I loved weddings long before I started planning my own, and happily, I still love them, a year and a half later. I still consume lots of wedding inspiration daily, and in addition to the color-coded images I catalog on Pinterest to help with inspiration boards, I also still add to my “personal” wedding board. It’s the one where I stored the inspiration for our wedding when I was actively planning it, and it’s still where I keep my very favorite bits. I thought it would be fun to share a few of the pins I’ve added over the last few months — the pieces that would be inspiring my wedding today, if I still had one in front of me!

Tim Will via Southern Weddings

Jemma Keech

Geneoh via Style Me Pretty

Byron Loves Fawn via 100 Layer Cake

Adam Barnes via Southern Weddings

Dennis Basso via This is Glamorous

Sarah Joelle via 100 Layer Cake

Marcus Nilsson via Martha Stewart Weddings

Jose Villa

Sylvie Gil via Snippet & Ink

Elle Golden via Style Me Pretty

Byron Loves Fawn via 100 Layer Cake

Adam Barnes via Snippet & Ink

Jemma Keech

Sylvie Gil via Snippet & Ink

Josh McCullock via Southern Weddings

Sylvie Gil via Snippet & Ink

Arna Bee via 100 Layer Cake

Claire Morgan

Jodie Chapman via 100 Layer Cake

So to summarize, I like all things classic and romantic, and I like tulle. A lot. Also, little sleeves. It’s fun to see how many echoes of our actual wedding there are in this post!

How would you describe your wedding style? What are you drawn to over and over?

P.S. Taken as a whole, this wedding is by far one of my favorites I’ve seen in a while. Exactly my style!

John and I made ham biscuits at our state fair last weekend (yay for October goals!), and though we didn’t have much chance to walk around, even our brief visit made me so excited for corn on a stick, ferris wheels, and cute farm animals. That, and the image of tickets in the top left corner, inspired this inspiration for a colorful wedding!

Tickets from ThriftyPyg, clematis centerpiece photo by Joann Arruda, short dress gal photo by Joey & Jessica via Southern Weddings, pink bouquet photo by Caroline Joy via Style Me Pretty, tented reception space photo by A Bryan Photo via Southern Weddings, paper pinwheels via The Sweetest Occasion, donuts via Pizzazzerie, invitation by Southern Fried Paper via Southern Weddings, ferris wheel photo by Marianne Wilson via Ruffled

I love how the tented reception space is vaguely reminiscent of a big top. And of course I love the donuts :)

Friends! So many exciting things happening these days. Have I mentioned that my sister-in-law Natalie is getting married? She and Joe were engaged over the Fourth of July, and we couldn’t be more thrilled! These two are perfect for each other; they complement one other in the most wonderful ways. However, their differences have made for an interesting planning process so far, as we try to balance what’s most important to each of them.

A July wedding in a historic ballroom on the Connecticut coast have been agreed upon, and we’re working on save the dates, a photographer, and a wedding gown as we speak! In terms of design, we’ve gotten far enough to mock up some initial inspiration boards after collecting images with Marget on a joint Pinterest board. Hints of lavender (my in-laws are growing some for the occasion!) and gold are a shoo-in, but as I look at the images, we seem to be going in two different directions for the main colors: emerald and deep teal…

Green and gold bouquet, emerald Lela Rose gown, bouquet from Martha Stewart Weddings, stair garland photo by Thuss + Farrell via Snippet & Ink, striped envelope photo by Jeff Loves Jessica, gold cake, emerald place setting photo by Ali Harper via Snippet & Ink, lavender centerpiece via Style Me Pretty, French blue flats from BHLDN

…or peacock and shale.

Peacock and shale bridesmaid photo by When He Found Her, lavender centerpiece via Style Me Pretty, Connecticut couple, stair garland photo by Thuss + Farrell via Snippet & Ink, green and gold bouquet, hellebore centerpiece photo by Ciara Richardson, Percy gown from J. Crew, gold cake, garden rose bouquet photo by Rylee Hitchner

A subtle difference, to be sure, but one which we should probably reconcile at some point. Your thoughts or opinions are welcome!

Can’t wait to see how things develop!!

John and I celebrated our first wedding anniversary on Sunday (hooray!). One of my September goals was to celebrate in style, and I’d say we succeeded — at least, we celebrated in our style :) We actually hemmed and hawed longer than I would have liked over our plans, but ultimately decided on something fairly simple — a day at Wrightsville Beach, and dinner at Piedmont in Durham.

We also exchanged notes, our nod to the traditional first anniversary gift of paper. (John blew mine out of the water — he somehow found leftover guest book cards from our reception, and filled them out. Made me tear up!) We really wanted to purchase an official wedding album for the occasion, but Tanja’s are $2,500-$3,000, and that’s just not in our budget right now. We decided that instead of comprising on something that’s not heirloom-quality, we’re going to wait it out. Maybe a fabric-bound volume for our cotton anniversary? :)

To switch topics a bit, I started thinking about what I’d learned, or what had changed, in our first year of marriage after reading Madi’s seven things she learned in seven months of marriage. I posed the question to John, too, on one of our nightly neighborhood walks. We came up with two observations, which I thought I’d share with you.

Number one:

John and I have been together for 8.5 years, so we were a part of each other’s families long before we got married. We grew up in the same town and we spent lots of time at each other’s houses in high school and college. We traveled together, we hung out with each other’s siblings, we not only met the extended families but knew them well. Before our wedding, both of us considered ourselves a part of the other’s family, no question. Yet… one of the only changes we identified post-marriage was that we felt a greater degree of ownership in the other’s family.

A family of birth will always be different than a family you marry into, but we both agreed that we just felt slightly, almost imperceptibly, more a part of the other’s family after our wedding. Just a small example: John said the hours spent cutting and hauling brush at my family’s cottage this summer felt different — because it felt more like his cottage, a place that he felt more responsibility for because it would be a part of the rest of his life.

We treasure each other’s families, and are so happy to have gained parents and siblings-in-love in addition to a spouse on September 15th!

Number two:

The second change we noticed post-wedding was also subtle. Like I said, we dated for a looong time before we got married, and to be honest, we knew almost that whole time that we would marry each other one day. I would say we largely functioned as a married couple, both practically and emotionally, even in college. So it came as a bit of a surprise when we both realized that after we got married, we felt (slightly, almost imperceptibly) more permanent.

I think the best way to describe it is that we now feel slightly more responsible for each other’s happiness. I know that sounds kind of wacky — like, people should be responsible for their own happiness, and you can’t change someone — but I think this is different. We are more likely now to put the other before ourself. I think we both try to surprise and delight each other more often. We want the other to be happy, because we truly are one, and if the other is having a bad day, or feeling sad, then we both hurt (as cheesy as that sounds). I didn’t expect this, because we already felt like such a solid unit before marriage. But God is so good to have brought us together, and I think we are learning every day what it means to take care of each other… and probably will continue to all the days of our life.

I am so grateful for the ways we’ve grown together over the last eight or so years, and for all the things we’ve learned and will continue to learn by each other’s side. Friends, I would love to know: If you’re married, did you feel like you learned a lot or experienced a ton of changes in your first year of marriage? Or not? How long were you dating before you got married? (I think it makes a big difference — you?)

P.S. I’ve received a few emails over the last twelve months with questions about our wedding, and so I’m planning to answer a couple of the more common ones this week!

P.P.S. Just a few of our favorite wedding photos by the inimitable Tanja Lippert… I love her.