I’m a planner. We had talked through every particular, minuscule feature to make sure our day was perfect. I even knew what day Tim was going to propose to me, because we talked about it. I don’t like surprises. I didn’t even want an engagement ring because I wanted to break away from old, patriarchal aspects that are entrenched in our society’s wedding traditions. But Tim insisted (and sometimes I love to be a hard-core, internationality-observing feminist, but other times it’s just too exhausting and easier to pretend to be blissfully ignorant). I am so much of a planner that Tim and I bought our wedding bands before being officially engaged because we knew that we were getting engaged the end of November, and I was leaving for New Zealand in January, where we would get married in April.
One lesson I learned is that you can’t plan for everything. Once I suddenly returned home in the middle of March, we were mopey from the inactivity of quarantine and our sudden change of plans. We went about our days going through the motions. Plus, our NZ wedding planner refused to give our $500 deposit back, despite the unprecedented times and the fact that she had done hardly any planning yet. We tried to stay in the best spirits we could knowing that other people were, and still are, in far worse positions. Also, after 2 months of being back I made a dispute with the card company we paid our planner with. She wrote a long email about how disappointed she was with us, but eventually gave us our money back. Tim and I wanted to do something soon, because we had a lot planned and wanted to get married before life got in the way. We couldn’t do a destination elopement like we hoped because of the pandemic, so we had to invite the most important people in our lives: my parents, my grandma, and his parents.
When things slowly started to open back up in May, I saw an Instagram post from an old co-worker who now does photography full-time, who was looking to get more into elopement/adventure weddings. (CC Boyle Photography) Not only would Cece photograph our wedding, but she would help plan and give suggestions — as much as our NZ wedding planner was doing for us. The final cost of our entire wedding would be half the cost of our original wedding.
I felt life come back to me. After meeting with our Cece, everything started to come into place. Within just a few days, we had the main plans for our wedding already set. We toured a few places up the shore to refresh our memory and to set specific spots in mind. We chose to take some wedding portraits at Palisade Head and have our ceremony and dinner at Tettegouche State Park. The few weeks and days leading up to it, we were completely stress-free.
Tim and I savored this special time by making keepsakes of our wedding together, like a custom table runner, table settings, “Our Love Story” chalkboard, ring pillow, and little vow books. I never thought that I’d ever be into doing little frilly wedding stuff like that, but it was actually a great bonding activity for Tim & I, we had never done crafts together before!
For whatever reason, I also thought it’d be really romantic for us to make our own food for our wedding day (plus I’m cheap!). So, we designed our own cheese platter, looked up an easy baked chicken alfredo recipe, and I made my semi-famous homemade cheesecake. (we kept the food warm at the state park by heating up bricks and wrapping the bricks & pasta towels and putting this in a cooler. Sounds weird but this method is used by catering companies a lot)
Another lesson I learned is that I am an OVER-planner. We thought through every second of the day that it went great, even though not everything goes as planned. Tim and I never thought our pictures would look so good, my grandma married us (we got her ordained online in less than a minute), and we honeymooned in Grand Marais in a secluded cabin.
Nothing special. Just love!
josie's musings 