Thank you to Style Me Pretty for sharing Lauren & Stephen’s stunning wedding.

Thank you to ModCloth for making my vision reality.

Thank you to Meredith, Michael and Orvis for such a fun spring time afternoon. Happy Spring to all!

A lighthouse at Christmas accompanied by dogs! Tom could not have found a more perfect moment.

Speaking of perfect, Melissa and Tom’s wedding promises to be filled with homemade delight everywhere the eye can see. I am so excited to be coordinating their autumn nuptials at Melissa’s family farm in West Simsbury, CT.

Amalia and Gabe’s vision was a vintage inspired, music infused, Maine featured, foodie friendly, DIY, friends and family contribution event, showcasing their love story and life together. The couple met through a mutual friend while attending college in Maine. Though the couple resides in a warmer southern climate they selected Restaurant Grace in Portland as the ideal stage for their production.

Amalia’s brother designed the vintage Maine postcard inspired invitations.

In case guests missed the towering circa 1857 Gothic Revival once church now restaurant, a painting of Amalia and Gabe, rendered by a friend, greeted them as they approached the entrance.

Breaking from the norm, cocktail hour took place prior to the ceremony in the Sanctuary. The couple created amusing signature cocktails for guests to enjoy.

Guests were then asked to find their way downstairs to the Great Room for the ceremony to begin. Downstairs was a menagerie of vintage treasures and décor.

Farm fresh and fragrant flowers were grown and bouquets crafted by Stonecipher Farm.

The wedding ceremony itself was a true celebration of Amalia and Gabe. Each member of the wedding party was asked to contribute a song, dance, poem, story or other prose. The couple then affirmed their own heartfelt vows to one another.

After the “I Dos” a wedding parade made their way to Portland City Hall for photos and a special treat, Mark’s Hot Dogs.

Once again formulating their wedding day as their own, Amalia and Gabe performed their “First Song” opposed to dance.

Guests relished an evening of delectable food, scrumptious homemade treats, entertaining music and overall exuberance.

Thank you to Amalia and Gabe for being truly one of a kind and inviting me along for the ride.

Venue – Restaurant Grace; Hair & Makeup – Ryan Anderson at Groom; Flowers – Stonecipher Farm; Hot Dog Vendor – Mark’s Hot Dogs; Photography – Robbie Kanner

Thanks to Kate for sharing the love.

Team:

Photography: Meredith Perdue

Design, Styling and Tablescape: Sarah Goodwin, daisies & pearls

Dessert Table and Venue: Jessica Parrott Robitaille, Nothing Bakes Like a Parrott

Paper Goods: Sarah Parrott Bianculli, Parrott Design Studio

Photo Booth: Parrott’s Photo Booth Company

Hair and Makeup: Michelle Wheaton, ENVY Hair Salon

A special thanks to our adorable models, Chris and Lindsey, for lending their smiles and entertaining us with their own love/engagement story.

The board I created was inspired by Union Station in Los Angeles, with its Streamline Moderne architecture. Click here to see the finished product.

I am thrilled to share that my board was announced the winner and is providing inspiration for the ModCloth 2012 spring wedding campaign!

Thank you ModCloth for organizing such a fun creative exercise. I will be anxiously awaiting the reveal of your spring wedding campaign.

daisies & pearls can wear many different hats for a client; advisor, designer, coordinator and helper just to name a few. I have even been animal control, removing a confused one eyed chicken, named Helen, from a wedding venue (and yes, for you Napoleon Dynamite fans, chickens do have large talons). When first becoming engaged a very important question you need to ask yourself is, “Do I need to hire a wedding planner?” To assist in the decision making process I asked my clients why they hired daisies & pearls. Here are their answers.

Annie: “I would say I hired a wedding coordinator because I have a lot of ideas that I love but am just not great at making everything work together. Another reason would be that I know the day of can be very stressful and I just want it to be a fun and stress free day for Josh and I, I know that you’ll be there to coordinate everyone there from the rental companies to the caterer to the DJ.”

