how we did our wedding on a budget

Weddings do not have to cost an arm and a leg to be nice. It's true! It might be a shocker, I know, but the wedding industry lies to you. Below is how we went about our wedding-on-a-budget, and the end result is more than what we could have dreamed of having. I would encourage every couple planning a wedding to look inside themselves and do just exactly what they want to do. It might be the traditional route, it might not be. Just do what you want to do with what you have. Here's what we did:

1: Food. Will and I raised a pig from March until July. We built the fence and her shed out of wood and fencing given to us from a friend, and we ran all over Chelsea and East Randolph collecting table scraps for her to eat (as well as grain...) and in the end had a most magnificent feast. That piggie was a loved piggie, and I will forever be grateful to her for what she provided us. The wood to cook the pig was cut by Will's father in the Spring. Will cut and stacked it and let it dry for the summer so it'd be ready. We also grew some vegetables, but most weren't ready to eat by July 14th so I'm not sure how much of that went into our food. When we were first engaged and talking about what we wanted, we came up with an idea to do a pot-luck dinner. Who doesn't love a pot-luck? The gathering of family and friends bringing delicious home-made foods? Yum. I also have an allergy to alliums and it's impossible for me to eat anything. Doing a pot-luck made sense for me and my allergies. Most people don't get what I can/can't eat (not that i expect them to) and so it's impossible for me to eat anything without knowing the exact ingredients. I didn't want to be sick on my wedding. My sister-in-law is an amazing cook and has crazy food allergies herself, so she actually made all of the dressings (for the salads, pig, chicken and fish) and also made up a dish of foods that I could eat. So that was great.

2. Dinnerware: we collected plates from the GoodWill store in Boston back when we were living there. I wrote a post on that awhile back. Then when we moved here, I went to the local thrift shop and spoke with the dear sweet woman that works there. She ended up just giving us stacks of plates to use as we would be returning them all to her when we were finished. Amazing! I gave her a donation when I dropped them off, as all of the profit from her shop goes to help local women/families in need. 

3. A woman in town gave us bags of tablecloths to use for the night, and another darlin' friend loaned us her tablecloths from her wedding. We had so many extra that we even had enough to cover the hay bale seating at the ceremony spot. We were going to have to get blankets for the hay bales (rough seating...) but we ended up not having to.

4. Speaking of seating, the hay bales were loaned to us for the night from my little brother's friend. That saved us a lot of money....hay bales are not cheap. We also had picnic tables from around town that our family and friends and community members allowed us to use for the weekend.

5. Flowers. We had a real live flower fairy deliver us GORGEOUS bouquets! A dear friend of Will's aunt grows beautiful flowers, and sometime between five and six, those flowers were delivered and set up all over the orchard. It was magical to walk in and see that.

6. Lighting and music: oh god. this part was so stressful. I can't even go there. But I'll just tell you that my brother is a gem of a man and good lord did he ever save the day. Also, three bests of ours (plus my sweet, sweet nephew) made the playlists which was INCREDIBLE.

7. Photography. A friend of ours is a photographer, and he took all of the photos for us. I can't wait to see them! He's a very busy guy during the summer, so understandably we haven't gotten our photos yet. I can't wait to go over them!

8. Everything else was all DIY, and all projects that I posted on here at some point.

Working on cake toppers and the guest book.

9. One of my brothers (the music/light guy I mentioned above) made a wooden arch for us to get married under. It was so special.

I was so nervous about the kiss for some reason. I actually wanted to practice (hah...excuse to make-out. Sure!) But then Will just swooped in and kissed me and holyshit the pictures make me swoon. 

10. Booze. The beer was the most expensive, coming in at somewhere around 300 dollars. We didn't want a dry wedding though, nor a BYOB, so we decided early on we would just do what needed to be done.

whatever, it happened.

11. We had no tent. I knew from the beginning that the weather was going to be outstanding. I just knew it. I also would not accept having a tent at the orchard--it was not a big enough space for that to happen. So no tent it was. I'm not sure what we would have done if it had rained...

