Southern Weddings

Holy hot shoes, Miss Brooke! (RSVP, FYI)  The bride paired her embellished heels with a traditional Maggie Sottero gown and lilac rose bouquet inspired by the mother of the bride’s own rose garden.  Could those bouquets match the bridesmaids’ belted Jim Hjelm dresses any better?  We think not.  Smitten Photos shot Brooke + Steve’s Georgia wedding at the River Pointe Golf Course.  What do you think of the “church” the bride and her father handmade for her ceremony?  Brooke insists it was her favorite part of the day, and we have to cast our votes for the wooden steeple as well!!

How did the two of you meet?  Tell us your story.  We are both from really small towns in southern Georgia, and we both went to the same very small high school in Perry. I vaguely knew of Steve, but it wasn’t until a night in September of 2003 that we officially met. My parents were having a big dinner party for ten couples, and for some reason a family friend invited himself and Steve to this party.  We ended up talking the whole night!  I found out he was actually only 2 years older that me, and that we had a lot in common. I was so shy at fifteen, and Steve was a freshman in college, so I couldn’t have been more surprised when he called to ask me out a week later.  Our relationship has been a lot of growing up together. We learned to cook together, got a puppy, together, I taught him how to ski, and he taught me about music. We have seen and learned so many things traveling all over the South and throughout Europe. More than anything, we just really enjoying doing things together.
Describe the proposal. Because I knew he had the ring, I thought there was absolutely no way he could surprise me. I just knew I would be able to tell something was up. Steve was pretty clever, though, and proposed with breakfast in bed. Anybody who knows me knows that I LOVE sleep. I am a heavy sleeper, and it takes me a while to actually wake up. So when he came in that morning (which was actually Christmas Eve), I was just excited about breakfast in bed. It took me a while to wake up and notice that he was totally nervous and fumbling with a box in his hand. I dropped my fork when he opened it, and he said the sweetest things. Of course I said yes, but I still couldn’t tell if the proposal was for real or just a dream! I was completely and utterly surprised!
Three adjectives that describe the day are: Romantic, creative and eclectic.
Our favorite detail of the wedding was: This is a hard one. I think it has to be the “church” that my dad and I built. It just made everything so special. But I really liked all the elements of the ceremony, especially the mason jars we sprayed like mercury glass, and the drop cloth and burlap chair covers.
Tell us about finding your wedding dress: I really wanted to wait to go dress shopping with my mom and sisters, but I couldn’t contain my excitement and gathered some girlfriends to hit the local stores. My only direction was that I didn’t want a corset back. I had made it almost all the way through my first appointment with little success, until Zoe (our helper) brought me a Maggie Sottero. It was beautiful, but she said the reason she hadn’t brought it before was because it had a corset back. Honestly, I knew even before I walked out of the room that I was in love. It was the first time I actually felt like a bride instead of like a little girl trying on the wrong dress. Of course I didn’t think it could be that easy so I continued looking for months, but after four trips back to the first store I had my dress.