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In my last post, I recounted the heartbreaks I incurred through venue searching. First I had to just say no to a downtown Chicago loft wedding, and then I had to say sayonara to the suburban version of an urban loft wedding. At this point, I was quite literally out of options.
Personal photo
This is my “at my wits end” face.
I went back to the drawing board (or the Google Docs, if we’re being literal) and revamped my list. I started looking at hotel ballrooms and banquet halls, even ones that hadn’t been updated since the ’90s, even ones that had a marquee near the road saying “Congrats Kurt and Trudy.” I looked at country clubs, museums, outdoor/tent receptions, even restaurants. I looked at expensive places and cheap places, places that considered bread and butter to be one of the courses in their five-course meal package, places that included a single carnation on each table as the centerpiece, and places that would throw in a chocolate fountain for free, just for me (but don’t tell anyone). I looked at places near my house, near Mr. Unicycle’s parents’ house, near the airport, near my office, and beyond—pretty much a 15-mile radius from as far southeast as Chicago to as far northwest as this place.
When I first got engaged, I fully planned on waiting a month or so to revel in newly engaged bliss before doing any wedding planning. I needed to make the engagement Facebook official. I needed to schedule blocks of time for gazing adoringly at my new bling. I needed to practice calling Mr. Unicycle my fiancé in a nasally French accent (as in “Dahling, look at this gorgeous ring my fian-say gave me!”). I needed to milk the post-engagement-excitement-induced appetite loss for all it was worth because I’m a stress eater.
Image via She Knows Living
I’m engaged!!! (and surfing the net!!)
But here’s how every conversation went down when I told my nearest and dearest about the impending nuptials:
Finding the perfect reception space was definitely not a walk in the park. It wasn’t nearly as easy a decision as securing the ceremony location. (And, to be honest, after being snapped back into reality with our budget constraints, I wasn’t feeling as confident about the ease of booking a reception space.) Since Williamsburg is such a small town, there wasn’t an adbundance of information about weddings online. I began a search by visiting a number of photography blogs to view pictures of real weddings in the area. It was a great way to gather ideas about new locations and have a more candid view of the spaces.
I initially found Wessex Hall at Williamsburg Winery. As a senior in college, I had made a trip with fellow sorority sisters to the winery and had fond memories. A reception at a winery would be fitting, as Mr. Hawk and I enjoyed attending the occasional wine tasting, and the rustic look of Wessex Hall with wood beams and metal chandeliers was perfect (and felt very Williamsburg). It was around $1,000 less than the Alumni House, which was a plus, but when I contacted them our date was booked. (Ugh. Woulda been too easy, right?) They only had availability on Labor Day weekend, and I wasn’t willing to change our date (and go back on the college’s waiting list for Wren) so I moved on.
Photo via Williamsburg Winery
Next, I considered several of the hotels in the area. There was the Hospitality House, where I was planning on reserving a room block, the Williamsburg Lodge, and Williamsburg Inn. The Lodge was booked, the Inn wanted something like a minimum of $20,000 in food and beverage, and the look of the Hospitality House’s ballroom wasn’t exactly the look I was going for. (NEXT!)
Since I’ve come clean with my issue of patience, I’m sure this next confession will hardly come as a surprise… I started planning out details of the wedding (only in my head, I swear!) before I was formally engaged. (I certainly can’t be alone in this, right?) From the very beginning, for whatever reason, there was NO question in my mind about where I wanted to get married. I attended a small public school in Williamsburg, Virginia, and my experiences and memories there stuck with me. Besides the historical aspect, there really isn’t much going on in the ‘burg; however, what it lacks in entertainment, Williamsburg makes up for in beauty. Quiet, quaint, and picturesque are all words that accurately describe the ‘burg. And although these things perhaps aren’t the perfect ingredients for a party school, they certainly do make up the recipe of my ideal wedding locale.
Photo by Holland Photo Arts
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After a few months of intense internet searching, I was pretty sure I had found our wedding venue. I know, though, that internet photos can be pretty deceiving (think apartment/house searching!), so I figured I should probably check the place out in person. Unfortunately, being a medical student in upstate New York, I didn’t seem to have any opportunity in the near future to go take a peek. Enter my parents! They so kindly offered take a drive over to the venue and check it out. And they LOVED it! My mom offered to book it right then and there, and I almost agreed! But we cooled our jets and Mr. Elk made plans to go down to Long Island over the holidays and check it out. And it was PERFECT!!!
So without further ado, our venue, the Old Field Club.
This is what you see when you drive up to the venue—very understated but beautiful.
Old Field Club image via OFC website
This is the ceremony area, with cocktail hour to take place on the adjoining deck and in a screened off porch not visible in this photo. I love the natural beauty and simplicity!
I love hearing about the rehearsal dinner! Mr. Raccoon’s family offered to be in charge of ours, and it sounds amazing!
First, I’ll tell you about some of the places that were almost chosen.
Zydeco’s 5:
Images via michellej Flickr / Fun City Finder / Metromix Indianapolis
Create the honeymoon of your dreams.
Let’s be honest, guys. When you hear the phrase “Vegas Wedding,” what immediately pops into mind?
Image via Luster Studios / Photo by Craig Carpenter
Neither of us had our heart set on a location. In a way this was good, but it created what seemed like endless options to explore!
