Southern Weddings

If Lara hadn’t just replenished my office candy supply with Easter goodies galore, I’d be jonesing for a major sugar fix right about now. Sarah boasted the highlight of their festive reception at the Belle Meade Plantation had been the lavish dessert bar, and she wasn’t kidding! Dessert Designs provided the three-tiered confection that doubled as the couple’s wedding cake and the sweet spread’s main event – yum! Emily loves the fact that Sarah + Tyler wed in a real life horse barn and celebrated in the adjoining carriage home, complete with hay bales and mounted bridles. (I’ll spare you the obvious bridle/bridal pun, because I’m awesome like that.) Hats off to photographer Brion Hopkins for this rustic Tennessee wedding!

Describe your wedding flowers: My bouquet was filled with narcissus, white sweet peas, star of Bethlehem and blue privet berries, surrounded by magnolia leaves and tied with a striped burlap wrap with pearl buttons. I adored it! To me, it was an ideal mix of earthy/elegant, high/low elements.
Describe your wedding cake: Our wedding cake was just one item on our dessert table, which included cookies, carrot cake cupcakes (Ryan’s favorite), caramel and candy apples (my favorites), bags of caramel corn and horseshoe-shaped chocolates, so we chose a relatively small three-tiered cake. The cake was covered in ivory fondant icing and decorated with a simple sugar magnolia.
What was the biggest challenge you had to overcome while planning your wedding? Finding time to do everything! Ryan and I both have busy careers, and, I admit, I’m a bit of a control freak, so I did not exactly delegate any wedding planning tasks. I do not, however, regret any of the countless hours I spent shopping for perfectly mismatched accessories for the bridesmaids, scouring antique stores for picture frames to turn into chalkboards, rubber stamping burlap sacks to hold dessert table treats, etc., because our wedding truly reflected our personalities and style. Plus, I actually enjoyed every moment of it!
What was your most memorable moment about your wedding day? Aside from saying our vows to one another, my favorite moment was walking down the aisle with my father. The stables looked almost magical, I was surrounded by my family and closest friends, and I was moments away from marrying the man of my dreams. I remember thinking, “This is the happiest day of my life.” Ryan says that his most memorable moment is when he first saw me in my wedding dress. Yeah, he’s a keeper.
Did you write your own vows? If so, what was your favorite phrase, verse or line? Yes, we wrote and memorized our own vows, and did not say or read them to one another until the ceremony. My favorite line from Ryan’s vows to me was his opening: “For years you were just a dream and a prayer. Now that I have you, I will never let you go.” Ryan’s favorite verse was when I said, “Where you go, I will go. Who you become, I will become the complement.” We’ve placed our vows at the very front of our wedding album and plan to repeat them to each other every year on our anniversary.
What’s next for you as a couple? What are you looking forward to in the future? Right now, Ryan is interviewing for his fellowship in hematology/oncology, so it is exciting to see what possibilities that will bring. Other than that, I’m hoping to start referring to myself by my married name on a more consistent basis. Some habits die hard, I suppose!