A Cozy Christmas Wedding: Toasts (or Gangsta Rap Makes a Cameo)

In an effort to keep our toasts brief, we asked just our sisters to speak and we spread their toasts out a bit. As mentioned in an earlier recap, my little sister went first before dinner. After dinner we did the rest of the toasts.

Mr. Knitting's sister went first and gave a brief and sweet toast:





Then my older sister gave the most epic toast of all time:



Okay, that might be a bit of an exaggeration, but not really (at least in my opinion!). My sister is a really awesome writer. For her own wedding ceremony she wrote a poem about her and her husband and it was pretty much the greatest wedding reading ever because it was funny and it told the guests a lot about them. Anyway, for her toast to us she wrote us a similar poem and I thought it was one of the best moments of the night!

In fact I've copied it out here below for you all to read:

A Scientist and a Ballerina - Big Sis Knitting's Wedding Poem

A scientist and a ballerina
Met in the high school hall.
She was the beautiful new transfer student
And he was very tall.

They slowly got acquainted,
He turned on his charm
And before anyone knew it,
He had her on his arm.

They spent their time together,
Rollerblading in the park.
They often gorged on freezies
And read Harry Potter until it was dark.

On hot summer days
He would head over for a nap
And would usually awaken
To the sound of Mama Knitting's gangsta rap.

Their high school days were ending
So both as brainy as can be,
They packed up their bags
And headed off to U of T.

She joined a dance group
And studied the history of art.
He pursued his love of science,
But she was still number one in his heart.

They took many trips together
And once visited New York.
This was around the time
Kristin was still eating pork.

Soon they got their own apartment,
Their very own nest,
So they could always come home to each other
When it was time to rest.

So after many years together
As partners and best friends,
They threw a great big party
And declared their love would never end!

This is how Mr. Knitting and I looked for pretty much the whole time she was reading it.



Oh, and she's not kidding about the part with Mama Knitting's gansta rap. My middle aged Ukrainian/Canadian mother loves rapping. If you haven't already picked up on it from my other posts, she's a bit of a character!

This poem was definitely one of the best wedding gifts we received. It was so thoughtful and funny. The fact that she took the time to sit down and write so much about the two of us in such an entertaining and enjoyable way meant so much to Mr. Knitting and myself.

Afterwards we spoke briefly thanking everyone for being there and letting them know how much their support and love meant to us!


Guest Photo



And with that, dinner was finished!

Unless otherwise noted, all photos by the amazing Josh Levinson.

I Thought I'd Be Older...

Growing up, on the rare occasion when I thought about getting married, I thought I'd be at least in my late 20s. This is pretty common in Toronto amongst most of the people I know. Getting married any younger seemed really weird and like a surefire recipe for divorce. The prevailing wisdom both then and now is that people change so much in their twenties that they're not possibly capable of choosing a partner before their late 20s.

Thus, it was a bit weird for me to realize at 23 that I was ready to get married. While I realize that in many other parts of the world this is a completely normal age to get married, it just wasn't for me and I referred to myself as a child bride quite a bit because I sometimes felt a bit awkward about the fact that I was engaged at such a relatively young age.

Adding to this, Mr. Knitting and myself are by far the first of our friends to get married and we suspect there will be a few years before any more of our friends of the same age get married. This isn't an issue at all because many of our friends are in equally committed relationships, and those who aren't, aren't weird about the fact we're married (if they were we probably wouldn't actually be friends!).

However, I occasionally feel uncomfortable letting people know I'm married because they are usually pretty shocked and don't feel the need to hide it (because they don't have manners!). To be fair, a lot of those people seem to think I'm 20 which in Toronto is a legitimately young age to get married, but still. It's pretty rude no matter how old I am.

However, I've decided it's time for me to get over that. I'm really happy to be married and while getting married at 24 is not for everyone, it was a great choice for Mr. Knitting and myself.

Still, every so often when I stop to think about it, I do find it interesting that I'm 25 and ridiculously happily married. How and when did that happen?

How old did you think you'd be when you'd get married? Did the reality match up with your expectations?