Lauren: “Shortly after getting engaged, we secured our venue (a small bed & breakfast sitting on 10 acres of land in Kingfield, ME that had never hosted a wedding before). Even though we wanted to do everything ourselves… design, decor, food, drink, set-up, and break down… we were also interested in some support and experience to help make our DIY wedding weekend a successful reality. We knew that doing it all would create stress and we didn’t want the added responsibility to detract from the experience for ourselves or our parents. Throughout our year-long engagement, Sarah was our go-to person for anything and everything wedding related. She was always there to answer questions, come up with ideas, offer solutions, listen to our pre-wedding anxiety and she even met us at the venue a few months before the wedding to walk through the site with us. Sarah responded to emails, calls and texts quickly whether it was an etiquette question or to help brainstorm another one of our crazy DIY creations. Sarah showed up at 10am the Friday before our wedding (after taking a pit stop in Augusta, ME to pick up some last minute additional flowers!) and did not stop working until 10pm on the night of our wedding. Whether it was setting up the ceremony site, sending my dad and I down the aisle, or arranging the scotch and cigar bar after dinner, Sarah was there for us 100%. Knowing Sarah was there to solve any issues that arose helped us be able to relax and really enjoy our wedding day! She pays attention to detail, goes above and beyond in every instance, and truly has the passion to match her motivation and attentiveness.”

Michelle: “When my fiancé and I decided that we were going to tackle to HUGE task of planning an outdoor wedding at a private residence, I knew I was going to need someone to help coordinate everything (from the forks to food and alcohol all the way up to what I would do with all the guests if it rains)!!! I had met with other wedding coordinators around the area and all of them seemed to want to plan my wedding for me. I had taken the time to find vendors I was interested in and my ideas seemed to push aside for the vendors they “typically worked with”. When we met with Sarah, she sat and listened to all my scatter brained ideas, vendors I liked, and with a smile on her face and excitement in her voice she said “We can make this happen!” I know I can go to her with any idea or request and she is happy and eager to help! My fiancé and I are not just another client to Sarah, but people she has an invested interest in because she wants to make our wedding day something special! I know, without a doubt, we would not be able to make this day happen without her!!”

Sarah: “It was my fiancé’s idea to hire a wedding coordinator. We are getting married in his home town (not mine), and he was insistent on finding someone local to help with our big day. I immediately pushed back – we’re paying for a lot of our wedding ourselves and this is one area where we hadn’t really budgeted. Additionally, I tried to argue that, among other things, I can just work with the events captain for the (local) catering company we’re using. I also promised him that I wouldn’t be stressed-out on the day of the wedding and could enlist family/friends and the catering company to help with last minute details. I quickly learned to my dismay, that this is one area that my fiancé was NOT going to budge on – rather than push back further, I did some research, read lots of reviews, and scheduled some calls. As soon as I talked to Sarah of Daisies and Pearls, I knew my fiancé had made the right call (and chastised myself for even doubting him in the first place)!! I can’t imagine our wedding without hiring a wedding coordinator and look forward to having Sarah help us carry out our vision for our special day!! There are so many things that I hadn’t even thought of that Sarah has (will be) covered(ing) for us. I won’t have to worry about anything on the day-of our wedding (one of Patrick’s biggest concerns) other than making sure I’m dressed and where I need to be – I can’t even begin to explain what a huge burden this has lifted off my chest (and I hadn’t even realized it was there!). Additionally, I overlooked a very important factor that my fiancé recently pointed out – in hiring a wedding coordinator, we’re also gaining some leverage with our other hired vendors, as it’s in their best interests to work well with a wedding coordinator (Sarah, Daisies and Pearls), whom they’ll likely be working with again and again, rather than the couple getting married (who will most likely just be using them for their wedding). Sarah’s also been an amazing source of inspiration and advice. Just having someone available who has been through this before and is available to answer any and all of my questions is a great value in and of itself. I will never again question this decision and have been recommending a wedding coordinator to all of my friends and coworkers getting married!”

Shirley: “My wedding is over, and one of the things I miss most is…working with Sarah! For months, she responded to and added to my questions and ideas. Sarah was always so supportive and enthusiastic about my thoughts, and even my corny jokes. Being out-of-state, she guided us in choosing vendors – and they were perfection because she thoroughly understood what we were looking for. What is amazing about Sarah is that she is so talented and so knowledgeable; there is nothing she cannot help with. Sarah did not steer my wedding vision, instead, she listened and studied attentively as I shared my cluttered hopes for the big day. Sarah had this gift for helping me mold my thoughts into reality – which I could never have done on my own. It was amazing to have her organization as well. There was not a single second of the wedding day that wasn’t accounted for, and yet, the day did not run like a machine. The day managed to stay care-free and light, just the way I had hoped. I was with my family and friends, ate everything, and stayed in every moment of the wedding, because Sarah was a steady beacon, making sure every detail was in order and on time. Many things Sarah had done came to my realization after the wedding was over and I was amazed.”

