Top 10 Unforgettable Moments from Our Wedding

It wasn't our intent to create the most unique wedding experience for our guests. But I don't think anyone has ever attended a wedding quite like ours. 

Usually, all I need to mention is the words "piñata," "floor M&Ms," and "cake-cutting sword" to pique someone's interest. Followed by, "Jeff's biggest regret is we didn't get to do any of the close-up magic tricks." That's before I even mention someone broke their hip on the dance floor.

In my bride(zilla) era

About two weeks before the wedding, I was in full stress mode, ready to write a blog post about embracing the term "Bridezilla." I was facing the societal expectations—and most importantly, contradictions—every bride likely faces, and I was sick of it. Contradictions like, "It's your day, do whatever you want!" and "You have to think about the guests, they came all this way. You owe them." Instead of having fun planning our day, I was being bombarded with a myriad of "what if?" situations that stoked fears of judgmental relatives, too-salty food, and rain and mosquitoes ruining our al fresco rehearsal dinner. 

I usually pride myself on my chill, laid-back demeanor. But at this point in my life, I looked at the term "Bridezilla" and thought, I'm prepared to own it. 

Because of all the monsters we brides could be compared to, Godzilla is a badass. For your convenience, I compiled a shortlist of admirable qualities:

• No one can stop Godzilla. 
• Godzilla isn't necessarily a villain or hero. Godzilla just does what Godzilla wants to do. 
• Godzilla isn't afraid to make a mess (i.e. they're not beholden to perfectionism and people-pleasing ideology). 
• Godzilla certainly is not worried about what people are "thinking." 

Granted, Godzilla is kinda a dick. But they often end up saving the day by defeating a greater evil, and when that happens, everyone's rooting for them to succeed. And at the end of the movie, Godzilla gets the gift of slipping away, retreating into the sunset to return to their solitary existence under the sea or at some island beach getaway.

So yes, in the stress of completing last-minute wedding decisions and feeling like I had to manage so many people's expectations, I was ready to lean into the tougher, bitchy side of myself. The side of me that says, "I'm gonna party and have a good time with the people I love, and you can either join in or get lost." That's where I was at.

Jeff saw my stress and took a different approach. In addition to simply wanting to add elements of fun and surprise into our shared wedding day, he brought the perspective of, "Oh, I'll give our guests something to talk about, and it won't be the food..."

The Farm

To start, a lot of the fun, unique features of our day were simply due to the nature of our wedding venue: the amazing Farm at Twin Ponds. 

• We told them we wanted to get married by the river, where no one had been married before, and they mowed down the brush and made it happen. 
• We needed a way to get guests down there from the parking lot, and they said, "How about hay rides?" 
• We teamed up with Evan and Courtney to use their 2 tiny house Airbnb spaces for the grooms and bridal parties to get ready, and it was straight-up fabulous. 10/10 would recommend. 
• God pitched in like the team player he is with an amazing September fall day. It was all coming together perfectly.

But we weren't going for perfect. At least Jeff wasn't. He was going for memorable.

Originally, he wanted to get carried down the aisle in a coffin by his groomsmen. I vetoed that. 

I mean, I believe in "till death do us part," but when it came to envisioning our special day, spooky and macabre wasn't on my vision board. For the pranks that did get planned—some with and some without my knowledge—Jeff's common refrain to friends who asked "did Lauren approve this?" was "It's my wedding too!"

At the end of the day, all of the wedding day's activities brought a fun, unforgettable twist to the experience, with several of our friends telling us it's the best wedding they've been to. I agree with them, but I'm biased.

Here are the top 10 unforgettable moments from our wedding:

1. Rick rolling the bride

I picked out all the processional music for the ceremony, but Jeff worked with the DJ to add some Rick Astley at the end of my entrance walk. This slightly got foiled when I decided the morning of to shorten my walk considerably, which turned into us grooving at the front of the altar and me wondering why the music hadn't faded away yet. I totally missed that it was "Never Gonna Give You Up."

