Our Wedding Takes a Drastic Turn and We Explore a Bajillion Venues

When we last left off, I was feeling all sorts of confusion about our tiny wedding and venue choice.

After we dropped Mr. Rucksack's parents off at the airport, he and I had a heart to heart. I told him everything that had kept me up the night before and we discussed what it would mean for our wedding. We decided not to talk about it until we got back home and drove in silence both trying to figure out what we really wanted from our wedding.

About 15 minutes from our home, I got a phone call from my mom. She had just gotten off the phone with Uncle Bill, my grandfather's cousin. He had told my mom he understood if he wasn't invited, but that he would really like to be there for my grandparents since they couldn't be there - my grandfather died when my mom was in high school and my grandmother passed away a couple of years ago.

"I'm sorry," she told me over the phone, "I didn't know what to say."

I immediately started bawling. "Tell him he's invited! Tell everyone, they're invited!" I exclaimed as I hung up the phone with my mom.

Still crying, I turned to Mr. Rucksack to discuss for real. I had to invite Uncle Bill I told him. But then he would have to invite his Aunt Chris. But if I invited Uncle Bill and his wife, I would also want my Aunt Kim. Suddenly we were in a quickly growing snowball. It was If you Give a Mouse a Cookie, wedding style. (Has anyone thought of writing that book? If not, I declare it mine!)

"I guess we're having a wedding," we nervously agreed.

That night - just hours after viewing the vineyard - we told our parents about our new idea. I'm pretty sure we were giving them a huge headache at this point!

After we put our tiny wedding visions out of our minds and decided that yes, we would be having a traditional wedding, it was time to put Plan B into motion. Again, we listed out the things that were important to us, this time with 120 guests in mind: our family, our friends, good food, lots of dancing, fun, and of course getting married. We then had to do a whole new wedding venue search to find the best fit.

I think I researched every wedding venue (and restaurant, museum, library, pavilion...) in a three state radius. We had some grand ideas followed by some crazy ones followed by a whole lot of sticker shock. Some of the places we saw were really awful. Mr. Rucksack and I are pretty against anything that feels like a wedding factory, so I should have known we would have been appalled by a local wedding venue that prides themselves on 4 weddings a day and a magical dry ice dessert display. But desperate times call for desperate measures, right?

Among the disasters there were some great contenders and we narrowed it down to three awesome and very different venues.

Venue A: The James Blackstone Library in Branford, CT

Mr. Rucksack and I had visions of a vintage themed Great Gatsby reception here. Brimming with pink marble, muraled ceilings, and art deco accents, the library is simply stunning. The price was also right. At $300 an hour, we'd easily be in budget for our reception.

Via Wildmoo Books

Via James Blackstone Memorial Library

Via Donna Cheung Photography

Cons: The library doesn't close until five which would mean a limited amount of time for our caterer to set up. There also isn't a kitchen, so food prep would be difficult unless we found a caterer with a mobile kitchen.

Venue B: The Pine Orchard Club, Branford, CT

Mr. Rucksack and I loved the location of this venue, as well as the ease. With everything included, we wouldn't have to worry about a single thing. We also thought it would be really fun to play up the nautical vibe and go with a red, white and blue theme.

Via The POYCC

Via The POYCC

Cons:  This is one of the more expensive venues we looked at.(Which makes sense since they do pretty much everything for you) Also, all of the Saturdays for next year were booked with the exception of one Saturday in the fall, so we'd have to look at doing a Friday or a Sunday. And lastly, in our past experiences dining there, the food was good, but not amazing.

Venue C: The Madison Surf Club, Madison, Ct

The beachfront location of this venue was definitely a big selling point for Mr. Rucksack and me. The Surf Club is a town owned facility (think beach pavilion, but slightly fancier) that can be rented to residents for private events and we loved how casual and flexible it was. We thought it could be fun to do a "boardwalk" type reception or a beachy clambake. Oh and it was the least expensive of all the venues we looked at which of course was a huge bonus.

