Weddings are such an exciting time, especially as a first-time bride! My fiance and I have been together for nearly 5 years, have a family together, and have a life together. But taking that next step just hadn’t been on our radar for practicality reasons.
Then on March 1st, we decided to take that leap! I was so excited because at 40 I had never been a bride. I honestly wanted to keep things simple. He insisted that we do the “real thing” since I had never experienced it before. So rather than go to the courthouse I started planning our July wedding.
Three weeks after we decided to change my last name, Michigan went into lockdown. I waited and watched, optimistically hoping that our July wedding date would be okay.
We had already secured our wedding and reception venue and had printed all of our invitations before the lockdown was even on the radar. As the days and weeks drew out in lockdown, my “not wanting to stress” attitude started to stress. Would we really be able to see this thing through? It’s not like it was a huge deal, because we already had everything. The only thing that was really changing was my last name. But we had made a commitment, and I really wanted to marry my best friend. Even if it meant only celebrating our day amongst ourselves and our 3 boys.
Having an autoimmune disease kept me very isolated through lockdown, and I couldn’t imagine having a bunch of other people join us to celebrate with the risk. But I was broken. I wanted to be his wife. I wanted to go through all the motions and take his last name. So we pushed on. We continued to be optimistic that our day could still be special, regardless of what that looked like.
Most of my shopping and planning for the wedding was done online. We were getting near-daily deliveries of wedding-related items. One of those deliveries included my wedding dress, that I had never even been able to try on. Going to the store to shop and find my perfect wedding items just wasn’t a reality.
As the days and weeks pushed on, my Google history started to look like a nervous soon-to-be bride, wondering if her happily ever after would ever really happen. The courts were closed, restaurants shut down, churches meeting virtually. I felt defeated. But I pushed on. I wasn’t ready to give up the hope that we could still have our special day the way that I had envisioned.
As things started to open back up I saw a little light at the end of the tunnel. But then I found the full weight of the reality of what we were really trying to pull off on my shoulders. It’s not like we had been planning some 200+ guest wedding.
From the very beginning, we only wanted an intimate gathering of close friends and family. Our guest list was at 80 people, and 20 of those were just immediate family! How could we possibly cut it down further? How do we decide which friends and family were close enough to invite while leaving others out? We’re both 40 and have lived half a life already. These people were all our family.
As Governor Whitmer announced that Michigan would start to move through phases I reached out to our reception venue, because pre-COVID the restaurant had a limit of 110 people for the banquet room we were using. No more than 50 people, 10 per table, and tables had to be spaced at a minimum of 6 feet apart. My heart sank.
Then I reached out to the cute historical church that we had reserved for our wedding because I just knew I would hear a similar response. The church had a max capacity of 100 people when the world wasn’t in a lockdown. Heartbreak once again.
So now, 6 weeks before our wedding we were back at square one. We had no venue to get married at and no place to celebrate our special day. I told my mom everything that had happened and she mentioned that maybe we could get married at her church. With everything that had happened their calendar seemed pretty open.
Literally, 6 weeks before what was to be our wedding day I was recreating one of the most important days of my life. We talked to the pastor of my mom’s church. Our date happened to be open to marry in the church. Not only that, but they had an enormous family center behind the church that had once been the gym for the former private church school. I was cautiously optimistic that this may actually work.
But even with a venue how were we going to find food to feed our guests? The following day my future mother-in-law was scheduled to be at our house to watch our boys because I had some work that I needed to get done. Without any hesitation, she reached out to a family friend who owns a catering and banquet facility just minutes from the church. Yes, yes, and yes!
In a matter of just days, 6 weeks before our wedding day we made it happen. A new church, new reception venue, and catered food for our guests!
After I got a confirmation of all these things I reached out to minted who had designed our original invitations and they graciously reprinted them with the new information and made sure we had them with 5 weeks to go!
We’re closing in on our big day, and I’m TRYING to remain stress-free. In the past 4 months, everything about our special day has been turned upside down. But I’m feeling pretty confident that things will be just perfect!
