Naomi & Casey's punk rock Iowa wedding • Offbeat Wed (was Offbeat Bride)

The offbeat bride: Naomi

Her offbeat partner: Casey

Location & date of wedding: First Assembly Church Chapel in Cedar Rapids, IA. November 1, 2008

What made our wedding offbeat: For starters, I wore a black dress. It was actually a bridesmaid's dress, which made it tons cheaper.

Then, we did almost everything ourselves. I made our invitations on postcards. No real flowers — my bouquet was handmade from little christmas bulbs and tulle. Oh, and little white lights. Yes, it lit up!

Every tradition in weddings we pretty much went against. No unity candle, I stood on the ‘wrong' side, my mom and dad walked me down, Casey had his parents walk him down.

There was no white was at our wedding — it was all black and bright blue.

My ring is a black onyx, and we had very few traditional pictures taken. They were all unique and fun and captured who we are. The wedding party walked down to Ratatat songs, and I walked down to the acoustic version of “Hey Ya” by Outkast. No wedding programs — we made a slideshow to introduce everyone.

I made all the confetti. I made tons of 3-D paper stars instead. I made my birdcage veil instead of a traditional veil. We had cupcakes and soda and blue popcorn instead of a full meal, since the wedding was at 7pm. We had Dance Dance Revolution at our reception, and a little photobooth as well. We also hooked up another video game station to play Smash Brothers or whatever they wanted to play. No formal dances. Nothing sappy about it. Just a fun time.

Our biggest challenge: The biggest problem for us was getting everything planned in such a a short amount of time without taking off any work. We had everything down, including pre-marriage counseling in three months. My family and Casey's family were pretty much expecting a crazy non-traditional wedding, so we didn't have too many people look down on us for the choices we made.

My favorite moment: My favorite moment of the whole event had to be all the comments and smiles people gave us after the ceremony. They all said it was a very refreshing wedding and very unique. Like nothing they've ever been to. I also loved knowing that everything was paid for and we had money left over in our pockets, and realizing just how punk rock and classy you can make a wedding with such little cash.

A few of my vendors: I got my dress and the girls' dresses at Brides and Weddings at Manchester, IA. They were great and made me feel so important and embraced my offbeat style. David's Bridal looked at me funny and embarrassed me.

I got our invitations printed at Nextdayflyers.com. they are SUPER cheap and great to work with. They called me on the phone and knew me by name.

Casey got his shoes custom made on the Converse website. I got my converse made there too. I wore them at the reception.

My offbeat advice: Go out and buy or rent books on how to make things yourself. Like your bouquet or centerpieces or your veil. Stay away from wedding shops, wedding floral shops, even the wedding aisles at stores. Anything with ‘wedding' in the title jacks up the price ten times! You can find most everything you need in the craft aisles, in department stores, online, anywhere.

Be creative where you shop. I found my rhinestone pin that was in my birdcage veil at Goodwill.

DON'T USE CREDIT CARDS. Try making your own invites. Getting them printed online is a LOT cheaper than going to a printing place in your town or having a company design them.

Enough talk — show me the wedding porn: Click the cuties below to see the 200 amazing photos for Naomi & Casey's wedding: