A Woodside Wedding: We Get Tossed, Part 2

After I did the bouquet toss, it was time for the garter toss! If you remember, I'd hand sewn my own DIY garter:

(personal photo)

Because it was such a hot day, I didn't put on my garter until right before the tosses, and I never ended up putting on my old and blue other garter. I knew Mr. Cola was going to have enough trouble locating one garter under my eight layers of dress, without adding a second one in the mix!

And struggle he did, it took him what felt like a good two minutes of reaching up my dress. I love the laughter on everyone's faces in the background of our pictures--his struggle with this was pretty hilarious!

Still looking....

Come on, dude, it's not that hard to find.....

Success, he's finally got it!

Then it was time for some tossing! The guys gathered (we had a whole lot more single guys than single ladies at our wedding).

(Two above pictures are guest photos)

And it was our MC groomsman who caught it. Look at him, showing off!

It was pretty funny because this was our groomsman's 3rd garter he's ever caught, just like it was the 3rd bouquet that my cousin had ever caught. And they're both currently living in Texas...hmmm! ;)

I love this photo of Mr. Cola right after the garter toss. It really captures how much fun doing these silly traditional tosses were!

And oh yeah, I had to yell at my friend, who was supposed to catch the garter. I'd been telling him for a year that he was the target, considering he and his girlfriend have been dating for 8 years, and already own a house together. But he didn't even try to catch it!

(A lovely guest photo, capturing me yelling "Dude, you were supposed to at least try to catch it!")

If you are doing the bouquet and/or garter toss, will you have "targets" in mind of who you're going to throw to?

Miss any wedding week details? Catch up here:

- I packed an emergency bag that saved my dress
- We had a crazy 4 days prepping for house guests and stuffing favors
- Shopping for a ton of wedding flowers to arrange ourselves
- Mr. Cola drinks a 40 and I have a night out on the town for our low-key bach parties
- A day of DIY'ing flower arrangements
- I kicked off our official recaps with my #1 wedding tip
- We began the weekend festivities with a sunset cruise for our wedding party
- We rehearsed our quick and easy ceremony
- I panicked, but we got our rehearsal dinner decorations set up just in time
- Our families met for the first time at our rehearsal dinner under the trees
- What went wrong on our wedding day, and my tips for future brides
- My bridesmaids and I got our hair and makeup done in the hotel suite
- I put on my wedding dress and became a bride
- The guys watched the World Cup, then got ready in 10 minutes
- Traffic delayed our decorations getting to the venue, and I almost ruined our first look
- We got to see each other for the first time on our wedding day at our first look
- We took some time for bride and groom pictures in the park
- I gave you a behind the scenes look at our family, friends and DOC setting up our venue
- Arriving at our venue and getting ready for the ceremony to start
- Everyone walked down the aisle
- Excerpts from our ceremony, and reading the vows we wrote for each other
- I interrupted our officiant, we exchanged rings, and with a kiss we were officially married!
- Wedding party and family portraits, and my thoughts on missing pictures
- Our guests enjoyed cocktail hour while we took a few more photos
- Everyone ate a delicious dinner, and our siblings gave beautiful toasts
- We didn't practice, but we had a very special and wonderful first dance as husband and wife
- I showed you some disposable camera pictures, which were totally worth it to include on our tables!
- I found a target and tossed my bouquet at her

(Unless otherwise noted, all photos in this post were taken by the very talented photographers of Shoot Me Now Photography)

A Woodside Wedding: We Get Tossed, Part 1

About 45 minutes after dinner ended and we had our first dance, it was time for some wedding activities! First up was the bouquet toss.

I know lots of couples decide not to do the bouquet and garter tosses these days, but for us they were just fun traditions, that have been done at almost every wedding we've been to. So we figured, why not?

Our MC groomsman made the announcement, and ladies started gathering to one side of the bar. I surveyed my targets.

I finally spotted who I was going to aim for, and made sure she knew my eyes were on her!

Then I did a fake out throw! I love the below guest photo because you can see just how badly our officiant's girlfriend wanted to catch it, and my sister looks like she's saying, "hey, what the hell is with the fake throw!"

(guest photo)

I figured more than one fake toss would just be cruel, so I went ahead with the real toss.

I quickly spun around to find out who had caught it.

(guest photo)

Turns out it was my cousin (with her arms in the air in the above photo). This was apparently the third bouquet she's caught, so hopefully good luck comes in 3s in her case!

(guest photo)

Are you planning on doing the traditional bouquet and/or garter tosses at your wedding?

