, and the building itself is this huge towering vintage 1800's Victorian. The wedding ceremony was preformed in one of it's spiral towers, and I couldn't have felt more like a queen.

Everything else fell together in the nick of time. We decided my Dad would officiate the ceremony himself, which was such an honor for us. There could not have been anyone better for the job. Before we knew it, the time had come, it was our wedding day. Honestly, everything went perfectly. We got ready in our seperate rooms, the photographer took pictures of us individually, and the guests started arriving. The cake and flowers arrived as well, and were gorgeous.

I spent my time alone being wickedly nervous that I was going to fall or mess up reading my vows or a million other irrational fears, but by then it was all too late, and we were walking to the room, and it was all happening, and I was frantic. Canon in D played throughout the room while me and my Dad stood behind a partitioning screen. He held my hand as I held his arm, and he told me it was all going to be okay, even though he was also extremely nervous to do the ceremony himself. It was our time to walk then, and we came out of the partition and, while I knew my family and friends were sitting all around us and watching, I only saw one person. My handsome Calvin stood at the altar, with such love and joy in his eyes I swear I could not look away if I had to. 

My Dad did the ceremony wonderfully. Everything was genuine and true and I was so proud. Calvin read his vows and I cried like a baby. He told me that his love for me could not be contained by all the space in the universe. It came time for me to read and I completely bawled my way through them. I'm pretty sure only about 5 people heard them in their entirety because I basically sobbed them out. But heres a hint: I talked about Pokemon, and Avatar: The Last Airbender. 

We exchanged our rings and I Do's, smooched, and before we knew it, we were walking back down the aisle. The ceremony was over in a flash and, to be honest, I was so relieved!

Next, the photographer had us take a bunch of family pictures, couple pictures, and then on to the lunch and cake! :)

My big new family :)

Our cake was just perfect. It was exactly what we wanted. Simple, cute, and delicious! We ordered this adorable bride and groom bird cake topper, and placed the cake on a little slice of rustic looking wood for a stand.

Me and my Mom did the majority of the decor ourselves. To make the centerpieces, we ordered these crazy cute birch bark vases with our initials burned into them from NH Wood Creation's Etsy shop. We filled each one with moss, then an assortment of flowers, pearl twigs, and branches. We even attached little teeny purple birds to the branches :) The napkins each had a little card of thanks that I designed in Illustrator with two birds on a branch whose bodies make a heart. If anyone is interested in a free .pdf of that design email me :) Each place setting also had a little nest full of jordan almonds to look like eggs :)

My Mom and I also set up a candy bar in one corner, with all sorts of candies and little bird stamped paper bags to scoop it into :)

I honestly don't really remember what exactly the lunch menu was, I was just so ecstatic it was all happening, finally. I think there was something involving chicken and skewers and really great iced tea.

After we dined and caked to our heart's content, everyone packed up and said their goodbyes and it really sank in: we were married. His eyes are the eyes I will wake up to every morning. I could not have been more happy. I want to say it was the greatest day of my life, but I think more accurately, it was just the beginning of the greatest days. That moment set in motion our lives together and every morning that I get up I am thankful.

Today and every day Yeti, I will marry you.

Happy Half Year, Babe.

<3

Readers, thank you for sticking with me. I realize this was the longest post in history, if you made it here, you did good. I hope you find the Aang to your Katara. And as always, I hope you have a beautiful day.


All wedding photos (C) Katharine Bicket.