Mr. Raccoon is living in Nashville and has been attending St. Anne’s.
Image via Nashville Daily Photo
We went to school together in Evansville, and the campus chapel is always available for weddings.
A New York wedding can be many things. A traditional New York wedding consists of TONS of delicious food, is held in a beautiful chandelier-ed ballroom, and consists of lots and lots of partying. I mentioned before that I don’t want a traditional New York wedding and am going for a more rustic-chic look. This is not to say that I don’t LOVE attending a New York-style wedding. I’ve found that they are some of the best to go to, but I may be a little biased on that. I thought I would give the hive a taste of what a “New York style” wedding is, something that Miss Fox and I mentioned that may have left people from other parts of the United States/earth stumped. Plus, who doesn’t love some wedding visuals on Weddingbee?
Here goes! Let’s refer to my friends as Mr. and Mrs. Bear. I’ve known the Bears for quite some time. Mr. Bear and I went to high school together, and then we moved on to the same college. Mrs. Bear was my first college friend (after my roommate). Sometime during the first week of freshmen year I had a dorm party. Mr. and Mrs. Bear both attended, they met each other, and the rest is history! So, if you’re counting, that would mean they have been together for almost eight years. We have all been waiting patiently for this wedding day. Prepare for picture overload!
The day was pretty dreary until right before the ceremony was set to begin. The sun came out just in time for them to get all those first-look/wedding-party pics. Good karma juju at its best!
The sun coming out on the beautiful property at The Swan Club
I know that title isn’t nearly as sophisticated as it should be, especially considering our venue.
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| Image via My Chicago Wedding |
The tasting was sophisticated and classy. But the food was so good, I just wanted to dance up and down and go, “mmmmmm, yummy.” In fact, I still do. So there you have it.
I don’t know where my camera is. I thought I’d left it at work and was kicking myself for not having it for the entire five days I was off (birthday celebration, woot!), but I’m back at work and still can’t find it. So all pics from here on will be taken on my super-cool new Blackberry that was a birthday gift to myself. I apologize in advance.
Mr. Kettle and I picked up Grandmother Kettle and drove out to Joliet for the tasting. There, we met Momma and Daddy Kettle, Mima and Poppa Kettle, and FSIL Grand. Yeah, we took eight people there. I tried to take pictures, but it was an afterthought.
This is the second installment of my little “Venue That Wasn’t” series. For this venue, I wanted to show you all Leila Arboretum. Seriously one of the most beautiful places in Battle Creek. In the spring, it is bursting with new flowers and green everywhere. In the summer the trees are lush and beautiful. If the fall it is a Midwestern dreamscape of orange, yellow, and blue, and in the winter it is a marshmallow magic land of rolling hills and sledding.
OK, enough yip-yapping! I will show you pictures!
When you come up the main drive, this is what greets you.
There are so many nice venues in South West Michigan, and I am really a sucker for “what-if-ing” So I thought I’d start my own little mini series for a number of reasons. 1) It may be helpful to other brides who are still in the midst of their venue hunt. 2) These little walks down “what-if lane” will help me re-affirm my venue choice. (Not that I need much re-affirming—I am very happy with both venues, I just thought it would be fun!)
So for this the first episode, I would like to introduce you to The Birch Gallery.
This beautiful place would FOR SURE be where we would get married if: we could have a Catholic wedding outside, we were getting married in the fall, when the weather is a bit more predictable than April, and if the majority of ours guests were not from out of state (read: need hotels), and we weren’t having 200 guests (give or take 50). Alas, all of those things are part of our wedding reality, and for that reason, we will not be getting married here.
To recap, we had struck out with our initial venue search, but I then discovered an appreciation for all-inclusive packages that opened up a few more options for us.
Among these options was a little place called Historic Cedarwood.
Image via Cedarwood Weddings / Photo by Left Turn Photo
How did I feel when we found Cedarwood? This sums it up pretty well:
“You know the feeling when it’s the bottom of the ninth, the bases are loaded, and you know the next one’s coming right down the middle. And then, you just connect…and for an instant, you know that it’s going over the fence and out of the park…and further than you could ever imagine.” - Steve Guttenberg, It Takes Two
The future in-laws were in town for the weekend at the end of March, and there was talk about showing them our venue after I got off work that Sunday.
I was all for this plan, as the only time we have been to our venue was the previous June (2010), when we initially toured it and met with the DOC. I figured this would be the perfect chance to reassure myself that I indeed love the place (hey, booking two years out leaves a lot of time for reconsidering!) and to poke around town a bit to find good picture-taking locales!
First off, I don’t have a personal picture of this (bad blogger), but remember how there are three houses that are a part of the Vandiver?
Images via Vandiver Inn
Well, the Vandiver Mansion was/is greener than it looks in the photo there, but the other houses were definitely white when we first visited last year. Totally fine, whatever, no biggie…I guess they didn’t really look like they were all a part of the same “complex,” but I wasn’t worried.
When I began my seemingly endless search for venues, there was one phrase that made my nose turn up and brought a bitter taste to my mouth. What was the dreaded phrase, you ask?
Personal image
I was with filled a desire to hand-make table decor and dig through flea-market booths. I was looking forward to contacting every vendor who would talk to me and finding people that would make our wedding truly unique, truly ours. At the beginning, I thought the phrase “all-inclusive” was going to eliminate all of this.
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