Miss any wedding week details? Catch up here:

- I packed an emergency bag that saved my dress
- We had a crazy 4 days prepping for house guests and stuffing favors
- Shopping for a ton of wedding flowers to arrange ourselves
- Mr. Cola drinks a 40 and I have a night out on the town for our low-key bach parties
- A day of DIY'ing flower arrangements
- I kicked off our official recaps with my #1 wedding tip
- We began the weekend festivities with a sunset cruise for our wedding party
- We rehearsed our quick and easy ceremony
- I panicked, but we got our rehearsal dinner decorations set up just in time
- Our families met for the first time at our rehearsal dinner under the trees
- What went wrong on our wedding day, and my tips for future brides
- My bridesmaids and I got our hair and makeup done in the hotel suite
- I put on my wedding dress and became a bride
- The guys watched the World Cup, then got ready in 10 minutes
- Traffic delayed our decorations getting to the venue, and I almost ruined our first look
- We got to see each other for the first time on our wedding day at our first look
- We took some time for bride and groom pictures in the park
- I gave you a behind the scenes look at our family, friends and DOC setting up our venue
- Arriving at our venue and getting ready for the ceremony to start
- Everyone walked down the aisle
- Excerpts from our ceremony, and reading the vows we wrote for each other
- I interrupted our officiant, we exchanged rings, and with a kiss we were officially married!
- Wedding party and family portraits, and my thoughts on missing pictures
- Our guests enjoyed cocktail hour while we took a few more photos
- Everyone ate a delicious dinner, and our siblings gave beautiful toasts
- We didn't practice, but we had a very special and wonderful first dance as husband and wife
- I showed you some disposable camera pictures, which were totally worth it to include on our tables!

(Unless otherwise noted, all photos in this post were taken by the very talented photographers of Shoot Me Now Photography)

Gettin' Cultural and Stuff

I always love reading about the many beautiful cultural touches many couples incorporate into their weddings. There are so many special and meaningful things that can be added to celebrate family and cultural traditions, but sadly, Mr. Cola and I don't have much to work with.

I'm very Irish (and Mr. C is a self-proclaimed mutt, with a many European cultures in his family's background), and, well ok, so we ARE having an open bar (with Guinness as one of the 6 beers on tap), but there's not much else that sounds neat enough to do that's "Irish."
{Source}

There are, however, some interesting options that I came across when I Googled "Irish wedding traditions":

• There's one quaint custom where the groom was invited to the bride's house right before the wedding and they cooked a goose in his honor. It was called Aitin' the gander — it has to be where we get the expression 'his goose is cooked!'
• Bunratty Meade is a honey wine that's served at the Bunratty Castle medieval banquet. It's from a recipe based on the oldest drink in Ireland and if you've never tasted it, it's well worth trying. In the old days, it was consumed at weddings because it was thought that it promoted virility. (If a baby was born nine months after the wedding, it was attributed to the mead!) Couples also drank it from special goblets for a full month following the wedding, which is supposedly where we get the word honeymoon. This was to protect the couple from the fairies coming to spirit the bride away.
• Lucky horseshoe. Irish brides used to carry a real horseshoe for good luck. (Turned up so the luck won't run out). You can get porcelain horseshoes which most Irish brides carry these days, or one made of fabric which is worn on the wrist.
• Magic Hanky. This charming custom involves having the bride carry a special hanky that with a few stitches can be turned into a christening bonnet for the first baby. With a couple of snips it can be turned back into a hanky that your child can carry on his/her wedding day.
• Make-up bells. The chime of bells is thought to keep evil spirits away, restore harmony if a couple is fighting, and also remind a couple of their wedding vows. Giving a bell as a gift has become an Irish tradition. You could also have your greeters hand out tiny bells to your guests to ring as you process.
• Irish Dancers. Consider hiring a group of Irish dancers to hand out your programs before the ceremony. Dressed in their full regalia, it would add a wonderful touch of pageantry and color. They could also dance at the reception later.
• Flowers. In the old days, many Irish brides wore a wreath of wildflowers in their hair; they also carried them in bouquets.
• Ancient custom: In the old days, couples ate salt and oatmeal at the beginning of their reception: Each of them took three mouthfuls as a protection against the power of the evil eye. Also, when a couple is dancing, the bride can't take both feet off the floor because the fairies will get the upper hand. Fairies love beautiful things and one of their favorites is a bride. There's many an Irish legend about brides being spirited away by the little people! For the same reason, it's bad luck for a bride to wear green.

{Source of these traditions is from Ireland-Information.com}

Maybe it's just me, but I'm not into the fact that so many of these traditions have to do with babies or fairies! So we'll have our open bar and be done with the traditions for our wedding day.

However, for the rehearsal dinner, I will be pulling in a bit of culture, even though it's not ours! One of Mr. Cola's oldest friend's, Groomsman P's parents gifted me some gorgeous jewelry while we were in Mr. C's hometown after Christmas. GM P's family is from India, and it's a very important tradition to gift the bride beautiful jewelry in their culture. Mrs. Jasmine gave a wonderful overview of the importance of jewelry and the different types in her Bejeweled post, from which I learned why there are loops on the top of the earrings I was given (because the earrings are heavy, the loops go over the tops of your ears to support the weight).

Since I already have my wedding day jewelry, I plan to wear these gorgeous pieces with my rehearsal dinner dress--I think the white and gold hand beaded jewelry will go perfectly with my white dress.


And doesn't the flower on these earrings and necklace look familiar? As in almost like our flower punches we used on our STD belly bands and favor boxes! How perfect!

(this picture and jewelry pictures above are personal photos)

So there you have it, although we won't be doing much to celebrate our own cultures, wonderful people we know are helping us incorporate a little of their culture in our wedding celebrations. And it doesn't hurt that I got some fabulous jewelry out of it either ;) !

How will you be incorporating your cultural traditions into your wedding? Got any more amusing traditions you'd like to share?