Via Paul Cantrell on Panoramio

Cons: It's a little on the rustic side. While the blank canvas meant flexibility and options, it also meant work and money. We were also a little concerned about how busy the beach would be. There's a snack bar literally ten feet from the Surf Club and it's open until some absurd hour like 9pm. We weren't sure how we felt about a bunch of screaming sticky kids running around during our wedding.

In the end, we revisited our list of important wedding factors and it was a no-brainer.

Which venue would you have picked? The Gatsby library setting, the nautical Yacht Club, or the casual beach club?

The Non-Wedding that Almost Was

Mr. Rucksack and I came this close to putting down a deposit on a completely different wedding.

We found the initial wedding planning to be Stressful with a huge capital S. So after taking some time off from thinking about it we refocused and then made a list of the things that were important to us: our family, our best friends, amazing food, and of course getting married to each other. That's when we decided to whittle down our guest list to a mere 20 people and find a venue that could cater to a small wedding. We narrowed it down to a couple of places and started making phone calls. A week later we stood inside our favorite vineyard in Connecticut.

Via Chamard Vineyard

I know, right?

The moment we stepped into their basement wine cellar I started crying. This was it.

Image via Hana Floral Design / Photo by Carrie Roseman / Event by True Event

Here it is all set up for a dinner party. You can't see it from this view, but on the opposite wall is a screen and projector that we planned on showing a continuous slideshow throughout our reception.

We began planning right away. The ceremony would be held in the vineyard among the grape vines. The reception would be in the cellar. Chamard would provide us with an amazing farm to table dinner. We would spend our wedding with our most important people. And I would not have to stress about anything. I felt awesome.

We told our parents and our friends. We apologized to those we wouldn't be able to invite.Then we made an appointment to see the venue one last time when Mr. Rucksack's parents were visiting from Minnesota and brought along our checkbook.

But then a turn of events changed everything. Mr. Rucksack's parents were very supportive of the whole plan, but I began feeling tremendous amounts of guilt. The night before we were going to the venue, I couldn't sleep. I kept feeling bad about all the people we weren't inviting. It also seemed crazy that we would have to have not only our wedding, but two parties afterward in order to celebrate with both our Connecticut friends and family and our Minnesota friends and family. Mr. Rucksack 's parents wanted to be involved with all of the parties, and I just couldn't ask them to shell out all of that money and time.

We went to see the venue the next day, but since Mr. Rucksack's parents had a flight change and needed to leave earlier, we also had to go to the venue a little earlier. Unfortunately it turned out that the venue coordinator couldn't see us at that time, so we were sort of left to our own devices to wander the property.

I was kind of grumpy from not sleeping, it was cold and rainy, and I was utterly confused. All of those things combined did not make for a pleasant viewing as we rushed through the various receptions spots. We left feeling very confused and as if we had fallen out of love with our venue.

Had our coordinator been able to see us or had it been sunny or had I actually slept the night before, we could have had a very different outcome and then I'd be telling you about a different wedding altogether.

Of course, that's not how this story ends. Instead, we changed our entire wedding overnight and although it's sometimes stressful, it really is just right.

Did you have second thoughts about your venue or change your mind at the last minute?

Now, this is the story all about how my wedding got flipped-turned upside down

And I'd like to tell a story just sit right there.....

I'll tell you how our wedding changed about a million times before finally settling on an idea that made sense and cost many less cents than our original plan(s).

There's a very good reason I don't write lyrics, and probably good reason that I don't plan weddings either.

You see, our wedding has changed direction about a hundred times since we first started planning. It's not that we didn't have good ideas. It's that we had sooo many good ideas. I've been planning my $100,000 wedding for the past ten years, faithfully reading Weddingbee and poring over bridal magazines and blogs for inspiration. My wedding PowerPoint presentation (from the pre-Pinterest days) is 273 pages long and take 5 minutes to load. My Pinterest has 25 wedding boards, all dedicated to different themes from Gatsby to Vintage Seaside to Vineyard.

