Weddingbee Blog

Storybooks are my favorite, from the fairy tales Grimm to Babar the Elephant to yes, even storybooks’ physical manifestation via Storybook Land at Disneyland.

I owe a great part of my admiration for storybooks to my mom, a children’s librarian.

To pay tribute to her, my wonderful bridesmaid Alexa will recite a reading based on the book, The Runaway Bunny.

To tie in the theme, I created program backs using the pages of my favorite children’s book (about a wedding, of course!) “A Frog Went A-Courting” adapted and illustrated by Nina Barbaresi:

I used different pages so about every row, if they put their programs together, can get the gist of the story:

Here’s the front of the program––it’s pretty cool how the colors match the books’ colors!

By the way, here is what the aftermath of cutting out 100 programs, and their backing, and assembling them, looks like:

Yes, it looks as if wedding threw up on my parents’ rug. Sorry parents. It’s only for 10 more days!

Anyway. Back to Alexa’s reading. It is inspired by a few I found around the internet, and it incorporates direct quotes from the book as well.

Here is the full text of what she will read during our ceremony:

“As many of you know, this book is a conversation between a mother rabbit and one of her bunnies who wants to run away. As some of you know, the bride’s mother happens to be a children’s librarian, and if you couldn’t already tell by the programs, such literature holds a special place in their hearts.

A certain truth about relationships is revealed in Margaret Wise Brown’s classic children’s book The Runaway Bunny.

In the book, the bunny tells his mother, “I am running away… If you run after me, I will become a fish in a trout stream and I will swim away from you…” to which his mother responds that no matter how far he wants to go, no matter how well he wants to hide, his mother will be there: “if you become a bird and fly away from me,” says his mother, “I will be a tree that you come home to… if you become a crocus in a hidden garden… I will be a gardener and I will find you… if you become a rock on the mountain high above me I will be a mountain climber, and I will climb to where you are,” the book reads.

In our closest relationships we need to give each other the freedom to be ourselves by holding space for each others’ evolution safely in our hearts at the same time as we maintain our deepest, closest connection. Our partner can change and explore, always knowing that we will be there. It is this balance between communion and autonomy, between adventure and intimacy, held in a profoundly mutual and loving space that we wish for Miss Paisley and Professor Paisley throughout their lives together.”

And that’s it! I love it!

In keeping with my storybook theme, I plan to watch one of my favorite uplifting Disney movies, Enchanted, starring Amy Adams and McDreamy, on the morning of my wedding.

Throughout the day, probably right about when some passive aggressive comment floats by my ears or when a freak California summertime rain cloud looms, I’ll envision an army of happy singing animal cartoons there to help me take it all on the chin.

Or when I walk into my reception, and realize my DIY flowers have all wilted from the oppressive heat, I’ll imagine my fairy Godmother, with a flick of her wand, has showered make-everything-pretty dust all over my reception.

My mom told me a story the other day at the dinner table, it was about a little boy’s dismay at a felt story board she presented during children’s storytime at the library. He kept pointing at a window pane my mom had just placed onto the Three Little Pigs’ house on the felt board.

“It’s not a window!” he said.

“What do you mean? It is a window,” my mother patiently explained.

“No, no, no, it’s not!” the little boy said in frustration, struggling to explain.

“Do you mean because there’s no glass?” my mother asked.

“Yes!” the boy said, with obvious relief.

“There may not be actual glass on this windowpane, but you can use your imagination to pretend there is.”

Just like the felt story board is just a simple backdrop for an often intricate, wonderful story, so is the wedding a simple backdrop for another story: your deep and meaningful relationship with your new husband. The candy buffet, the annoying distant cousins––all are just like one-dimensional felt props to your multi-faceted story.

When I look around at our decor, and it isn’t glinting quite the way it does on the pages of Martha Stewart Weddings or on the screen of Style Me Pretty, I’ll remember the lessons taught from reading, use my imagination a little, and take a page from Enchanted to look on the bright side: I’m embarking on my true-life, happily-ever-after ending with my new husband, and the beginning of the rest of our lives.

Do tell, what’s your favorite children’s story book that never fails to put a smile on your face?