The Tale of Our Wedding Reception

Another year has rolled around, so it's time for another "wedding memory" story. (Here are the past ones: The Poisonous Berries, The Wishing Well, The Temple, Wedding Gifts.)

Our reception was a fairly typical, do-it-yourself one, held in the cultural hall of our church building. I don't remember too many of the details now, but I know my mom worked hard and a lot of friends helped. One friend made the cake, another made hundreds of mints, others helped with the decorating. 

One of the "big" decisions a bride faces is choosing the colors for her wedding. Because my favorite color is blue, and because I wanted to honor my patriotic birthday, I chose red, white and blue. I still remember how aghast Wayne was when I told him, and I remember feeling so hurt that he didn't trust me to make everything look classy and nice. Fortunately, we got over that, especially once he realized I had never planned on having the royal blue of American flag, but a baby blue.

With the baby blue, we used a bit of red in the centerpieces. (I'm not sure how we came up with the idea, but I do remember making these fabric baskets, and then giving them away to those who helped us with everything. I used mine as a sewing basket for years and years and years, until it finally fell apart. I keep telling myself that one of these days I'm going to recreate the pattern and make another one, just for memory's sake.)

We used more red in the flower arrangements.

Oh, and I guess there was some red in the favors that our little sisters passed out. Isn't it nice that Holly's wheelchair color-coordinated with everything?

We bought yards and yards of sheer blue fabric to use in decorating the room and making a backdrop for pictures and the receiving line. It was later re-purposed into a few things, including the bed skirt for the crib so I wouldn't have to look at the storage boxes under it.

We didn't serve dinner or even finger foods as I recall, just cake and punch, along with nuts and mints. So, I imagine the cake cutting ceremony took place fairly early in the evening.

Tossing the bouquet took place near the end.

We even opened our gifts that night. Totally would not recommend that to anyone in the future!

And then the reception was over and it was time to leave!