30 Day Challenge, Day 26: Here Comes the Bride

Tim & I in 1984

So, you want to know about my dream wedding?  No?  Well, sorry....that's today's challenge.  I'm a little stumped here.  I kind of quit dreaming about weddings after I got married 26 years ago.  I should let Megan guest write this one (but she doesn't write...willingly) because she took a class on wedding planning her senior year and she has a notebook 4-inches thick filled with pictures and ideas on every single aspect of the redneck wedding to end all redneck weddings.  She even found an engagement ring that looks like a tiny beer bottle cap surrounded by diamonds!

I guess what I could do is tell you about my wedding (because at the time it was obviously my dream wedding) and also tell you what I might do differently now.

Our  November ceremony was very traditional, in a church, with the full-blown ceremony, eight attendants and a ring bearer.  It was the 80's, the bridesmaids wore pink and the groomsmen wore grey tailcoats. 

If I was doing it today, I would either have the wedding outside in October when the leaves were changed but still on the trees or in December with the church decorated with Poinsettias, white twinkle lights and candlelight.  An October wedding would have the attendants in fall colors, a Christmas wedding would have the girls in red, the guys in black.

The reception was at the American Legion and was set up and decorated in traditional banquet style....long tables, dance floor, buffet.  Ugly pink tissue paper decorations hanging from the ceiling.  The bar was an open one and the food was traditional for this area....chicken, rigatoni, halupki, etc.  We had a live band called the Stantonaires. 

I would skip the banquet hall for an October wedding and find a beautiful old barn for the reception.  For a Christmas wedding I would rent the hall we had my Christmas party for work at this year.  It is in the mountains and two walls of the banquet room are floor to ceiling glass looking out over the scenery.  Extra pretty if it snows!  Inside it is timbers and stone, very pretty decorated for Christmas.  There would be NO tissue paper decorations in either location.  The bar would remain open.  I would totally change the menu.  I believe I'd offer 3 choices that you'd have to choose when you RSVPed and then dinner could be served.  I loathe buffet lines.  The leader of the Stantonaires died and they disbanded so they are not an option, but I would do my best to find a comparable band.  I liked them so much more than today's DJ's and we had a lot of compliments on them.  They were about 10 members, had lots of brass (which thrilled my great-aunt from Philly), played any kind of music from Big Band to polkas, to Country and Top 40.  They also coordinated all the activities like our first dance, the bridal dance, tossing of the bouquet and garter, etc.

My mom rushed us out of the reception.  She and Dad couldn't afford any more to keep the band longer, though around here it is common practice at receptions like ours was to take up a collection from the guests to keep the party going.  I don't know what time she had Tim and I out of there, but I heard all the guests were shooed out by 8:30.

I would plan to have enough money to keep the party going and I would stay till it was over.  There were so many people we never got to visit with.  I hated that and I've really regretted it over the years because I lost my grandfather very shortly after the wedding and the dynamics of my family changed drastically.

Does that give you an idea of my dream wedding?


Day 27: Original Photo of the city you live in
Day 28: Something that stresses you out
Day 29: 3 Wishes
Day 30: a picture of yourself this day and 5 good things that happened since you started the challenge