I could spend all day soaking up the loveliness of this Florida affair by Bee Photographie, and I may or may not have spent all morning doing just that. There is just soo much pretty in one post! From the sweetie pie bride (she is one of those people that just looks nice, know what I mean?) to her handsome Australian groom, this wedding is worthy of a few moments, minutes or even hours of your afternoon, trust me. Click here for even more!
Click here to see the entire image gallery!
From the Bride... Josh and I love the outdoors and are all about and having fun with friends and family, so a backyard wedding on Lake Osborne was the perfect setting for us. We are a young couple on a shoestring budget having just moved back to Florida after spending a year in the Josh’s home country, Australia. We were extremely blessed to be granted permission from a family friend to use their stunning backyard as the backdrop for our special day. The yard backs onto a lake, which gave the guests a beautiful setting to watch the sunset.
The wedding was small, around 60 guests consisting of mainly close family and friends, along with the Josh's parents, aunt, uncle and groomsmen who flew in from Australia, London, and New York. One of the front row seats was taken by a Mac Book, which was logged into skype, so the entire thing could be watched in real time by more family back in Australia.
The flowers and details reflected our earthy, vintage, lace and organic inspired theme. We spent the short 3 months we had to plan the wedding gathering different things such as doilies, birdcages, old picture frames, old books, lanterns, and flower vases. We used an old suitcase as a cardholder and had a globe symbolizing the many months we spent on opposite sides of the world throughout our relationship. Instead of a guest book we opted for a Dutch tradition using a Wishing Tree. For the guests favors we potted succulents and had Australian honey brought over by Josh's parents. We attached hand stamped Cheers tags to the succulents and honey for an Australian touch (cheers being the typical Aussie way to say thanks).
When it came to deciding whether or not to do a unity candle we felt as though the unity candle and/or sand ceremony was too traditional and wanted to do something unique so opted to come up with our own tradition. A few nights earlier while sharing a bottle of wine, we each wrote a letter detailing all the reasons why we love one another and why we are getting married. We each gave those notes tied up to our mothers to bring with them to the wedding ceremony. During the ceremony we had our mothers present us with the unread letters and we placed them inside the empty wine bottle and sealed the bottle with a cork. The wine bottle is to stay with us wherever we go with the unread letters in it and if we ever feel as though our relationship is in desperate need of rekindling, we can smash the bottle and read the letters to be reminded of why we made the commitment of marriage to each other. If we never run into such a predicament, we will smash the bottle and read the letters in celebration of our tenth wedding anniversary.
With such a time crunch and tight budget using friends and family as vendors was what made this wedding possible. The cake was made by a friend, my hair and makeup were done by friends and we used a member of our church’s praise team as our DJ. Friends and family members helped with everything from hanging the Christmas lights, decorating the tables, and staking in wedding signs the day before and the day of the wedding.
The day ended up being more perfect than we could have imagined and we love reliving it all through the amazing photos captured!
Wedding Photography: Bee Photographie / Wedding Venue: Private Residence / Wedding Dress: Allure Couture via Bridal Couture / Bridesmaid Dresses: Ann Taylor / Garter: Rosebud Lips / Hair: Eryn Alphenaar, Friend of the Bride / Makeup: Lisa Miller Sanford, Friend of the Bride / Groom & Groomsmen Attire: Perry Ellis + Calvin Klein / Cinematography: Jamice Ivie / Flowers: The Flower Market / Wedding Cake & Cupcakes: Kelly Zylstra, Friend of the Bride / Cake Bird Toppers: Michael's / DJ: Adam Guadalupe, Friend of the Bride