Our wedding has been described as “unconventional.”  I think this is because we only incorporated traditions we liked.  When we had to make a decision about something, we asked ourselves, “What feels like us?” instead of,  “What are we supposed to do?”  It’s fun thinking back to that day; I felt like I was being spooned by the gentlest bear – everything was incredibly warm, fuzzy and surreal.

Here is a synopsis of our wedding (the song in the background was written for us by our friend, Dave):

Rings

Greg proposed to me with a ring he made out of a twist-tie.  Yes, that’s correct – the thing you use to tie up plastic bags.  One afternoon, he disappeared into the kitchen for awhile, fashioned an engagement ring out of a twist-tie, then proposed to me.  I wore that twist-tie (and seven others – they had a tendency to disintegrate) until my real ring arrived.  The ring I have now is an unpolished raw diamond.  Our bands have “I will” engraved inside because that’s what we said during our vows and our first dance was to that song by The Beatles.

  

Paper Goods

We opted not to do ‘save the dates’ AND ‘invitations’ and combined the information into a tiny postcard (wedding details were on the back):

Instead of a paper guest book, we found vinyl Beatles albums with our wedding songs on them. People signed them using metallic sharpies. We framed them and now they hang on our wall:

We also made these thank you cards and sent them to everyone who attended:

         

Wedding Party

It’s interesting that we didn’t have a traditional “wedding party” given my lifelong dream of being a bridesmaid.  Instead, my brother stood with me, and Greg’s sister stood with him.  We just wanted everyone to feel equally included.

  

Music

We were really spoiled in the music department.  Greg’s best friends, Kevin and Andrew, are talented musicians so they played during our ceremony. Then my brother’s AMAZING cover band played all night, with special guest appearances by my Dad’s band and Greg’s band.

Here are the songs we chose:

• “I’ve Just Seen a Face” – The Beatles (This is my all-time favorite song. Kevin and Andrew did a beautiful acoustic version while I walked down the aisle, and then sang the full version while we signed the registry.)
• “Daughter” – Louden Wainwright (Kevin played this while I danced with my dad)
• “In My Life” – The Beatles (Greg danced to this with his mom)
• “I Will” – The Beatles (Our first dance)

Greg sang his wedding vows to me.  There are no words to explain how great this was – it is best understood by watching (start video at 2:40):

      

Gifts

• The Mom’s – Embroidered handkerchiefs with personal messages.
• My Dad – I cut a heart out of a pair of my dad’s old jeans for my “something blue” and wore it on the back of my dress. Then I had a matching silk heart sewn into the back of his tie with a personal message.
• Our siblings – Flasks with their initials. For my brother, I engraved the GPS coordinates of our childhood home.
• My best friends– I had delicate necklaces made out of hammered gold.  They were in the shape of PEI with a heart cut-out in the location of the wedding.
• Greg’s best friends – Leather toiletry bags with their initials.
• Michael (my long-time best friend co-officiated the ceremony) -I found him a signed script from Seinfeld, his all-time favorite show.

Personal Touches

• Flowers – All of the flowers for the wedding came from my aunt’s garden and a few of her friends. My aunts picked, arranged, and made the bouquets/boutonnieres for the wedding.
• Cupcakes – My mom has a chocolate cake recipe that is my all-time favorite and so my cousin made a bunch of amazing cupcakes using that recipe. SO DELICIOUS!
• Jam – Greg’s parents made delicious homemade jam as the wedding favor and brought it all the way from Ontario to PEI. (We had the sticker labels made through Etsy.)
• Fireworks – My cousin surprised us with an absolutely incredibly fireworks display.  If you look closely, you can see two of my cousins running around on the beach, trying not to catch on fire.

   

Food

We had a food truck come and serve a delicious ‘small plate’ style meal, and then had an open bar and a BBQ during the dance.

 

Reception

We did this part in my parent’s living room. We set the chairs up theatre style so everyone would have a good view during the speeches.

 

Dance

This was a good ol’ east coast kitchen party, except we were in the garage.  The dancing went until 5am.

  

It was the most special and magical day of my life, and remembering it makes me feel so happy.

I hope you enjoyed reading about it!

❤ Kailea