12. We went on a honeymoon to a campground in the Northeast Kingdom. We had planned on an intense hiking get-away in Maine, but we were so exhausted after the wedding that the thought of driving ten hours to hike for a few days seemed like torture. So we went to the middle of nowhere in Vermont and had a kick-ass time together. Perfection.

Oh! I can't forget! My brother and sister-in-law surprised us with fireworks AND my best friends Justine and Morgan surprised me and Will with chinese lanterns. Duders, I tell you. Those chinese lanterns made the whole night officially magic.

So there. That's how we spent 2000 dollars. Everyone has come up to us and told us either A. How amazing it was and how glad they were there, or B. How amazing the pictures looked that have been put on Facebook, or C. Word of mouth around town from people that went and said it was an outstanding wedding.

Of course people say that, however I'm going to believe that they're being honest just because it really was the most rocking wedding ever. :)

The End, even though I don't want it to be.

life lately

it's been awhile since i've posted. i've had all these posts in my head on the wrap-up of the wedding, but it's overwhelming. how can i ever write about the most magical days of my life with will to date? i can't. it's impossible. the wedding week was...was...perfect. 


so until i get around to that post, i'll put up a photo of us officially hitched.

oh, and i'll tell you what we spent on the shindig, because i said i would even though i feel weird about it (and even though the whole point of this blog was to show a wedding done well on a budget, i'll continue to feel a little unsettled about disclosing how much we spent. mostly because to some people, this amount is way too much and to say it's not a lot of money is false.). anyway, we spent around two thousand dollars. i think we accomplished our goal of a pretty wedding on a budget! i'll write more on how we did it later, complete with photos. i just don't feel like it right now, ok?

tanaroo!

I am going to tell the story of Tanaroo through photo captions because that's what I feel like doing.

 

This is me, hugging Brenda because I love her. Lemme tell you about Brenda. Will doesn't have a mother, Will has three mothers. Brenda is one of them. The other is De, and of course the third is his mother mother. I'll get to De in a second, but this little photo caption story is all about Brenda. When I think of Will and the people in his life that have helped to shape him into the beautiful man that he is, Brenda comes to mind as being one of the greatest influences of all. She has the hugest personality. The hugest laugh, the hugest smile, the hugest heart. She is just so special. I can't ever begin to touch on my love for her or how grateful I am for all that she has done for my husband. As part of the package that comes with marrying Will, I get to have Brenda in my life too which makes me feel nothing short of what I imagine winning the lottery to feel like. Seriously, she is THAT amazing. So. Tanaroo. Tanaroo started when Will and I went to visit Brenda one day while she was sunbathing in her backyard. We were discussing wedding plans, and she wanted to hear some stories about my friends Justine and Morgan. Thus the subject of Bonnaroo came about, to which Brenda coined the term 'Tanaroo' for a wild night with these girls (and other bests, too, of course) before the wedding. I had forgotten about it, and was actually secretly hoping that if something did happen it would just be a small group of us having dinner. I kinda hate the whole bachelor/bachelorette/it's your last night of freedom, AND as thoroughly discussed in the last post, I loathe the attention and didn't wanna go places where I'd be made to do stupid shit. So. So fast forward or else this is going to be so dang long/longer than it is already. The Thursday before my wedding and I'm getting ready (quick interruption: if there is one single thing that I miss about living with Justine and Morgan, it's getting ready with them) to go out to what I thought was dinner (quick interruption numero dos: I didn't eat anything because I knew I would be having an amazing dinner. I was starved at this point) with just Justine and Morgan and Brenda and De. We were to meet at my parent's house at five. This happens, except that Brenda and De show up in a freakin limo, and Christie is inside and we're picking up more gals and we're headed out to a French wine tasting and dancing. I was made to wear a hat that said Bride, and this awesome shirt that Brenda and De had made for us all. At first I was completely dying. But then I got over myself and had the best night. It was so dang special, and sometimes when I'm feeling really sentimental, and because I'm a freak, I actually cry over it still. So so special. Anyway, so this is me hugging Brenda because I love her. 