A Cozy Christmas Wedding: A Turkey Feast

Now it was time to eat!

Our dinner began with some borscht and mushroom dumplings:



We picked borscht because we thought soup was a great way to start a dinner in December, we both love borscht, and it was a nod to Mr. Knitting's Polish roots.

Then most of our guests were served a traditional turkey dinner chosen for it's connection with Christmas:



Lots of our guests said nice things about the turkey dinner, but in my (admittedly biased!) opinion, I think the gluten-free vegan option was actually a lot better. I think this might be a first...

Ratatouille:



Those crackers on top were both delicious and fun!:



I had lots of fun pretending to have horns (too many amaretto sours?).

The view of the King's Table that Mr. Knitting and I had:


Guest Photo

This photo actually gives you a better idea of what the lighting was like in the dining room. It was definitely pretty dark and cozy.

While many couples choose to use dinner time to visit tables, we made a point to limit that as much as possible. We figured if we started moving around a lot, our guests would follow suit, thus making it difficult for the servers to do their job. The staff had also told us beforehand that we're the ones that set the pace for the dinner, so if we took a lot of time to eat our food, then dinner would be going on forever. Our wedding was also small enough so that even without table visiting we were definitely able to spend time with most of our guests.

That being said, despite our best intentions we definitely did a bit of table visiting:


Guest Photo

Doing one of our favourite poses:


Guest Photo

I'm not totally sure how this became a thing, but we do it a lot:


Personal Photo


Personal Photo

The meal ended with some ice cream for our guests to enjoy during the toasts before we set them loose on our dessert table. Once again, the vegan option seemed a lot more appealing.

Vanilla ice cream in a chocolate cup:



vs.

Raspberry sorbet:



Okay to be fair, the photo of the sorbet was worked on by our photographer and the vanilla one wasn't, but still. Raspberry sorbet is way more exciting!

Don't worry though, these weren't our real desserts! These were more of a pre-dessert to enjoy during the toasts before the real dessert from the dessert table (which had awesome vegan and non-vegan options!).

I really enjoyed the dinner. The food was really good and by this time all of the stressful parts of the wedding were over. I had a really nice time just sitting there chatting with those around me and just letting it soak in that I was married and that I was actually at my reception dinner.



However, the best part of dinner was definitely the toasts that came right at the end. Stay tuned for the awesomeness!

Unless otherwise noted, all photos by the amazing Josh Levinson.

A Cozy Christmas Wedding: Dinner Time!

After the cocktail hour ended our guests made their way into the dining room and found their tables. After a brief introduction by my little sis, Mr. Knitting and I joined everyone and it was time to eat!

Our MC:



Our grand entrance:



We chose to walk in by ourselves without our parents or wedding party because that felt a bit too formal to us. We almost chose to skip any kind of grand entrance ourselves, but then decided that was going to far in the other direction!

I was really happy with the way we seated everyone. Most people were sitting at tables of six, which made having conversations a lot easier. I really liked how this added to the intimate feeling of our wedding.

My gorgeous dance friends:



In contrast, Mr. Knitting, myself, our wedding party and their partners sat at a King's Table. For a review of what this is have a look at this post.

Here's a look of it in action:



I absolutely loved the King's Table. We sat at the end and then everyone else sat on each side of the table. This was a great option for us because it solved my problem of not wanting to split up our wedding party from their partners, but also not really wanting to sit at a sweetheart table or with our families. It also felt really fun and festive and enabled me to have lots of hilarious conversations with my older sis. I highly recommend this option!

As we waited for our yummy food to be served our guests could enjoy some of the details on their tables.

There was the jam my dad made:





Our centrepieces:





Our very Christmas-y menus:



Our equally Christmas-y table numbers:






Personal Photo


Personal Photo


Personal Photo

Each table number featured a different vintage Santa image that I found. It was occasionally really funny looking for these because while most of the images were awesome, some of them were really creepy.

For example:



Needless to say, none of those ones made it into our table numbers!

However, details could only occupy our guests for so long (30 seconds?) and soon it was time to eat!

Unless otherwise noted, all photos by the amazing Josh Levinson.