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The Offbeat Bride: Stori, Elementary School Counselor
My Offbeat Partner: Tausha, Peet's Coffee & Tea Assistant Manager
Location & date of wedding: Boundary Bay Brewery Beer Garden, Bellingham, WA — 10.11.2008
What made our wedding offbeat: We wanted an event that was inviting to everyone we loved (who didn't really know each other), and we really didn't want to waste money on things like table cloths, vases, candle holders, place holders, etc. So, with a two month time frame, we found everything we needed at garage and estate sales all over Portland. Even our officiant was gratefully recycled from good friends wedding, as well as our shoes, center pieces, decorations, some art auction pieces, hair piece, vow ideas, one bride's outfit, etc.
We definitely pulled it off, with a budget of my small credit card limit and some talented and gifted friends who helped bring everything together. We tried to reduce and recycle as much as possible. We used our flowers and ruined/distressed table cloths for our thank you notes, we used close friends for photos, food, desserts, and music.
I committed wedding dress blasphemy by cutting my Nicole Miller Dress down to tea length, adding a little tail feather piece and using the left over fabric to have an awesome seamstress, Lindsay Pantano of Magnolia Designs in Portland, create my Bride's vest.
Our biggest challenge: Money, distance and sick mama of a bride. We wanted to get married 300 miles from where we live, since it was where we met. This ended up causing us a lot of problems (lost flowers sent to Portland, when we were 300 miles away, in Bellingham.
Thank goodness for Necole the Great, and the local Farmer's market), but it well worth it.
Tausha's mama was admitted to the hospital on the eve of the wedding, which was hard and disappointing. But since we didn't get a honeymoon, it was at least nice to get away from home for such an amazing event and then come home to a fairly clean house.
My favorite moment: We were going non stop 'til we got dressed. Once we were taking pictures with our amazing friend/photographer we calmed down a bit, but we were both on the verge of nervous, pre-game, vow vomiting. So the best moment was getting shots of booze (buttery nipples, of course) with our photo man, Joel Gaffney, while we waited for our playlist to summon us to walk down the isle.
My other favorite moment was our vows. Both were so personal and intimate. Considering I am always the ultimate pessimist, it was the most amazing, positive experience of my whole little life, thanks to our supportive chosen family.
My advice for other offbeat brides: Go with the gut, people. What can you afford? What makes the event completely you? Even silly things, like making sure the cheesiest songs ever are included in your music, or making sure you have little gifts for the people who go above and beyond. Making sure you get to dance to your music, or making sure you get a rad Bloody Mary before the big ol' deal.
We lost a whole playlist because of time, so we made sure to find each other on the dance floor and get a little dirty dancing on with our peeps. It makes all the difference to feel all those little things. We can't stop re-living it all.
Enough talk — show me the wedding porn (including some of the cutest “couple photos” I've ever seen):
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love, love, love this wedding. earthy and minimalist and just lovely. and the bride is wearing something very similar to what my husband wore at our wedding – brown pants, white shirt, cream vest. what a great color combination!
I love the photo! Very sweet and romantic! Thanks for sharing.
LOVE the pictures!! and I have to say you guys look so damn cute together! My favorite part is the quilt idea. I’m a scrapbook/memories fiend and love ideas that make the keepsakes super personal. Any chance of seeing a completed quilt picture?
[…] sent around some hair flower picture things last week, but this one I saw today on Offbeat Bride is probably closer to what I’m thinking – it’s smaller and less flowery and more bridey […]
yay! a bellingham wedding! totally made my day! we also thought about doing ours at boundary bay, but decided on zuanich point park instead. needless to say, i love your wedding!
I love both your names! I am sorry to hear about Tausha’s mom, I hope she will be better soon. Congratulations on a beautiful and fun-filled day (gotta get me a bloody mary beforehand – thanks for the tip!)
omg i love your big gay wedding. i am planning my big gay wedding in june and was struggling with making it silly and like me and my honey but also making sure people see it as every bit as important as a straight wedding. your wedding totally gave me hope.
Thanks for the comments! We haven’t figured out the sewing maching yet (our one wedding gift from my grandma) so no quilt to show so far. My head piece was easy to make, used pieces of my dress remnants and a jeweled bobby pin, happy to make one for someone if they are interested! Tausha’s mom is great, home and recovering. As for Jill’s response…I was super concerned about people’s responses to our casualness, but, seriously…almost everyone came up and said “I’ve never cried at a wedding, that was so amazing” or “I’ve never felt so much a part of the wedding,” these are the moments you will remember and recall in times of relational friction…others believed in you and wish you well! Make it your day, and those who truly love you will wilt with glee. Anything I can do to help, please let me know!!!
peace out,
Stori
Blasphemy or not, your dress looks amazing!! & I agree: the super smily & lawn chair pictures really are “wilt with glee” worthy. Yay!
I adore the photo of you two in the adirondack chairs. Awesome! Wilt with glee? Oh, yes.
I am totally drawn to this wedding. Yeah, super-spendy weddings look sleek and so on, but I adore “home-made” style weddings. Maybe it’s because of all the obvious…well…LOVE that goes into them.
Beautiful wdding, beautiful couple!
I am also in Bellingham! Happy wedding!
this is so romantic! i love the idea of incorporating the wedding dress into the other bride’s vest!
thanks for posting!! this is a beautiful wedding with awesome diy and community involvement. i love it! and i LOVE OBB for posting more same sex weddings!!
thanks!
congrats to the happy couple!!
I LOVED all the pictures! What a cute couple!
that dress is to die for. Lovely.
I love it! Could you give some details on how you did the thank-you’s? We’re trying to recycle (on a dime) as well, and that sounds like a fantastic idea.