This is Morgan and Justine and me and Christie. Having them altogether meant my life was complete, and I've been going through some serious depression now that everyone is gone. I miss them so, so much. It actually physically hurts my heart to miss them this much. I don't think it's normal! When I was a kid and dreamed up the kinds of friends that I would have when I grew up, these were the girls I dreamt about. They make everything in life so good. I am so lucky to have them. 

This is my pops and my (now) husband and me and my momma. And the limo. My husband just got done working at the reception site, and was dirty as you can tell. Obviously you can see that I still think he's bangin'. Also this five second photo frenzy that was taking place during this photo gave me a glimpse into what the wedding day was going to be like and the amount of photos that would be taken of us. That pretty much sealed the deal on our decision to not take photos that day. Someday we wanna hire an amazing photographer and do some special shots of us dressed up in our wedding gear, but dude I tell you I could not handle that shiz on the wedding day. Anyyyyyyway. I love my parents. They are a really amazing example to me on love and life and authenticity and just...well, everything. I'm so lucky to have them, and as Will tells me all the time, he is so lucky now.

Here is Morgan and Justine and me and Christinus and Libby and Brittany. Love.

Brenda and De had given everyone a balloon and a tag attached where they wrote a special note or wish for me or for Will or for me and Will together. Morgan had just released hers, and clearly this is the beginning of the all of the tears that fell that night. I love these girls. Love love love.

Toasts in the car. The following pictures are of more toasts given. Things that I notice about each photo: 

1. Morgan's face, because she looks so completely happy.

2. Holy crap more alcohol. 

3. Morgan's face again. She's giving a toast here, and it of course made us both cry. 

5. I devoured that cheese and bread. I actually got to the point where I couldn't swallow because I had so much bread in my mouth. That cheese was amazing.

6. My dance moves just keep improving. 

I just realized that I have no photos of De from this night! So sad. She's another mother to Will, just like Brenda. Her support to the both of us these past nine years has been amazing, and for Will his entire life. She is consistently a positive look-on-the-bright-side type of person. She always always always is positive and funny and kind and thoughtful. I'm working right now with her best friend and sometimes we get to chatting about De, and hearing about her from a friend's perspective has made me realize how incredibly lucky I am to have her in my life. I really really love her. All of the things I said above about Brenda ring true for De. These women are incredible.

So that's the bachelorette night. We ended it by partying into the wee hours of the morning with my brothers and my guy and friends. Justine and I at some point snuck upstairs and played with the ouija board and had really absurd conversations on spirituality and life and that which is not seen. I don't even know. It was just an amazing night and I freaking love my friends.

post number 1 of 1394819283 of the week leading up to the wedding

i started writing a post a few days ago, and it's already approximately two hundred pages long. so instead i've decided to break it up by day, beginning from the week-ish before the wedding to whenever i feel like stopping. it's just easier (and better for you to read). plus, i'll put photos up for your viewing pleasure.

on thursday before the last weekend before the wedding (does that even make sense?) will and i sat upstairs after dinner and worked on our vows together. when we were finished, we decided to read them to each other, just the rough draft and save the final draft for the actual ceremony. that night was so special, and in a way, almost more special than the actual ceremony itself. we are both people that feel intense discomfort at being the center of anything, so we decided that just reading through our vows to each other privately would help us to remember the reason we were doing this to begin with on the day of in hopes that we wouldn't freak out too much at the prospect of standing up in front of so many people. we both sobbed our way through that first reading. it was ridiculous. like really, really ridiculous. but also awesome and special and sacred and everything that vows should be. still now when i think back on the ceremony, it was that thursday a week before that gives me the biggest heart smile.

and as far as the final draft of our vows at the ceremony? that didn't really happen. i stumbled through mine and left out portions because i couldn't see through my tears and got all mixed up because of nerves, and will just ended up talking to me instead of reading from what he wrote. if i could go back in time to the wedding day, i'd tell myself to calm the fuck down. seriously! i was PANICKED by the people that were showing up. and so when it came time for the ceremony, i felt like i was having an out-of-body experience and was not really present with what was happening. all of that was okay now that i think back on it, all because we had read together beforehand and got to share privately our vows written for each other.

