Wedding Wednesday – The Wedding!

Our final Wedding Wednesday post! I am very happy to celebrate this day has finally come where I can write all about my day, my amazing venue, and my rockstar vendors! Many of you know how hard it was being a bride during COVID and dealing with SO many cancelations. It was honestly a very emotional time but was worth the wait. Below I will go into details of the day, share our stunning photos, recommend our awesome vendors, and express my forever gratitude to our venue and their team! I feel so blessed.

Our Vendor List

Photographer: Serena Star Photography

Videographer: Alliance Video Productions

Watch our wedding videos here: Chelsea & Johnathan (mediazilla.com)

Florist: Alisha Simone

DJ: Jay Harrison Entertainment

Hair and Makeup: Your day your way

Cake: Chocolate Carousel

Dance Studio: Arthur Murray Dance Studio

Dress: Aleana’s Bridal Shop

We had our formal wedding at Clark’s Landing Yacht Club in Delran NJ. I would love to link the venue but unfortunately, they have closed down. If you love my wedding etc you can find their sister location at Clark’s Landing Yacht Club, Point Pleasant, NJ, and/or Bradford Estates, Hainesport, NJ. Even though it closed down, I can still tell you all about the amazing experience. We truly wanted a water scene a part of our wedding as we love being on the water or just near it. This location has beautiful docks with the most beautiful sunsets.

For our stay, we and the guests got rooms at the SpringHill Suites by Marriott Mt. Laurel Cherry Hill. The rooms were large and right across the parking lot, we had our dinner rehearsal at Anthony’s Coal Fire Pizza. They were very accommodating, friendly and the food was perfect. It was nice to have a location so close to the hotel to avoid more travel for guests who drove/flew in.

One reason I booked this hotel is they have a relationship with a bus group which offers discount shuttles to and from the venue for weddings and events. They also have complimentary breakfast every day. Weddings can cost so much, even if you’re just a guest, and I wanted everything to be as cost-efficient as possible. This also made life so much easier on my girls for hair and makeup the morning of since we had to wake up super early. We were able to walk downstairs and eat breakfast while getting ready. We rented out the conference room space for our group.

For hair and makeup, I used the company called “Your day your way” and I have nothing but amazing things to say about them. The staff was responsive, easy to work with, and beyond understanding with all of my COVID cancelations. I would recommend them in a heartbeat to anyone! My grandmother who did hair and makeup for a living even raved about how great of a job they did, that’s how you know they are talented! All night I was told I looked like a Disney Princess and that was my goal. They nailed it.

I was absolutely obsessed with my flower hair piece. You can buy it from Etsy at this shop. I actually had all my girls wear flowers in their hair. My favorite part about these bobby pin flowers is that they were fake but looked so realistic, which means they can be used over and over again. It was great! For the girl’s smaller flower pins they can be found here. To enhance my hair and ensure I got that beautiful disney princess look I bought hair extensions from BFB Hair. Their hair is 100% real, they will send you hair samples for color matching and shipping was super quick!

It was such a special morning being with so many people I love and adore, dressed up in matching robes together.

I of course had to have super extra fun shots with confetti and bride balloons. I waited so long might as well! This brings me to our amazing photographer. We hired “Serena Start Photography” and she took the most beautiful photos I could have asked for. She has an artsy vision just as I do and captured every photo I wanted. Extremely talented and I couldn’t have asked for more! If you love these matching robes as much as I did (they are SO soft) you can find them here. My bride balloons can be found here. Lastly, my confetti poppers here.

They even got some great shots of John getting ready. He hates photos and it’s amazing how they made him look happy in all the shots! He doesn’t seem miserable at all being in photographers like he typically is.

Before jumping into the whole overview of the day I wanted to share some detail photos. This includes ring shots, dress, attire, flowers, venue space, etc.

Arriving at the venue and finally being able to put on my wedding dress was one of the most surreal moments I have ever had. It finally began to feel like “Wow this is really happening, and it is finally my time.” I waited so long to experience all of these moments and I was living in a complete dream. When it came to putting my dress on though it took a village to help me do the back buttons, haha.

Here are a few more getting ready shots I wanted to include just because I am so obsessed with all of my photos.

Something really important to me as well was getting a first look done with my bridal party, my father, and most importantly, John. I wanted share this intimate memory with some of the people closest to me to really sink in the day and everything it meant to me. These are some of the people who have been here the most for me during this whole experience and I wanted to see in a very special setting.

Here is John and me. I was actually really scared to see John’s reaction and I am not sure why. Probably because he is not always as expressive as most people, but his face truly lit up. It was perfect! He also hates puffy dresses and I was so nervous mine would be too poofy but he assured me it wasn’t, phew! Haha

One of my biggest emphasize for pictures the day of the wedding were for as many shots with John as I could get. With him being in the Military traveling/being deployed, the photos were extremely important to me. When I’m alone for this days, weeks, or months these will be memories I can look back on and not feel so alone. The way our photographer captured these photos was everything I could have asked for and more. It was exactly what I wanted. Showing our love posed and candid. They were romantic, intimate and just overall us.

Of course, lastly, it wouldn’t be a true wedding without our fur babies by our sides. I hand-made Mia’s collar but if you love Maverick’s suit and tie that matches John’s exactly we used Etsy! The Etsy shop can be found here.

