{Not} Living Vicariously

Baby . . . You are the Best Thing

When F.P. and I first started to date, he let me know that he was not, nor would he ever be interested in being, a dancer. He knew that I enjoyed swing dancing and as it turns out we might have met sooner if he’d been willing to try dancing as we had several friends in common from the Nashville Swing Dance crowd. But there you go, he wasn’t interested and it took me going to a book club in the ‘Boro to actually meet him.
 
I never pushed him to go dancing. To me, it wasn’t an issue. Then, for my birthday, about four months into our relationship, he took me to a dance when one of my favorite bands was playing. And he enjoyed himself. He didn’t become a convert overnight. However over time we continued to go and have fun.
 
We decided there would be dancing at our reception which meant there would be a first dance. And since there would be a first dance, F.P. picked out a song – Baby You’re the Best Thing by Ray LaMontagne – and decided some lessons just might be in order so we didn’t stand and do the “eigth grade sway” to the music.
 
We found an introductory special being offered by the new Dance World down the street from his house and signed up. We had a really good instructor for the smooth dances which was great as it turns our our song danced best as a combination rumba/salsa. Also F.P. picked stuff up in weeks that I had been practicing for years. So he is a bit of a natural at it. And the best thing is, even after the wedding is over, he is still interested in getting out on the dance floor with me.

What's your exit?

Music choices can be hard. There are several traditional songs that can be used in weddings. Many of them I do like and we did choose to use. However, for the recessional when we exited as husband and wife, we wanted that to be a bit different and make a statement about us. Which was hard.
 
Cedarwood has an amazing guitarist they use for most of their weddings. We really liked what we heard on his website and enjoyed discussing with him our various options. We had made decisions on everything but the recessional and had listened to all sorts of suggestions via youtube. Clicking through some of their related video, I came across an orchestral version of the Muppet Theme and started thinking. We have enjoyed watching the Muppet Show . . . and it has Kermit the frog . . . and musically it could work . . . and we’ve never heard of anyone else using it . . . and so we asked the guitarist what he thought about it. He came back saying that it would not be possible for a solo instrument, however if we added in a violin they could do a “gypsy jazz” version for us. Sold! I had my exit song in place and thoroughly enjoyed the looks on people’s faces as they realized just what song we were “recessing” to. Plus the guitarist enjoyed it so much he is considering adding it to his repertoire for future weddings.
 
For the curious, our lineup was:
Seating of parents and Maid of Honor entrance – Jesu Joy of Man’s Desire
Brides entrance – Canon in D by Pachelbel
Unity ceremony – Greatest Commands
Recessional – Muppet Theme

the Private Moment

One of the current trends for weddings, when the photos are done in advance, is for the bride and groom to have a “private moment” in which they see each other for the first time that day. This takes place either completely alone, or with just the photographer present to document the moment. Sometimes . . . tradition flies out the window.
 
As we were following current practice and doing our photos in advance, we scheduled a private moment into the photo shoot. This was to take place at 4:20, we would do the rest of the together photos, then I would go hide at 5:15 before the guests were due to arrive for seating. We knew we were cutting it close, however somehow things did not quite work out the way we planned.
 
Due to the distance of our ceremony location and it being on the other side of town from many of our guests they felt the need to not be late which meant they got there way too early. We already had several guests wandering the grounds (and watching us) by the time our private moment was to occur on the front porch of the house. Luckily his first instinct was to applaud me as I came around the corner, capturing our natural instinct to celebrate the fun in any situation as opposed to looking for the drama in the serious moment.
 
As our photographer later remarked “every bride should be applauded by her groom.” Our private moment ended up being not so private. However it did end up suiting us perfectly!

My princess moment

I work with some very talented people. However I had no clue just how talented some of them are until I started planning my wedding. My mother does not sew and the only reason I even know how to turn a sewing machine on is because of my college roommate (and maid of honor) Debbie. I was very touched by a colleague asking if she could make my dress for me, as long as she was not stepping on my mother’s toes. I would get a custom fit dress made just for me! I had never even dreamed of such a luxury. Of course I accepted!
 
She did ask that I try some dresses on in order to give her guidance so a friend and I made an appointment and went shopping. I fell in love with the halter neckline which isn’t surprising considering how many of those I have in my summer wardrobe anyway. We talked patterns and she convinced me to go with a Vogue pattern for the dress and she would customize the neckline (i.e. design a halter top) for me. Wow!
 
The dress was created by her and customized by her and I felt like a fairytale princess with my dress made by her (which fits in well with the frog prince fairytale theme of the wedding). I can’t even fathom how she was able to create the dress because I was not born with that gene. I just get to appreciate it in others.
 
I am so lucky to have such good friends and talented people in my life.

Historic Cedarwood

If you are planning a wedding anywhere in the Nashville area, let me recommend Cedarwood (www.historiccedarwood.com) as a phenomenal one stop shopping venue. Their talented staff saved my sanity over the course of planning my wedding. With our mothers living out of state, we knew we needed someone who could narrow down the choices for us and yet also allow us the freedom to include our own personal touches.
 
Cedarwood offered us this and incorporated both beautifully. Again and again our friends and family are telling us both how much fun they had and how beautiful a location we found. Let me tell you, they are right. The grounds are beautiful, the flowers (by on staff florist Karen Wright) are fantastic, the cakes (by Patty Cakes www.pattycakes-tn.com, she even made us a frog prince cake for the groom) were tasty, the catering (from Chef Christopher’s www.chefchristopherscatering.com) was delicious, the music (both the instrumental from Rob Higginbottom www.nashvilleweddingguitarist.com and the reception from DJ MadDog Fleming) was exceptional, and everyone on staff did their part to make our day an absolute dream.
 
We only had to provide an officiant and a photographer. We had friend Mark perform the ceremony and our photographer was Jennifer of www.jenniferdunawayphotography.com. The photos that have come back from Jennifer are stunning and Mark did “simple, short, fun” just as we requested.
 
Cedarwood gave us the fairytale wedding we didn’t even know we wanted.

Back again

So yes, I went away again for a little while. What can I say? My internet access has been spotty between a wedding, a honeymoon, and moving into a house with no internet access. That has been remedied and I have plenty of entries pre-written to post for your reading enjoyment.

Have fun!