so if you are anything like me or will, i suggest doing a special read-through before the ceremony. plus that whole next week leading up to the fourteenth, i kept on reflecting on that night and the things will said to me and feeling this intense love from him and for him. it felt like nothing else mattered that entire week. so that was a pretty great feeling going into our wedding day.


i have no photo from this, but i'll post one just because i said i would:

wedding update

Nineteen days to go! 
Thought I'd do a little updating on the status of wedding projects. 
The decorations for the wedding ceremony and reception are very simple: flags and white lights and flowers. I've been super busy with gardening, white lights are being collected, but the flags have not been worked on hardly at all. 
So today, this wonderfully rainy June day, was packed full of sewing. I'm just taking pieces of fabric I have around the house and cutting them into shapes I like and sewing them up. They're all different colors and all different shapes and all different sizes. I have some made out of an old blue polka-dotted shirt from something I found at the GoodWill store for Halloween last year, a red and white flowered flag from a favorite dress that had some broken straps, and a pretty tan flowered flag from curtains that I made from one of my very first apartments. I'm going through old fabrics from my mom as well, and cutting those up and sewing a million more flags. 
Nineteen days to get this (plus a whole lot more) all done. Cripes.

And then here is what my calendar looks like, if you wanna know. Looking at this made my darlin' freak out. 

That Maine is our Honeymoon. We're doing the simple thing, and going camping and hiking and kayaking and beachin'. One full week of it. I can't WAIT. 

happy summer!

yesterday was the solstice! we celebrated by hopping in the car the minute that will got home and heading to the river for a beer and a swim. it was heaven! we didn't get home until after nine, swimming until the sky turned lavender and it grew quiet all around us. vermont holds such magic. 

it felt like i was swimming at a different river, even though this is the same spot i've always gone to. the flood changed the entire flow, shape, beaches, banks and feeling of this spot. it was pretty amazing to see that. 


today i'm going through all of the plates and vases we've collected for the wedding and making an inventory so i can see what we still need. it's coming up so soon. SO SOON. i'm getting a ball in my stomach as i'm writing this, realizing all that needs to get done and how little time is left. shit. how is it already a little over three weeks away?!!

three weekends in between

From tomorrow there is twenty-five days until July 14th, the day that I will marry Will. The day we'll walk in the field towards each other, a field full of wildflowers and evening sun and people we love. We'll stand hand-in-hand and say things to each other that has been culminating in our hearts since we started loving each other, and then we'll party our asses off until the sun comes up the following morning. I can't wait until the day after, when I get to wake up and say "Goodmorning Husband!"and kiss him and realize that for the rest of my life, I get to say that and do that. I am so excited. So excited!

Blog posting has been sparse. I don't really care except for myself, because looking back over this process through blog posting and photos has been fun. The last time I posted was after the finishing of those invitations, when I wanted to just run away and get married because it was all so overwhelming. Now things are incredible. Will started a new job and we've both decided that there isn't much point in me finding something for work until after we're married due to the fact that I'd have to take so much time off. So I've been gardening like a mad-woman. I end my days exhausted and happy and full of dirt: dirt in my fingernails and toenails and in my hair and in the cracks of my summer feet and in random streaks where I've swatted horseflies away but left a trail of dark earth. I really, really love this summer. At twenty-eight I am exactly where I want to be doing exactly what I want to be doing. It's such a good feeling.

Bullets:

*Bonnaroo has come and gone. thankyoulord. It ended up being an event that Will and I forced ourselves to go to. We wanted to go because we thought it would be good for us to have something really fun to look forward to right before the wedding, where we would just hang out with friends and laugh and have a wonderful time. It ended up being that, but also not worth it, because it was all of that AND the opposite of all of that, if that makes sense. I didn't hang out with one of my dearest friends hardly at all. That sucked. I ended up feeling detached from myself and like I was counting down the days until we were back in the car and headed home. It's not that I didn't have fun, it just was not what I was dreaming it up to be based on the experience I had when I went before, with just Morgan and Justine. I miss those girls and the experiences we have when we're three and like sisters and laughing and talking and filling up our souls with each other. This was supposed to be that, but it wasn't. I left sad, and that feeling has stayed with me.