2. The "one" ring

The fellowship of the rings

Jeff greeted guests as they arrived, and before they boarded the wagon ride, surreptitiously began asking if they would hold the rings and bring them forward when the officiant asked. He passed off costume jewelry to nearly a dozen people, and a lot of them took the role very seriously, with only a few catching on that their rings might not be the rings. When the moment in the ceremony arrived, everyone came forward one by one to place the rings in Jeff's hands, his palms overflowing until he dropped them all in the grass and took the real ones out of his pocket. I had no idea about this prank, and it was probably my favorite.

*Note: reading Wendell Berry's "Mad Farmer Liberation Front" poem and incorporating tea drinking into the vows were also huge highlights for me.

3. The infinite groom's party

Jeff is not one to have a defined groom's party or even a best man. There are just too many people Jeff loves and respects. (This was also reflected in the number of people Jeff added to the invite list.) In that vein of thought, Jeff asked as many male wedding guests as he could to wear a specific outfit—white shirt, navy pants, brown shoes, suspenders—which meant that many of the wedding attendees matched the groom's party. So who was actually in the party? If it were up to Jeff, everyone.

4. "So you're saying there's a chance?"

Jeff was inspired by the Dumb and Dumber movie to pull off a post-ceremony/pre-reception costume change. Some owls also made an appearance; none were harmed in the making of this wedding.

 

5. A piñata, pool noodles, and floor M&Ms enter the dance floor...

The original plan was to fake a "garter toss," instead pulling out a cake-shaped piñata from under the chair, and then letting the kids at it with pool noodles. A couple issues arose the day of, however: a.) it was a Wal-Mart grade piñata, b.) it sat on damp grass for most of the day, c.) Jeff decided the candy would actually be loose M&Ms, which caused the piñata to be incredibly heavy. It broke open on Jeff's face as soon as he lifted it up off the ground to reveal it to the crowd. After using the noodles to sweep the M&Ms off the dance floor and into the grass, the kids were super pumped the rest of the night to hunt down "floor M&Ms." My nephew listed it as one of his highlights of the evening.

6. One-of-a-kind drinks

Jeff was in charge of drinks and desserts, of which we had a copious amount. He decided to shop local, sourcing ciders and unique-styled beers from the surrounding Carlisle, PA area. But he bought these in individual varieties of 4-6 packs, resulting in 2 very confused bartenders. The drinks ended up being truly one-of-a-kind.

7. Close-up magic (almost)

Fortunately, Jeff's only wedding regret was that they weren't able to pull off bad close-up magic during the dinner hour. Several friends had volunteered to do cringy tricks (illusions) like "Is this your card? Is this your card? How about this one?" as dinner-time entertainment. (This was inspired by a show we saw in Vegas, and both got called up on stage to participate in). Turns out, our guests didn't stay seated for long enough. Should've done it while folks were waiting for the hay ride, Jeff remarked after.

8. The cake that nearly gave my wedding planner a panic attack

Jeff thought, what if we had a sheet cake with a picture of Lauren and her brother, Andrew, on it? Wouldn't that be funny? This so nearly also got my veto, except that every time Jeff told a close friend about it, they died laughing. 

I want to apologize to my wedding planner for the panic she felt when she saw the cake had 3 pictures of me and a person who was not my husband. Also, I want to extend gratitude to my unsuspecting brother for being an unwitting participant in one of our wedding pranks, and for being the best brother I could've ask for. I'm glad Luke liked eating some of the "daddy cake."

9. The sword of destiny & Jedi robes

Why cut your wedding cake with a knife when you could use a sword? Especially one gifted by a cousin who couldn't be there. 

Gonna be honest, I think the Jedi robes had to do with the fact that Jeff wanted our cake-cutting music to be the Duel of the Fates? It was an homage to our Star Wars fandom, if nothing else.

10. "Somebody call 9-1-1...shawty fire burning on the dance floor"

Our DJ was fantastic. I talked to way too few of our guests and for far too briefly because I couldn't stay off the dance floor. Unfortunately, that same dance floor did cause one of my favorite relatives to trip and break their hip. They are mended and back up and walking now, thank goodness. But it does prevent me from calling this wedding anything close to "perfect."

It was, for sure, memorable. And as long as most of the memories are good, that's all you could ever ask for in a wedding.