From the Bride: I think we did a few things that made our wedding standing out. First, the dress. The entire wedding and reception were inspired by my dress. I really had no idea what kind of dress I wanted but I've never liked wearing all white. After I made my first (and ultimately, only) dress appointment I started looking through the designers websites that Rebecca's carried and saw that dress. I knew immediately, before even trying it on, that was my dress. It felt very me - a little nontraditional and a little traditional.

Secondly, we decided to have a short wedding ceremony and instead of renting an entire set of chairs for 10 minutes our wedding planner, Glen, suggested having a standing ceremony and having the caterer pass around champagne for guests to sip before and during the ceremony. The guests really seemed to enjoy that. We also had our friend, Derrick Oehrle, perform the ceremony. He was able to write a personal ceremony about our love story, with lots of horse racing and golf puns (we are big fans of both). It really made it special.

Finally, at the reception we did three stations of food rather than a sit down dinner or buffet. We had a street taco station, a slider station, and a shrimp and grits station. This kept everyone up and moving around so there was no big chunk of time during the reception where people were not up mingling, dancing and having a good time. We danced our first dance to “You Are the Best Thing” by Ray LaMontagne. We also had a late night snack - a french fry bar with cheese, bacon, ranch, etc. I love french fries so this was a must. Our caterer really knocked it all out of the park. We served two signature cocktasil - Strawberry Black Peppercorn Margarita and Brown Butter Old Fashioned. Honorable mention for the ghost chairs we rented for the reception that really just tied the whole modern sophisticated vibe together.

Bride’s Advice: Do what you want to do, not what you think everyone expects or what is tradition, but truly what YOU want. If you do that, it will be the most wonderful day.