*My oldest friend, probably unbeknownst to her and probably I should tell her but probably she'll read this post and know it's about her, has come back in my life in a way that feels most wonderful and good. She's never gone away, but I've felt as if I've drifted myself away from her these past few years. We've had a rocky friendship at times, but have alwaysalways stayed friends. Always. Since May I've missed her so much that it actually hurts. I don't even know why. It's not like I don't miss her other times, but starting in May I just felt like I've NEEDED her in my life. And guess what? She just told me she's coming for a week to help out and hang out. It's made me so happy I've cried.

*Those last bullets were really personal. I should probably erase them but I won't.

*So far everyone has said yes on their RSVPs. Actually, that's a lie. Today I got a couple in the mail that were answered in a no, and some of them made me really sad because I fully expected them to come and didn't realize until now that because Will and I wanted an evening wedding, it would make it impossible for these people to come just because they're older and unable.

I don't feel like writing anymore. I need to get outside...

I'll post photos later.

suck it, stress

Will and I do this thing at the end of the day when we're in bed, where we list five things we are really really grateful for that happened on that day. I'm doing a blog-version of that right now to better illustrate how I've chosen happiness instead of stress and the ways in which it has worked out. 


1. The invitations are completely and totally done. Will and I sent them out together on Tuesday evening. We walked to the big blue mailbox at the post office and together we opened it and pushed those ridiculous invitations away. It felt so freaking good. He looked at me with the biggest grin and said "welp, it's happening!" It felt really real. I know that's weird, it's just a sending of the invitations, but I can't tell you how much those stupid things stressed me out and how amazing it felt to just be done with them. Plus we celebrated by sitting out on our porch with a few beers and just talked the rest of the night away--not once about the wedding. It was nice to just forget about it.

assholes.

2. Yesterday we worked on the pig's shed together and made her a dang mansion. I'm just grateful for that because it was fun. No other reason.

Piggles+milk=adorableness.

3. My dad came home! He has been gone since March 8th. My mom looked really pretty last night when we dropped her off to meet him at the restaurant for dinner. Obviously she's happier when he's home, but it was good to see it and it made me happy. 

4. Today my little brother did this:

Dude. I have no words. Ceremony spot!!!!! Part of the reason I've been so stressed is because of the amount of work we have to do on the land, with gardening, with cutting wood and cooking and preparing EVERYTHING. It's just felt totally and completely overwhelming. And so today we walked out there and he just decided to do it all. It looks freaking incredible. I was in tears walking to it realizing that it was all going to come together. IT'S REALLY HAPPENING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'm so happy!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

5. I'm really grateful for my girlfriends, and for our friend Cabot, who has been so organized and on top of things. I've been so overwhelmed with everything, but with notes and phone calls and nudges of encouragement from these special, special people I've really been picked right up. I've been realizing how much the wedding ceremony/reception is going to be so amazing just because at the end of it, all of these beautiful people will be celebrating with us and it's going to feel so good. So for that I'm especially grateful.

That's all! More updates coming as it's getting closer and closer and closer...eeeeeeeeeek!!

What a difference a year makes

This time last year I was...wait. Actually that's false. In about a week it'll be a year. But for the sake of this post, I'm just going with it being a year ago.

This time last year, Will and I were living in Boston. I was working/out of the house 60 hours a week. Hating it. Will was miserable...a depressed shell of himself. But other than that, we were enjoying being engaged and NOT planning a wedding. And so I left for a southern road trip with J and M, with a stop-over in Memphis where we sang on stage with some saccharine sweet southern sorority girls we met. We were headed to Gulf Shores where we did what we do. By that I mean: shamelessly move in on someone's camping spot, ride shuttle busses to the Florida border with some really, really crazy people, swim in the ocean and lounge on the beach, go four loco in a parking lot to be served on by the most sarcastic southern man, wait for Justine while she blasts off on a rocket ship, make friends with horrible mothers and then leave them horrible messages for being horrible people, make an entire crowd get down country-swinging style to Old Crow, lose each other, find each other, find Morgan pouring water allover herself in line waiting for the port-a-potty's, and of course, the crazy-twirling-smiling-hippie sand-dances the three of us do best while listening to Paul Simon.

