Southern Weddings

I love this couple!  These two are truly meant for each other and the love just pours out of these incredible images from {Paul Johnson Photography}.  Cake by one of my favs Debra Spurlin from Confections on the Coast (her cakes taste as phenomenal as they look!), wedding coordination by {It’s a Shore Thing}, flowers by {Nouveau Flowers of Grayton Beach Florida}, location {Rosemary Beach, FL}.

The weather was: Amazing! It was a beautiful, clear, cool day. We were so blessed!!!!
What colors did you choose for your wedding? Chocolate Brown, Sage, Coral
Describe your wedding flowers: My bouquet was an assortment of hydrangeas, hellebores, white freesia, and orchids. The bridesmaids had small bouquets of green cymbidium orchids and red coral orchids. The florist did such a wonderful job keeping them simple, but beautiful and tying all of our colors in. To be honest, I knew nothing about flowers. I just told the florist I like orchids and hydrangeas and to use any flowers that were in our color scheme.
Describe your wedding cake: I am such a sweets fanatic! Our cake was 6 tiers and each tier was a different flavor. We had lemon, carrot, pistachio, strawberry, chocolate, and repeated pistachio as our topper to keep! It was decorated with orchids cascading down the cake with brown ribbon at the base of each tier.
How did the two of you meet? We met at a local sports bar and grill in Tallahassee out with our friends. Wilson got on stage and played the guitar and sang me a song and he had my heart!
Describe your engagement: He proposed at a Christmas Tree Farm when we were cutting down a tree. The tree he lead me to had a sign that read “Please Pick Me: on one side and “Will You Marry Me” on the other.
What attracted me to my husband was: Everything! His kindness, his sincerity, his humor, his talent, he’s a family man, and of course his good looks!
What attracted me to my wife was: Her personality, her amazing talents, her looks (ha!), her family and friends, I could go on and on…..haha!
A date we went on that we’ll always remember: A funny date we had was….. Wilson tried to be romantic and surprise me with a horseback riding date. What he didn’t know was that I hate riding horses and the date was a group lead trip down some power lines and we all had to wear orange because of hunters! It was not what Wilson had in mind.
Our favorite detail of the wedding was: It is so hard to pick a favorite, but the ceremony being in the round and the style of the reception was perfect for us.
What was the biggest challenge you had to overcome while planning your wedding? Dealing with all of our family members (my parents are divorced and both remarried and all of our parents live in Tallahassee). We wanted to make sure everyone was happy and involved. The lists were so difficult too!!!
Where there any special family traditions you included in the wedding?  I loved that we added a special part in for my step-father. When I got to the end of the aisle I stopped and he gave me a flower to add to my bouquet. I thought that was neat! I also had both of my step parents do the readings. That was really special to both of us.
What was your most memorable moment about your wedding day? It would have to be walking down the aisle and seeing Wilson….Wilson said me walking down the aisle to him was his favorite moment too.
Scariest moment? One of the flower girls came running into the house minutes before the line up and had black tire marks all over her white dress from playing near a car. We all freaked out for about a second, then laughed, and then the wedding planners fixed it!!!
Funniest moment? When the preacher asked “What do you bring to this marriage” and we just paused and no one said anything (because we didn’t know what we were supposed to say!!) and the preacher whispered to us….the rings….and everyone laughed.
What were your something old, something new, something borrowed and something blue items? Old and Borrowed: The necklace I wore was a family heirloom. New: My dress and Shoes Blue: My sister in law had a ribbon monogrammed with my new initials that we tied around my bridal bouquet.
Why do you love your husband? I could go on and on…..He is such an amazing man. He is a true friend to others, a family guy, treats me and everyone around him with complete respect, he is fun, honest, funny, so talented, adventurous, and truly makes me happy every day.
The most unexpected event on our wedding day was: There was a wedding crasher!! But the planners found them and kicked them out! We never saw them until our wedding photos and video!
How was your wedding different than the way you’d always imagined it would be? I never imagined something as beautiful as the day turned out with all of our family and closest friends there. It is so hard to really picture what it will be like and it is overwhelming when you see the most important people in your life participating in such a special day for you and your husband. We went outside of the box with the seating in the round and gospel singers….but it turned out better than we ever expected.
What advice would you give to someone planning their wedding? Make it you! Wilson and I talked about every decision to make sure it was what we wanted. Our parents had so many great ideas and suggestions, but we waned to make sure it came down to us. We did not want to ever look back and say I wish we had done it differently. If we made all the decisions and something went wrong, then we were ok with it because it was what we wanted to begin with. We could not blame anyone else for pushing us in a certain direction. So I would say to make it your own!