When Mr. Rucksack and I got engaged, I figured all of my extensive research would go a long way in our planning process. I was Wrong with a capital W. It turns out we were in for a lot of sticker shock (wouldn't you know, my dream $100,000 budget was cut down to $15,000 in the real world) and venue woes. Also, with so many ideas out there it was hard to figure out what exactly was "us."

We felt a little like this: (and even ended up with a semi-nautical theme, ha)

But after months of "planning" we finally have a real vision and real vendors! Whew! Now I just have to keep reeling myself in when I start adding on a million projects and "must have" decorations. I blame Pinterest.

Did you have a hard time paring down your wedding ideas, too?

How do you know?

I knew Mr. Rucksack was the man for me right away, something I thought happened only in movies. I hated when people would tell me "When you know, you just know." My response to this kind of nonsense was typically an eye roll and a chuckle. Then it happened to me and all I could say was "Ohhh, now I get it!" It was like something suddenly clicked when I met Mr. Rucksack .

After about a month of dating, he told me he loved me. He had been drinking at the bar I waitress part-time at, while waiting for me to get off of work. The bartenders that night had been particularly generous to him and he was feeling good. After he said those three words, I immediately told him to take it back. I loved him too, but there was no way I was saying it back after he had been drinking.

"Fine. I take it back," he told me. Then in true Mr. Rucksack form he turned back to me and said, "But I don't really take it back. Because I looooove you."

When he said it again a week later, I told him I loved him too. And then the next morning he pretended he didn't remember because we had finished a bottle of wine together the night before! Thanks a lot, Mr. Rucksack! This story still cracks him up every time we tell it. He's his own biggest fan, I swear.

Within a few months we were buying a house and planning our lives together, and the fun just hasn't stopped.

Did I mention our biggest difference and premise for our make-believe future sitcom?

That's right. This liberal feminist is marrying a republican.

It's really not a very big deal at all anymore, but when we were first dating I would find myself whispering to my friends, "Yeah, he's amazing...but he's a republican." For the girl that had just finished an internship with a Gloria Steinam organization, it was a very big deal.

And Mr. Rucksack is not just any Republican. After our second date (ok, it was our first, but don't tell my mom), Mr. Rucksack slyly invited me over to his place for a glass of wine. As I sat down on his couch I took a look around and saw from left to right: A George W. Bush bobble head, a framed poster of Nixon, a framed poster of Reagan, an American flag, and a Don't Tread on Me flag. This is really not something you see in Connecticut very often. (He often says that he feels like a Unicorn in Connecticut)

It took a little adjusting, but we actually agree on most issues. We also help each other to view issues from another side. I've learned a lot by dating this guy that owns elephant embroidered pants! (No really. He actually does have a pair of obnoxiously awesome pants with elephants on them)

Party Animals Pants via Bonobos

Aside from our Dharma and Greg like differences, we're your average couple.We're both major foodies, we love wine, we constantly quote Parks & Rec and Always Sunny, and we sing to each other all the time. Sometimes we sing for real, like when he dances me around the living room and sings "Be My Baby," but most of the time we make up ridiculous songs about our mundane life - the dog, eating breakfast, showering.... BM Penny lived with us for a month and I'm sure we drove her crazy as we pretended we lived in a musical.

So you know, pretty much just like Dharma and Greg without all the yoga.

Via Starpulse

Do you and your fiance have any differences that you put aside in the name of love?

I'm So Glad I Got My Nails Done Today!

I was a little suspicious the day that Mr. Rucksack proposed. He had been acting funny for a few days, even spilling out "I know something you don't know!" after having a couple of happy hour drinks one night. So on the morning he suggested we go to a vineyard after work to listen to some music, I had a feeling this might be it. I put on a dress that wouldn't make him too suspicious of my suspicions and even managed to get my nails done on my lunch break!

But then he was late picking me up from work. By 5:45 he was apologizing and I felt like an idiot. Of course he wasn't proposing tonight. How silly of me to get so worked up. By the time he picked me up, it was too late to drive up to the vineyard. "Why don't we just go for happy hour instead?" he asked. I muttered back that I guess that was fine.

