Southern Weddings

You know what we really like about Brooke + Steve’s purple color palette?  Rather than being full on jewel-tone purple (which, I must admit, I really love!), everything – from the escort cards to the centerpieces and the flower-topped Publix cake – is tinged a soft shade of lilac.  It’s romantic, sophisticated and just a tad vintage.  And there’s my spiel on wedding colors for the day!  For more from Brooke + Steve’s Southern celebration, visit Smitten Photos’ own blog posts here and here!

Describe your wedding flowers: My mother grows the most amazing lavender roses.  My whole color scheme was based on those roses!  The roses we ended up using for the wedding with weren’t as full as her garden roses, but overall I was really happy. We had two different styles of flowers for the reception and ceremony. For the ceremony, we did simple full arrangements of white and green flowers. For the reception we chose unique flowers and vessels for each table. Describe your wedding cake: This might have been the hardest part of the whole process for me. We met with so many cake designers. Everyone was really creative, but we were on a tight budget. Steve said Publix from the very beginning, but I had a specific idea of what I wanted. Steve’s only request was no fondant. After lots of looking, I finally stopped by Publix and customized exactly what we wanted. I really loved the contrast of the white and purple roses, but my favorite part was the birds on top. Our cake topper was two birds hot glued to a stick that I had customized to look like a bride and groom with some black felt and lace trim from the fabric store.
What was the biggest challenge you had to overcome while planning your wedding? I am really lucky to have a very creative family. My parents, my step-mom and I all had very different opinions about what we wanted the day to be like, so the first thing I had to learn how to do was to make sure everyone felt they were equally a part of the wedding. I also had to figure out how to voice our view for what we wanted our wedding to be like without making it seem like we were picking sides. It was difficult in the beginning, but things magically resolved themselves as the date got closer!
Did you write your own vows?  If so, what was your favorite phrase, verse or line? We didn’t write our vows, but I did use www.myweddingvows.com as a resource for things we liked and things we didn’t. We worked really hard to piece together a ceremony that reflected us the most.
What’s next for you as a couple?  What are you looking forward to in the future? We are really young to be married, but we have our whole lives ahead of us. That means we have a lot of flexibility to figure that out. I know there will be a big move in the future for us, hopefully back South. I’m ready for some good sweet tea, tons of sunshine and that Southern hospitality you don’t really find as much in Louisville. I know Steve eventually wants to have his own dental practice.  As for me, I know I will be doing something creative, hopefully something to do with interior design. All I can say that if the future is anything like putting this wedding together and half as fun as we had that night, we are going to be a very lucky couple.

Congratulations, Brooke + Steve!  Good luck with all the exciting things on your horizon!