If any of these answers sound similar to your own situation, please consider contacting daisies & pearls for a free consultation. Thank you to my sweet clients, past and present, for their kind words.

Photo Credits: the featured behind the scenes action shots were captured by Meredith Perdue at Lauren and Stephen’s, Kingfield, Maine wedding.

Michelle recalls the day as follows:

“My roommate at the time and I were planning on going to a Brad Paisley concert. It was looking like it was going to rain and being an outside venue we were a little hesitant about going. Finally we said ‘what the heck’ and decided to go anyway…thank goodness we did!

We met up with some friends in a parking lot outside the theater to partake in some pre-concert tailgating. Mike was among the same group, parked with a few of his friends in the next spot over. As I was being introduced to everyone new, Mike especially stood out to me. This may have been because of his attire (a cowboy hat, sun glasses, and a Coors light in each hand) or because of his wonderful smile which immediately made me smile. After that magical moment, pre-concert activities carried on as normal, but Mike and I continued to gravitate to each other. I would steal a hot dog off his grill, he would sneak some Cheetos from me…always smiling at each other. Even in the concert we were by each other’s side all night chatting and singing the night away. After all the excitement we gave each other a hug and went our separate ways. I have to admit I was disappointed he didn’t ask for my number because I really liked him! The next morning I decided to throw the gender roles out and I found him on Facebook and friended him! You say, ‘creepy stalker’…I say, ‘taking the initiative’.

That night we ended up talking on Facebook for hours about anything and everything. I remember laughing out loud at our conversation and feeling so comfortable with him. Naturally he wanted to see me again (and yes…I wanted to see him too) but the next day my little brother came into town for a visit. Even though I made him wait a whole week and a half we continued to talk to each other every night.

Our first official date was dinner at his apartment. We shared more great conversation over enchiladas and wine. We had so much in common and we’re so comfortable with each other from the beginning. One detail that stands out is our common nickname ‘Meesh’. I texted my friend the next day, who gave me the nickname in high school, that I had met a guy with the same nickname and her response…’O.M.G. You HAVE to marry him!’ And well…the rest is history ”

Mike recalls the day as follows:

“As far as the actual story of how we met goes, Michelle summed it up much better than I could. What I can say though is that the first things I noticed about Michelle were her sparkling blue eyes and that big white smile. She looked beautiful. I would like to note that I did put down one of my beers in order to shake her hand, which was pretty gentlemanly on my part if I do say so myself!

We quickly bonded over that fact that we were the only two people in our group who didn’t know everyone else. They were all natives, but Michelle and I discovered a common lack of enthusiasm for our “temporary geographic assignments” and talked all night about the states that we call ‘Home’. Right away I was attracted to Michelle’s appreciation for the slower-paced style of living that we had both been accustomed to our whole lives, and shared fond memories of places where people use their blinkers, hold the door open for others, and return their grocery store shopping carts to the closest shopping cart disposal pen. She was so easy to talk to, and we sang and laughed together all night to the tunes of one of our favorite musicians.

I don’t know why I didn’t ask for her number that night, but I’m so glad she ‘decided to throw the gender roles out’ and took the initiative to track me down. I knew that I didn’t want to wait very long to see her again, so I pushed pretty hard for us to get together. Our first date was incredibly indicative of the life we’ve began to share together: spending quality time doing things like cooking, flirting, and most importantly, making each other laugh.

The biggest thing I take away from the night we first met is looking at a friend’s pictures a couple days after. In the background of a couple of them I could see Michelle and I standing there next to each other, oblivious to the world around us, enjoying the moment laughing and getting to know each other. The smile I had on my face in those pictures is the same smile she puts on my face every day, and will continue to for countless years to come.”

You can bet there will be some Brad Paisley blaring when Michelle and Mike tie the knot this September in charming Belgrade, Maine. I am thrilled to be on “your team”.