Weddingbee Blog

I was never a girl who planned out her wedding. All I knew was that I wanted to get married in a barn. I didn’t even really care where the barn was, just that it was a barn. I’d mentioned this to Mr. Gingham a few times but was never really being serious about it. Plus, we still had yet to figure out a town to get married in. My hometown was out—it was a great place to grow up but I wasn’t all that attached to it anymore. Mr. Gingham didn’t want to get married in Portland because he didn’t want our wedding guests leaving early and heading home. He (and I) want our guests to stay and celebrate all night long, which meant it would have to be somewhere that required a hotel stay.

We thought about Bend or Sunriver. There were barns and ranches there. Plus, that’s where we said, “I love you,” for the first time, and it’s definitely country out there. But, that seemed too far for guests to travel, especially some of our family who live in Seattle. Then we started thinking about the beach… it made perfect sense. That’s where Mr. Gingham grew up, and coincidentally, my family has a beach house in his hometown. His house and mine are only about a mile apart.

So, back to the beach.

There’s a great restaurant at the beach that has weddings out on their lawn and it became the number 1 contender. It would be big enough for our 200 guests with an indoor option in case it rained. We got excited… until we found out the price. To be honest, it wasn’t that expensive, and the people I talked to were super nice and accommodating, but we’re paying for our wedding ourselves basically with our tax returns, so we needed something a little more affordable. Imagine my surprise when one night Mr. Gingham decided to Google “Gearhart” and “Barn”. Now the funny thing is, Gearhart is a little town, one in which Mr. Gingham spent his entire life in, so the idea that he would get a hit on his search was crazy.

But he did. The Barn at Neocoxie Creek. There was no website, just a posting on Craigslist. So, I emailed the lady to get the info. Everything sounded great, except for the fact that it could only fit 125 people and we’re expecting 200. So, to rent a tent to seat everyone outside would eat a chunk out of our budget. But who cared—it was a barn, at the beach, in a place where both Mr. Gingham and I grew up! I’ll share the pictures with you now (we took these) and save our solutions to the above seating/price issues at another time.

Here’s where we’ll get married (unless it rains, which better not happen)

The outdoor bar

The guestbook table

The barn!! Did I mention it’s really old? 100+ years!

Inside of the barn. Can’t you just see this place all decked out in white lights?