Mrs. Gingerbread, Vancouver
Age and Occupation: 32, Psychologist
Fiance's Age and Occupation: 33, Software Engineer
Engagement Date: Sometime in the fall of 2004
Wedding Date: July, 2008
Blogging Since: March 24, 2008
Venue: Rainforest wedding, beachfront restaurant reception
About Me: I recently moved to Canada from Southern California. Trying to plan a wedding in a new city, not to mention a new country, is tough, but the fact that we can get legally married here more than makes up for it! The wedding will be an opportunity for most of our family and friends to see our new city for the first time so it will be both a wedding and a reunion. Besides my future wife, I am also madly in love with a good bargain, Swedish pastries, Tivo, and my two dogs and calico cat (in no particular order).
The Big Day: Food, Family and Friends
September 5th, 2008 @ 12:26 pm by Mrs. Gingerbread
Wow, this recap series is really long and I haven’t even gotten through the reception!
The Big Day: Getting Ready
The Big Day: Miss GB 2.0 Gets Ready
The Big Day: Gingerbreads Reunited (The First Look)
The Big Day: Over the Hills and Through the Park
The Big Day: The Ceremony (Part I)
The Big Day: The Ceremony (Part II)
The Big Day: Bouquets Found
The Big Day: Little Things
The Big Day: Faux Photo Booth Guestbook Revealed
At our reception, Mrs. GB 2.0 and I sat with family at the middle table so that we could feel like we were in the centre of the action. Long tables of ten gave the reception that nice, family-style feel.
Faux Photo Booth Guestbook Revealed
September 4th, 2008 @ 11:27 am by Mrs. Gingerbread
We arrived at our reception with little fanfare. Actually, we sort of just snuck in while everyone else was busy dressing up and posing for some photo ops. As I mentioned earlier, we had a box of props and a DIY “photo booth” that we set up for guests to take advantage of. Here are some of my favourite photos as found in our guest book.
Who are these people?! I think this is my favourite photo since this picture takes me back to a time and place that I’ve never even been. Ellis Island anyone?
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The Big Day: Little Things
August 25th, 2008 @ 1:44 pm by Mrs. Gingerbread
While Carlton was snapping our photos on the pier below the restaurant where our reception was being held, Aki was already upstairs taking pictures of the set up before the guests arrived. I really appreciated having these photos since I never got the see the whole set up before the wedding, and I was so curious to see what our guests would be seeing when they arrived.
We ended up going with five long tables, which really achieved that family-style feel while still giving us the space to have all the guests on the deck.
The Big Day: Bouquet Found
August 24th, 2008 @ 12:23 pm by Mrs. Gingerbread
As soon as the ceremony was over, we hightailed it back up to the room we’d been hanging out in before the ceremony to retrieve our bouquets that we forgot when we walked down the aisle! Our officiant actually recommended that we take ten minutes to “just be married” and spend some time together before getting swept up in celebrating with family and friends. I think we spent most of the time saying stuff like, “Oh my God, we’re married! Can you believe it? Wow, we’re married!”
We then headed downstairs to rejoin our guests and to take some family photos. Mama Gingerbread hugged Miss GB 2.0 and told her, “The ceremony was so beautiful. It was perfect!” Miss GB 2.0 couldn’t bear to tell her new MIL that we forgot the bouquets she’d spent all night making for us. But as soon as I saw Mama Gingerbread I blurted out, “Oh Mom, we forgot the bouquets!” Of course, she is a totally awesome, selfless Mama and said she didn’t even notice!
The Wedding I Anticipated Most This Summer (Besides My Own, Of Course)
August 22nd, 2008 @ 5:19 pm by Mrs. Gingerbread
Ellen DeGeneres & Portia de Rossi wed on August 16th with a small ceremony at their home.
Check out Ellen’s hilarious announcement of her wedding that she has on her website. She also has a few more pictures there.
Read more…
The Big Day: The Ceremony (Part II)
August 22nd, 2008 @ 12:35 pm by Mrs. Gingerbread
My lengthy ceremony recaps probably speak to the fact that I loved our ceremony. Like, a lot. At first, I was totally intimidated about the idea of planning the ceremony and was thinking of it more as “the thing we have to do before we have the reception”. I really credit having a officiant that was a good match for us to the success of our ceremony. She gave us good suggestions, she was open to our ideas, and she provided us with the security that someone was steering the ship so we were in good hands and could just enjoy the day. So, back to ceremony!
Mama Gingerbread read a prayer that we chose.
The Big Day: The Ceremony (Part I)
August 21st, 2008 @ 12:00 pm by Mrs. Gingerbread
Our officiant recommended that we spend the half hour before the ceremony somewhere quiet and private. As luck would have it, the venue let us retreat into their upstairs offices which had a nice view of the ceremony site. We sat around, sipped water, looked excitedly out the window, and let our flowers sit in some water. Down below, the musicians played as guests arrived.
Boston Bee Meet-Up Recap
August 20th, 2008 @ 2:49 pm by Mrs. Gingerbread
I had the good fortune of being in Boston for work last week and getting a chance to meet up with Mrs. Bubblegum, Mrs. Toucan, and some wonderful readers! We had a fun time getting acquainted over some drinks and Mexican food at Fajitas & ’Ritas. Too bad we remembered to take a photo after all the food was gone and after my face turned bright red from less than one beer (thanks Asian flush).
Thank You to Our Friendors!
August 11th, 2008 @ 11:55 am by Mrs. Gingerbread
Before I go any further into my wedding recap, I have to stop to acknowledge the people who made our wedding spectacular. To borrow Mrs. Hummingbird’s term the wedding would not have been possible without the help of our volunteer team of Friendors. We didn’t have a wedding party, but we did have a lot of people who were willing to pitch in and in doing so, they saved us our sanity and a lot of dough. Friendors= priceless!
Photographers
The friendor jackpot all started with Aki. You may recall we asked him to take our photographs because we’ve always been big fans of his work. He takes photographs because he loves it, but in order to preserve the joy of photography, he keeps it as a hobby. He agreed to take our wedding photos, but refused payment. We were completely shocked and totally grateful at his generosity. As if that wasn’t unbelievable enough, Aki then told us that he had a friend, Carlton, who is a great photographer that is just getting into the wedding biz, who’d like to volunteer too. What?! Two volunteer photographers?! (I should mention that I wasn’t a Weddingbee blogger when all of this generosity came rushing in my direction so it was totally genuine!)
Photo of Carlton in action by Aki
The Big Day: Over the Hills and Through the Park
August 9th, 2008 @ 5:33 pm by Mrs. Gingerbread
In order to get from downtown Vancouver to our rain forest ceremony site, we had to drive through Stanley Park. We were especially excited that our guests would have to drive through Stanley Park, since it really is one of Vancouver’s highlights. Given that our two talented, creative photographers were in the chase car behind us, we couldn’t pass up the opportunity to take advantage of the cool vintage car + Stanley Park + two brides. Here is an album page that Carlton put together from the impromptu photo shoot we did on the way to the wedding.
I’ll go ahead and show you some of my favourites in full size after the jump.
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