Thursday, April 14, 2011

A Cozy Christmas Wedding: A Few Ceremony Details

I absolutely love reading about other people's wedding details so I'm going to try to be as thorough as possible about mine, starting with a few details related to our ceremony.

Our Programs


Personal Photo

I absolutely loved our Western Union Telegram programs. I was originally inspired by this post on Ruffled, and I'm so glad I followed through on this one. I loved the way they looked and I think they really suited the vintage feel of our wedding.

I also had a lot of fun writing the text of the programs. Our wedding was a pretty casual affair and I wanted the text to reflect that. The paragraphs at the bottom of the programs explain the "wackier" elements of our wedding including Mr. Knitting wedding watch (entitled "What's with the Watch?"), his tie (entitled "What's Going on with Mr. Knitting's Tie?"), and our flower girls (entitled "Why are the Flower Girls Old?"). See I told you I used casual language! If you want to read the program just click on the picture to enlarge.

If you want to make your own telegram programs the template I used can be found here.

Reserved Seating Signs





I really loved these signs and they were very easy to make. I downloaded the frame from The Graphics Fairy and used my favourite Jane Austen font. The signs were then tied to the chairs using bakers twine. We made them for our parents and grandparents and I'd like to think they appreciated the VIP touch, but it may have only been me!

Mr. Knitting's Ties

Mr. Knitting wore 2 (actually 3!) different ties on our wedding day. This is because he is a clotheshorse. Just kidding, he's not, but he did wear 3 ties. The first one was a gift from my MOH:





I know you're all blown away by the fanciness of it, but it actually gets better. The tie plays music. I don't know why he didn't ditch the other ties and wear this one all day. I could have walked down the aisle to his tie music. Opportunity missed!

For our outdoor photos Mr. Knitting wore this tie:



This is one of my (deceased) grandfather's ties and my favourite that Mr. Knitting wore that day. This is the Anderson clan's tartan which is my grandfather's mother's clan.

For the rest of the evening Mr. Knitting wore this one:



This tie features the Anderson clan crest (an oak tree) and motto ("Stand Sure"), which is pretty fitting for a wedding accessory! I love the picture above because my grandmother has been out with my grandfather many times while he was wearing this tie and it's sweet to see her next to Mr. Knitting while he is wearing it.

My Bouquet

I was pretty indecisive about what to do about my bouquet, but in the end a very simple solution found me. While shopping at Pier 1 Imports I found this bouquet for $12:



I was really happy with this find. I thought it was pretty, it was very inexpensive, I loved the colours, and I didn't think it looked completely obvious that it was fake. Done.

My Something Borrowed

My lovely former boss Jennifer provided my something borrowed in the form of this beautiful brooch, which I (meaning my friend Emily!) attached to my bouquet with floral wire.



After the wedding, Jennifer let me keep the brooch so I'm not sure if it really counts as a something borrowed. It's more like a something owned...

Vintage Hankies

I love the trend of incorporating vintage hankies into weddings, so I made sure to include them in mine. I found a great selection in the fabulous vintage stores of Kensington Market and chose a few for myself and my ladies.

Here's a close up of the one I carried with my bouquet:


Personal Photo

My BMs and MOH were supposed to use the others to carry their lanterns, but looking at photos now it appears that they didn't. Fail:


Personal Photo

Oh well, the lanterns are still pretty:



Lace Wrapped Votives

Like many of you I was completely in love with Wedding Bee Hostess Bakerella's wedding recaps, particularly her details post. Seriously, if you haven't read it yet, do it now! I particularly loved the lace wrapped votives she used and ended up buying half of hers to be used in my wedding.

Here's a shot of the candles in action at her wedding:



Photo by Justin Demers of StillMotion Photo and Cinema

And here they are at ours:



We basically lined every surface possible with these candles. The lights were actually a lot dimmer than they appear in this photo so the candles really stood out and looked really nice (in my opinion!).

Ring/Watch Dish

I had a bit of trouble deciding which ring dish to use, but ultimately went with this one:


Personal Photo

It just had more of a cozy, Christmas-y feel and a better size for our wedding jewels.

So those are a few of our ceremony details. People will tell you that details don't matter, but that's not really my experience. Yes, in the larger sense I can recognize that the most important thing is that Mr. Knitting and I got married surrounded by all our favourite people, and maybe in 50 years the details won't be all that important to me, but I really drew a lot of pleasure in collecting these details, seeing them in action, and enjoying them now in pictures and as home decor (that's a different post). As a guest, and as a blog reader, I also really enjoy seeing other people's details. It's fun to see how people have used their creativity to personalize their event. Details are not essential to getting married, but if they're something you care about, then go all out (and then share them on WB so we can all drool over them!).

Unless otherwise noted. all photos by the amazing Josh Levinson

Missed a Knitting Recap?:
First we yoga-ed
I spent the morning being anti-social
Mama Knitting figured out how to dress herself and I turned into a bride
We had our first look and snuggled in the snow
We played in the snow with our friends and then spent an hour doing some unexpected set up
Our guests arrived

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