I had been thrown completely off the track and didn't even think anything of it when we went to the bar where we first met. It wasn't until he opened the door and I felt his hand start to sweat and shake that I thought something might be up.

And then I saw two of my good friends at the corner of the bar. Followed by another friend sitting next to them. "We just ran into each other!" my best friend tried to explain. But it was too late. I turned to Mr. Rucksack to ask him just what in the hell was going on and saw him down on one knee.

There was no spiel involved, just a simple "I love you. Will you marry me?" And it was perfect. 

And then I responded "I'm so glad I got my nails done today!" What can I say? I was in shock!

I did finally say yes (and also apparently the eff bomb a couple of times - sorry, mom!) and looked around to see so many of our friends and family there to witness our engagement. I felt like I kept looking and seeing more and more people!

I think the bartenders and patrons were just as shocked as I was. This is definitely not something that happens everyday at a tiny local dive bar. 

From there we popped open a bottle of champagne to celebrate and ordered some food for everyone. (If you're ever in the New Haven area, Rudy's frites with Samurai sauce are where it's at.)

My little cousin, Groomsman Brobot, was also super excited as evidenced by his video game playing.

I tried to keep up with the conversations but I kept getting distracted by my pretty shiny ring and all the excitement and pretty much just kept saying "Oh my gosh! I'm engaged!" over and over again.

Us with Momma and Aunt Rucksack and my little cousin/GM Brobot

A small sample of our wonderful friends that made it out for our engagement! I love them.

Poor Mr. Rucksack had a whole plan worked out for the night before where he was going to sing me a song at karaoke and then propose, but the plan fell through when my ring didn't come on time! He couldn't wait another week for Karaoke Wednesday, so he said as soon as the ring was in his hands, he started calling our friends and my family! While it wasn't what it planned, I think it was just right and I was so happy to have so many wonderful people there to celebrate with us.

Did your fiance have an elaborate engagement plan that had to be changed at the last minute?

How the Rucksacks Came to be a We

I was on a date the night I met Mr. Rucksack and it wasn't going well. It was going so not well, in fact, that when I got a text message from a coworker asking me to go join him for karaoke, it didn't take too much convincing before I agreed. And so the not-so-great-date and I headed down the street and joined some of our mutual friends at a local bar that happened to be hosting karaoke for the first time.

Meanwhile, Mr. Rucksack was coming home from the gym when his coworker sent him a text message asking him to come out for karaoke. Luckily, Mr. Rucksack also didn't need too much convincing.

By the time I arrived Mr. Rucksack was already there with his coworker - who happened to be my not-so-great-date's neighbor. AND somebody had already called dibs on Mr. Rucksack - my coworker. Did I mention that the particular coworker that I had joined that night is a handsome gay man? That's right. While Mr. Rucksack claims that he saw me and immediately began plotting a way to talk to me, I thought he was gay because my friend had called dibs on him!

How's that for a confusing meet cute?

Mr. Rucksack and I did end up chatting that night - he stole a chance when my not-so-great date went to the bathroom. It probably worked to my advantage that I thought he was gay because I usually get really nervous around hot straight men! The fact that I thought he would never be interested in me anyway meant that I was completely myself and we had a great conversation.

The following week we both ended up at karaoke again. He had even gone by himself in hopes that my friends and I would be there! Lucky for him, we were. That night, much to my surprise, he asked for my number.

He texted me just as I was getting home: "Just so you know, I'm taking you out. I don't know when, but it's happening."

"Do I have a say in this?" I responded.

"Nope."

"Well," I typed back "I would have said yes anyway."

He took me out the very next night and the rest, as they say, is history.

One of our very first dates to a Connecticut vineyard

*Before you start worrying about my not-so-great date from the beginning of the story, I'm happy to report that he also had a happy ending. We remained friends and he met the woman who is now his wife just a month after our not-so-great date!