Marget and Seth’s Wedding

Y’all, I feel so very lucky to be sharing Marget and Seth’s wedding today. Lucky because it’s gorgeous and so thoughtfully planned, yes, but also because I was so happy to play a small part in it! Marget is a few years older than John, and ever since he and I started dating in high school, I’ve looked up to both of his sisters with a little bit in awe. Marget is stylish, sophisticated, kind, and witty; she has a magnetic personality to which people are irresistibly drawn. I was (and am) no different, and therefore was so happy to stand next to her on her wedding not only as a sister-in-law, but as a friend.

She graciously agreed to let me share a few thoughts on their day. I’ve incorporated some of Marget’s own words, as well.

Marget and Seth chose a beautiful Rifle Paper Co. design for their invitation suite, and Marget worked closely with the designers to choose just the right shades of leaf green, blush, and peach to set the day’s palette.

That’s me on the left! Isn’t Marget’s bouquet just gorgeous? It smelled delightful, too, because of the mint tucked in. The striped wrap is from Anne M. Cramer. Hana Floral Design took care of all the blooms.

All of the bridesmaids chose their own black dress. Mine was actually having its encore wedding performance, as I wore it as a bridesmaid in my friend Katharine’s wedding in 2010!

To complement the black and white, Marget and all of her bridesmaids wore a “pop of color” on the lips. To prepare, we each made a trip to Sephora with the bride, where we had fun finding the perfect bold, matte lipstick to complement our complexions. Mine turned out to be a hot pink called Schiap, and though I never would have bought it myself (I’m a major scaredy cat when it comes to color!), it was SO fun to wear it, and I loved how it looked! Marget herself wore YSL No. 1 Le Rouge.

Gorgeous girl!

Marget and Seth choose to have both their ceremony and reception at Eolia, an oceanside mansion in Connecticut. Marget dreamed of doing just that when she was little, and I love that her dream came true! Their ceremony included a thoughtful mix of Jewish and Christian traditions, including a beautiful branch huppah.

The garden at Harkness is quite long. The plan was for Marget to enter at the halfway point for her walk down the “aisle,” like the bridesmaids, but she decided to enter from the furthest point to make for a longer walk as a surprise for Seth. I think it worked :)

From Marget: Among my favorite moments were taking a long walk across a field through the rain with my father so that we could surprise Seth by appearing at the very end of the garden for a long walk down the aisle. Seth loves to surprise me and was heavily invested in first laying eyes on me on our wedding day, so I wanted to turn the tables and give him a moment to remember. Indeed, seeing me in my dress for the first time is one of his favorite moments from the day.

Ahhh yes, the rain. It started sprinkling very lightly as we rode over to Harkness, and kept it up intermittently until the end of the (outdoor) ceremony, when it started to legitimately rain. It poured later in the evening, but thankfully the reception was largely indoors. I thought Marget handled the less-than-desirable weather beautifully, so I wanted to get her thoughts on it:

The day before the wedding I started getting calls from vendors asking us what our rain plan was, and my response was that if rained, we’d do whatever they thought best. But of course, I still believed it would turn out to be a beautiful day, because summer is made of beautiful days.

On the day of, as the grey skies gave way to mist, I was aware that rain was imminent, and just hoped that it would hold off until after our ceremony. Surprisingly, there was no sadness, just acceptance and a bit of optimistic hope. Like water running downhill, I knew that if it were to rain, it would indeed rain, and there was nothing we could do to change it. That was our wedding day no matter what, and I loved that day so very much. We recognize it would have been different if it hadn’t rained — our guests would have gotten the chance to stroll the grounds during cocktail hour, our mothers’ hair would not have been flattened, and we would have had the photographs I had imagined. But our wedding wasn’t a photo shoot, and everyone we loved was there, whether their blowout held or not. The question is, would our emotional experience have been different if it hadn’t rained? In some ways, yes. Seth and I were both distracted by thoughts of concern for guests who were being rained on during our ceremony, and we weren’t able to take the walk we had planned at sunset, which left us with no time alone together on our wedding day. My point is, it was different. If it had been sunny, I imagine I may have spread my arms wide, kicked my head back and soaked in the fresh air. Instead, Seth and I huddled up together under his blazer and made a run for it with my bouquet held overhead as an umbrella. We were still giddy and together, but our wedding day was one of the rainy ones. And I spent no time worrying about what was lost, or what might have been–even when my mud-soaked wedding gown was ripped on the dance floor. Because a wedding day is just like the rest of life – you can only plan in advance and be flexible on the day-of. Plus, the day was still overflowing with blessings and absolutely more fun than I’d ever had! Since our wedding, we haven’t given it much thought. But countless guests have told us that the rain only added to the day’s romance… and warned us that it’s a sign we’ll have a big family!

After Marget and Seth recited their personal vows and exchanged rings, their ceremony concluded with a variation on the Jewish tradition of “seven blessings.” Instead of having the traditional blessings read, Marget and Seth assigned seven family members or friends, or pairs of family members or friends, a virtue or element they hoped to have as part of their life together. Each person or pair was asked to share a thought, wish, hope, prayer, quote, or blessing that corresponded to their blessing. It was really interesting to see how everyone interpreted the assignment! John and I were asked to wish them “joyful faith.”

Because of the weather we did portraits with Katie Stoops inside the mansion.

I’m not the only mini food lover in the family! Marget and Seth had a “bubbles and bites” cocktail hour, small bites paired with petite glasses of bubbles. I would say the crowd favorite was the mini corn dogs and craft beer! Of course, there were a few drink stirrers at the bar :)

Marget has gorgeous handwriting, and lettered all of the escort cards herself.

They chose to sprinkle lovely and meaningful decor throughout the (already gorgeous) space, including family photos, antique books, and books by authors Seth, a literary agent, represents.

The Hora! I had never been to a Jewish wedding before, and the Hora was awesome :)

A few other sites had the pleasure of featuring Marget and Seth’s wedding, including Style Me Pretty, One Fab Day, and Katie Stoops’ own blog. If you’d like, you can also watch their wedding day film by McKenzie Miller here.

Marget and Seth, I love you. Thank you for letting me be a part of your magical day.