My Handmade Wedding Part 2

So when I left off yesterday Mike and I had just gotten married. That evening was the main event. My Uncle Jack, Mom, and I spent countless hours getting ready for it and the entire day before getting it set up. We chose to have the reception at an Eagles's Lodge since it was a completely blank slate that we could transform into a medieval castle. There were blank walls that we hung several rolls of flagstone patterned gossamer like this that they use to decorate for proms. We hung over 30 banners from the ceiling and walls that we handmade from green and purple felt, ribbon and tassels. My Uncle Jack made the huge hanging banners above that were behind the head table. They were the actual George and Lenox family crests that we found on-line. He used an overhead projector and laid it out and drew it out to scale and cut out the pieces. I have no idea how long it took him and his friend but I literally gasped when he unrolled them to show me.

My florist had columns that he painted to look like flagstone. We put them up around the cake and around the head table. He also helped us with the centerpieces. We laid out glass and I handpainted little votive cups in a marbleized pattern and those were all lit up. The centerpieces were an urn looking bowl with grapes and some wheat and flowers that we had on each long table. There were other large candles all over the place and some little lights with no florescents on to set the medieval tone. Yes I am drinking a Bud Light in this snapshot, not from my medieval goblet. All class I know.

My caterer got into the theme and we had a huge fruit and cheese display with a water feature. My favors were little placecard frames of castles and scrolls. I printed out my favorite John Donne (1572–1631) love poems and put those in the frames at each setting. I also made programs from parchment paper and rolled them up like a scroll that we passed out as people came in.

A good friend of the family sewed the Wench's costumes. We had one of my younger cousins and some neighbor girls dress up and help serve and welcome people. We pieced together jester costumes for several of my younger cousins who juggled and hammed it up. I hired a harpist from the local Ren Fest and she came in costume and played while we ate. We had a DJ for the dance afterwards. We invited people to come in costume and a large group of Mike's former students came in some wild outfits that they had put together.


One of our friends made Mike's majestic cape. He wore it during the Handfasting ceremony we did. Since most of the people had not been at the wedding I wanted to have some sort of ceremony that they would be a part of. I used a ritual I found on-line and had my brother who dressed up in his kilt perform. She also made herself a costume and since she reads tarot cards she did readings for people throughout the evening which was a lot of fun.

















It took us some time to find someone willing to make the castle cake I had envisioned. Mom called people all over my little hometown and one place said they would try but were going to charge an outrageous amount. She finally called this sweet older lady who said she loved challenges. She worked out of her house and came up with the design by covering pieces of foam board with the icing and created a structure that way. She also made the guitar groom's cake and charged us under $200 for the whole deal. My Mom borrowed the knights from a shop in town that used them as decorations.

My sister Angie volunteered to create a kid's area. We had a cardboard castle for them to get inside and color with puppets that they could perform shows with that we got at Oriental Trading. We had medieval coloring books for them to play with. The girls could use ribbon and lace to create a magic wand and the boys had blow up swords. I couldn't find a good picture of the play area in action but there was this shot of Angie cleaning up from the chaos at the end of the night.

All in all a good time was had by all which was my goal. I wanted it to be an event and something unlike any other wedding my guests had likely ever attended. Thanks for indulging me as I reminisced about the big day.