This year? This year I am LOSING MY SHIT.

This year Will and I are living back in Vermont (which is heaven, by the way. That's not part of the stress, that's fo sho!). Will is so, so happy and I am...getting there? Working on it? Something like both. We ARE planning a wedding. Two months from now, we'll be husband and wife. That feels so cool! So cool. But the process I'm not thrilled with. Actually, that's not entirely true. The invitations are getting the best of me, but I know when those are over I'll be a lot less stressed; it's the getting there part that is just driving me over the edge. There's a lot that's going on, and I just feel so overwhelmed. Not just wedding stuff. Life stuff. It's hard right now and instead of talking it out and de-stressing like I normally would, I'm a mess of pissy moods every single day because it's just mounting and I'm doing nothing to let myself just be.

To remedy this, because I'm realizing as I'm writing through this that I'm in serious need of a whole weekend of making myself insanely happy, I'm hoping that the invitations are going to be finished, and because it's supposed to be sunny and gorgeous, I'm going to wake up bright and early on Saturday AND Sunday and go for long, long ride followed by a hike or kayak with Will followed by lots of gardening with my mom followed by a marathon phone session with friends and a good, good bottle of wine. And then I'll take a deep yoga breath and move on from this terrible, horrible, no good, very bad (series of) mood(s).

Quick Little Update

It's been awhile! Wedding is still on, yes. Just don't have internet unless I'm at my parent's house, and lately every second I'm at my parent's house I'm outside and have not a moment to spend on the internerd. I love it that way. I've been busy first taking down a friend's old fence and then bringing it to my parent's land, and then taking down their old fence and putting up our 'new' one in its place. All of this for the cutest little black piggie! I probably shouldn't find her so adorable because in a few months time we're butchering her and roasting her for the wedding, but there's nothing wrong with showing my appreciation to this animal for the nourishment it will provide for us and our guests come July 14th.

Speaking of July 14th, we've got a tad over three months to go until our wedding. SHIT.

We have so much to do. I don't even know where to start. Eloping would have been loads better, it really would have.

ALSO: yes, we are doing a potluck wedding. Even if we were bajillionaires we would still have a potluck wedding. When we decided we would get married in front of people (and we reeeeeeeeeally didn't want to) we decided on doing it our own way, in the most low-key (but still pretty) way possible. Potluck, family and friends coming together, good music, camping...yep, that's what we wanted right from the start and that's how we're doing it. So bugger off you naysayers.

Aaaaand just about two months until 'Roo 2012. Heck yes. I don't know what I'm more excited for...getting married or this magical bliss. Justine and Morgan? You both reading this? TWO MONTHS.

photos! yeahhh photos!

tonight i was looking through old photographs because i'm in the process of making a gift for the family i work for. i came across some of will and me, and because going through old photos is a favorite thing to do, i thought i'd post some.

burlington nights.

the knudsey wedding

 this photo made me remember all of the nights in burlington we would sneak away to watch the sunset, or walk on the lake or just sit on a bench and talk. i miss burlington so much.

we had a lot of crap moments after i returned from france...but i remember this day as a really good day.

party at nate's not that long after we first started dating.

camel's hump

this photo reminds me of camping that weekend, and how i convinced will we should go canoeing even though there were huge waves and the wind knocked us in crazy directions. he was so in love with me that weekend. hah. 

before a concert. this concert was so.so.so awesome. i never wanna forget it. also, i know he looks so drunk but he hadn't even had a drop to drink. he just does weird shit with his eyes to mess with me.

will's baby brother lived with us for like a year. the cute boy on the left is him...and the only person that is going to stand up with us when we get married. besides will, my favorite part of will is cameron. always has been that way. i really, really love him.

back in college when we would only see each other once a month or so. some really sweet memories from this time.

CALIFORNIA! ROAD TRIP! BEST TIME EVER!

right before i left for france. this was such a good, good weekend.

le sigh. i love love love looking through photographs. also i need to get better at doing it, because lately i don't take ANY and i have nothing from the past year except random and useless photos that go on instagram. cripes.