The ceremony was so special. John and I are very traditional people and wanted to keep our standard vows and not create our own. Nowadays so many vows explain why you love the person you love but they do not go into depth with everything you should be vowing to one another such as sickness and in health etc. We really wanted to keep these traditional vows because we take marriage very seriously and truly believe the traditional vows area true commitment of what marriage means. However, to add our own personal touch on our wedding day, we made our ceremony very personal. We talked about how we met, the moment we fell in love and so much more. We truly wanted to give our guests a complete insight into our love story so they knew us as a couple. Our dear good friend Allie married us, which was beyond special, but someone I would also recommend for weddings is Revine Jill Dillner. She is a true gem and specializes in military weddings/elopements. I highly recommend her! I, of course, also recommend Allie. If you watch our video and love our ceremony reach out to me and I can give you her information!

I can remember so vividly watching the weather two weeks before the wedding daily. I was obsessing over rain, praying it would not happen. Everyone, I would come across I begged to pray for no rain that day. After so many disappointments of the wedding being canceled etc I just wanted everything to be perfect. I was about to head out to walk down the aisle and was told it looks like it was going to storm right during our ceremony and then clear up. I then spoke up and said I wanted to risk it and worst to worst we’ll all run inside. Guests started to arrive and the rain still was headed our way. All our bridal parties began to line up to walk down the aisle and I remember being in my bridal suite alone, taking a deep breath, and saying one last prayer to everyone watching over me. With that, I walked outside with my dad and the clouds magically shifted in the other direction. The second I started walking down the aisle any sprinkle of rain completely disappeared and the sun came out. I get chills thinking about this moment and almost cried with happiness. I knew someone was looking out for me. My dad then said it was all a magical experience because every year for my birthday it is supposed to rain or was about to when I was a child and then when the day came it would always clear up. He believes it is my Grandmother watching over me and I agree as well.

Also here’s two close-ups of our dogs going down the aisle, because I know that’s who everyone truly cares about, haha.

Walking down the aisle was a surreal moment probably more so for myself than other brides. I put off this moment for about 2 years and dreamt over and over again how it would be. It felt like a dream it was finally happening and I could have that moment.

The ceremony just continued to glow as the sun came out, we did readings expressing John’s Native American Heritage and we planted a tree to represent our love. It’s a tree that can be found in the Red Wood Forests, which we absolutely love, and wanted to shed this memory into our ceremony.

Finally, we got to say our vows, our I do’s, and end it all with a dip kiss. I was in pure bliss.

During our cocktail hour, I wish I could have been a guest. We had a slider bar with milkshake shots, mac and cheese bar, a seafood bar, etc. I got a few bites of food here and there but nearly not as much as I would have wanted. At least I have photos to remember it by? Ha.

When it came to the reception, and first dances, I was so worried so many eyes would be on us all at once. I thought I would possibly panic and not handle the attention so well as I don’t like to be the center of attention. In order to help resolve the feelings of nerve, I thought it would be a good idea to do a cheorgraphed dance. If we did this then I would be completely focused on the dance and not everyone watching us. The dance lessons were actually incredibly fun and John had a blast. It makes sense because he loves to dance! We danced to “A thousand years” by Christina Perri. We also got a smoke machine so it could look like we were dancing on clouds. I received so many compliments saying it was the best first dance people have ever seen. It really was magical.

The first dance with my dad was “What a wonderful world”, which he also danced to with his mom (My grandma) in their first dance at his wedding. That song has always been special to me because of this. John danced to “Humble and kind” with his mother which is a beautiful song.

There was so much love in speeches that were given that night and we felt so blessed. From family to friends, the most kind words were expressed and so many tears were shed. I’ve never felt so seen or loved.

In my opinion, our cake was AMAZING. We got funfetti cake with vanilla mouse and raspberry mouses filling on alternating layers. First off, I love anything funfetti, so when I found out this vendor did funfetti cakes I was estatic. I usually hate how wedding cakes taste, not going to lie, but loved ours. I heard other people say the same so you know I’m not being bias, haha. I incorporated John into the cake by using an airplane cake topper and having a gold map design around one of the tiers.

Lastly, ontop of all the dessert, fun and dance we did sparkler photos! Since we got “remarried” on the fourth of July I knew we had to incorporate something festive. I absolutely love sparkler photos and John wasn’t convinced with this idea but he was once they were taken. We just did family and the bridal party to avoid taking a lot of time away from the wedding itself, but had a blast! These photos came out stunning.

All in all, this was such a magical day. I appreciated everything so much more since it was taken away so many times. For any advice I could give to a couple about to be married is soak in every moment of the day. Do not get caught up in the little details, don’t get upset if everything doesn’t go how you want (Because it won’t), take a step back with your partner to feel all the emotions just the two of you, don’t leave your partner’s side or you may never find them again and please EAT THE FOOD. You paid for it so please find time to eat it! I made sure to follow all of these guides and I swear it made everything so much better.

I want to thank everyone again who has been following my wedding journey, supported us and showed us so much love. You are all the best and we love you dearly. Thank you for your patience with this wedding through the crazy world we live in and thank you for the love. We love you so much!