My Wedding Day Highlights in Honor of Celebrating 6 Years Married

Today I’m going to talk to you about MY wedding day highlights! Brian and I celebrated six years married on January 4th, and I thought I’d share a few highlights from our wedding day that I love to relive over and over again. Let’s go back to January 4, 2014.

Every couple plans their wedding based on their priorities. For us, our main priority was our people— I think our final guest count was 279! So, this meant that we had to do things differently in order to make that happen. We had to sacrifice the venue that we wanted, and the food that is quote “wedding appropriate”. But honestly, I wouldn’t change anything because it was such an amazing and special day and it represented us so perfectly.

First of all, we both got ready at our childhood homes, which was really special. Brian got ready at his parents’ house, and I got ready at my parents house; the homes we grew up in. It was really special to have all my bridesmaids over getting ready for the most important event of my life thus far in my kid bedroom. It made every moment feel extra special. 

I remember Brian crying at our first look, and I cried walking down the aisle to him during our ceremony. Our first look was amazing, and because we did that, we got to do a lot of our photos before the ceremony started.  Fun fact, I walked through stinging nettle to get to Brian for our first look. I remember my feet were on fire, but it couldn’t distract me from the precious moment Brian and I got to share. Of course after seeing each other and calming down the from the nerves, I lifted my dress to find swollen and red feet!

I was so obsessed with the scalloped sweetheart neckline on my dress that was also on the train. This dress was a dream come true. Sadly it’s from Alfred Angelo, who is now out of business!

Because of our choice to make sure we could invite as many guests as we wanted, we got married at a park amphitheater. Yes, our ceremony was in a park! It was $30 to rent, which is just MAGIC. Another huge priority of mine was to have the ceremony and reception in the same location so that people didn’t have to drive. Guests just walked down the path from the amphitheater to the RSM Bell Tower and we used a ballroom.

Cocktail hour was one of those stressors in the wedding planning process for me, so we just didn’t have one! Guests went straight from the ceremony to the reception. It was awesome, and only made possible because we did all of our photos prior to the ceremony. We knew the sun was setting super early for our winter wedding, so we didn’t want to chance the natural light for all of those important photos! My brother-in-law brewed us a special beer called the Albright and we got to serve at our wedding, which was super special.

Our January wedding was perfect, 75 degrees and sunny during the day, but cold at night. We wanted to get creative with food, so we did soup in bread bowl and salad— with lots of options! I think there was four different options of soups and four different options of really yummy gourmet salads. People absolutely loved it! They thought it was so fun and different and it filled their bellies.

And… I just remember a WILD dance party.  We had a normal size dance floor, but it just couldn’t fit everyone, so the dance floor was insanely packed. And we just danced for as long as we could until we did a sparkler exit, SUPER fun!

I didn’t think it was possible, but I love Brian a million times more now than I did on our wedding day. It is a profound privilege to grow in love and maturity with my husband, and I absolutely love our marriage and I LOVE our relationship. I love that it grows stronger every year through life, experience, and trials. We have grown so much. He is my biggest support and encouragement and I couldn’t do what I do without him.

xo-
Kelsey

VENDORS:
Photo Smetona Photo
Video Akros Media
Venue REM Bell Tower + Amphitheater Park
Caterer The Barrel Room
Florals Sweet Blossom Designs
Coordination Courtney Toney
Dress Alfred Angelo
Suits H&M