Our Vintage Florida Wedding – We Got Hitched!
So we have been missing in action on this blog for a while, but we’ve had a really good excuse: We got married!
With working full-time, planning the wedding, and trying to get some work done on the house, we’ve been going nonstop, but our wedding week was such a wonderful time to just relax and enjoy our friends and family. When we originally got engaged, we knew that many of our guests would have to travel no matter where we held the event. We figured we might as well hold it somewhere that people could really make a vacation out of. We chose Dunedin, Florida because it was close to where many of our relatives already lived, and we have vacationed down there many times before.
Dunedin (pronounced “Done Eatin”, ha ha) is home to Honeymoon Island. Though it sounds like a resort location or something off of a bad reality TV show, Honeymoon Island is nothing of the sort. It is actually a state park full of beaches, hiking trails, mangroves, and the occasional rattlesnake. We decided to do a small wedding on one of the beaches at Honeymoon Island. The park has event planners they work with to set up the weddings and they take care of putting up all the chairs and the alter, as well as putting the decorations out. They were really easy to work with and we were so happy with the way everything worked out.
As far as the wedding planning, my mom did so much to help, from talking to vendors to making the chair hanger decorations and staining the crates for our table decorations at the reception, so a big “Thank You” goes to her. We worked with a local florist, Save the Date Florida, to add some floral decorations to the beach venue, our reception tables, and our wedding cake. They did a beautiful job! I also designed and assembled the wedding programs that doubled as fans.
Our theme was vintage Florida and it allowed us to really have fun with some little details. Michael wore a flamingo tie and blue canvas shoes. I had a birdcage veil and wore blue pumps. We also encouraged the men involved in the wedding to wear different Floridian ties and socks. The guests were ferried back and forth from the hotel to the beach on a vintage trolley, and we also carried the theme over to the reception with vintage postcards, orange crates, and even blow-up flamingo can coozies. Though it was a beautiful wedding, we had fun with it.
The simple and beautiful greens and whites were so pretty as aisle decorations. You can also see the raffia chair hangers that my mom made.
I designed some wedding fans as programs for our guests to use on the beach.
Michael and his best man got their flamingo ties from the Tie Bar.
We were really lucky to have a talented photographer friend take our wedding photos. He has done sports, fashion, and other professional photo shoots so we knew we were in good hands. He’s also just a great guy and we were psyched that he could attend the wedding as our friend, so getting him to shoot the photos was just an added bonus. He took some amazing photos, some of which you can see below, where he (Steven Earl Yang) is credited. Thanks Steve!
We held a wedding rehearsal the day before the wedding and Steven even took some practice shots of us for the next day. (Photos by Steven Earl Yang.)
It’s official! We walked through a sea of our friends and family throwing lavender. (Photo by Steven Earl Yang.)
We took some shots in front of the alter before the wedding. (Photo by Steven Earl Yang.)
At the alter as the sun starts to set with our wonderful officiant, Sharon Verhage.
Did I mention that our friend rocked as our wedding photographer? (Photo by Steven Earl Yang.)
Our guests took the Jolly Trolley to the beach and back to the reception area. The company even put a cute little sign on the back.
The reception was held at Bon Appetit Waterfront restaurant in the upstairs banquet hall. It has a vintage feel to the entire room and a beautiful view of the ocean. It was a perfect location to hold our reception. It is also connected to a hotel where most of our guests were staying. The staff and event planner, Nancy Williams, were so wonderful and helpful, and they really made it a relaxing and enjoyable night. Because it is also located near downtown Dunedin, we decided to have a pub crawl after the event so that we could continue the party and get more time to visit with our friends and family. Overall, it was the perfect way to cap off the day and celebrate the event.
Our tables were decorated with vintage Florida post cards, citrus fruits, and even some inflatable flamingo can coozies. Our cake was covered in kumquat branches. (Photos by Steven Earl Yang.)
At the Reception venue, Bon Appetit Waterfront Restaurant, enjoying a mimosa in front of the ocean view.
The front and back of our wedding newspaper. We had a schedule, menu, and story about us on the front and some coloring pages and puzzles on the back. (Photo by Steven Earl Yang.)
The photo page of our wedding newspaper. We did this instead of playing a wedding slideshow during the reception.
Our table decorations. My mom made the little starfish envelopes that contained our custom newspaper, a vintage postcard and a pack of crayons. We also gave away key lime cookies and sea anemone frames for favors.
Our naked cake was covered in kumquat branches by the same people who did our flowers for the alter and tables, Save the Date Florida. It was so lovely and delicious in flavors of vanilla champagne and strawberry all made from scratch by Corey’s Cakes. (Photo via Save the Date Florida).
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