Crystal & Gregory’s red and malibu blue super wedding

It's a bird, it's a plane… it's Offbeat Bride's comic book-clad and caped superhero theme week! Get in the telephone booth and change into your wedding-gawking superhero tights — you're in for crime-fighting fun.

The Offbeat Bride: Crystal, Teacher Assistant

Her offbeat partner: Gregory, System Analyst

Date and location of wedding: Northeast Park Event Center in Gibsonville, NC — May 17, 2014

Our offbeat wedding at a glance: We decided that we wanted a fun, memorable wedding without destroying our bank accounts. We set a strict $5000 budget and stuck to it. We wanted to keep some traditional wedding ideas, but without being too stuffy and formal. Our wedding theme became comics and superheroes. It's something we both love, and we had a lot of fun finding comics for our centerpieces. I think we ended up getting all but two wedding-themed comic books that have been created.

We also opted out of the traditional wedding bridal march, ceremony exit, and reception entrance. We left the ceremony by dancing out to “Turn Down For What” by Lil Jon.

We refused to spend $800+ for a photo booth, so we made a superhero-themed prop table. Gregory's family is Trinidadian and my family is from North Carolina, so our music was definitely diverse. Many of the bride's friends and family have since asked us to send them soca music. We are both goofy and don't take ourselves very seriously, so our wedding was definitely a reflection of that.

Tell us about the ceremony:
Since both of us come from Christian backgrounds, our ceremony was religious. We also had a moment of silence for our loved ones who had passed away or couldn't be with us that day.

We each had memory chairs with our grandmother's pictures.

The wedding party, including the parents, walked down the aisle to “A Thousand Years” by Christina Perri. Instead of throwing rice or bird seed when we left the reception, our guests blew bubbles.

For our reception entrance, my mother is a huge John Cena fan, so we came into his intro music with a foam Cena finger and a WWE championship belt. It was actually perfect because the song says something about “my time is now.”

Our minister was very interactive and kept the guests involved.

Our biggest challenge:
There are many challenges when you are a DIY bride. Because of our theme, it was hard to find superhero stuff that wasn't geared towards children. We wanted a tasteful, adult version. I ended up making a lot of stuff, but the most difficult was the card box. I used a black and white Daredevil comic and Mod Podge. Also, to keep our wedding from looking like the American flag, we opted for a malibu blue, instead of navy, to keep a Captain America color scheme.

We had people in our wedding party from other states, and countries, so keeping communication open was so important. With any wedding, you have a wide array of personalities and opinions. In the end, it was about making sure we were happy.

My favorite moment:
The most meaningful moments of our wedding are the traditional details we kept: the first dance, father/daughter dance, and mother/son dance. I am very nostalgic and still pretty obsessed with '90s boy bands. Our first dance was “This I Promise You” by ‘N Sync. We got bored half way through it, so we did an impromptu dramatic boy band performance.

Due to budget restrictions, we weren't able to hire a videographer and I was very upset about not capturing this day on video. One of the groom's friends showed up and was able to capture our entire reception with professional equipment. This was his gift to us and it is honestly priceless. Our wedding movie trailer was amazing!

My funniest moment:
The funniest moment, and highlight of our wedding day, was my mother. She is 65 years old and had open heart surgery back in October 2013. You would have never known it on our wedding day. She got up and danced like a teenager! Also, the prop table was great. There were people climbing with a Spider-Man mask on, talking in the Christian Bale Batman voice, and having epic superhero battles. The children, of course, loved running around with masks on. It was hilarious for us to see all the tagged Facebook posts.

What was the most important lesson you learned from your wedding?
The most important lesson we learned was it truly is worth it. We both questioned having a wedding at all at times. Nothing was going right during planning. All of the time, effort, and energy came together and made our day memorable. During the process, I was so jealous of people who could hire planners, but afterwards, I felt so accomplished that we pulled off the wedding WE wanted. It was our vision and our work that made it happen.

Care to share a few vendor/shopping links?

• Bride's Dress: Bridal Mart
• Bride's Shoes: Michael Kors
• Bridesmaid's Dresses: David's Bridal
• Groom and Groomsmen attire: Men's Warehouse
• Cake Topper and Wonderwoman headpiece: Amazon
• Photography: This Little Light Photography
• Event Specialist: Kimberly Watts
• Other photography and videography: Neiman Murrell
• Officiant: RevOnCall
• Catering: Above and Beyond
• Emcee/DJ: Pearce The DJ

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