You Make My Dreams Come True: Dollar Dance

The dollar dance is another controversial wedding tradition, but it was one we knew we’d participate in. I’ve heard it may be a Midwest thing (or called something else in other regions) but every wedding we’ve been to has done it, and a lot of our guests expected it. We had so much fun with it, and our guests did too. It was so nice to get a chance to visit with tons of people individually.

To be honest, I have no idea what songs our DJ played. I pretty much left it up to him, and he did a great job of keeping the music going (even after he had to play a few more songs than we’d planned because of the number of guests who wanted to participate!) and kept the mood upbeat and fun. Anyway, on to the pictures!

{David’s younger brother’s girlfriend}

{BM S!}

{MOH A’s boyfriend}

{GM J}

{GM J’s girlfriend}

{Our wonderful SIL}

{My beautiful momma}

{David’s aunt with his mom looking on}

 

{guest photo}

{Love my mom!}

{My aunt and godmother who was a reader in our ceremony}

{My ‘little’ brother}

{My big brother}

{MOH A’s boyfriend}

{guest photo}

{guest photo}

I feel like I say this about every post, but these are more of my favorite memories and pictures of the night. I think I’m laughing in almost every picture! So don’t hate me too much for having a dollar dance at my wedding. :)

*All photos in this post (unless otherwise noted) taken by Becky of Stamp of Life Photography*

Need to catch up?

 

We started on Thursday.

We decorated Friday morning.

We rehearsed.

We got pretty!

I put on my dress. 

We had our first look!

The guys had their turn.

The girls stole the show. 

We got some fun bridal party pictures. 

We took bride & groom portraits.

We took care of the formal portraits.

We took pictures with the kiddos.

We spent time hanging out waiting for the ceremony to start.

The grandparents and parents were seated.

It was finally time for the processional.

A step back to the playing of the slideshow.

The ceremony started. (Part 1)

The ceremony continued. (Part 2)

The ceremony ended. (Part 3)

We had a little fun with our recessional. 

I shared our ceremony details. 

We made our grand exit.

And then made our grand entrance!

We listened to touching toasts.

Then it was time to cut the cake.

We had our first dance!

We danced with our parents.

We did our bouquet and garter toss.

You Make My Dreams Come True: Bouquet & Garter Toss

We were finally ready for the bouquet and garter tosses. David and I are pretty young and were the first of our friends to get married, so we had LOTS of single friends who were more than willing to participate. I loved this part of the night!

First up was the bouquet toss, and we used the most popular/cliché song out there - ‘Single Ladies’ by Beyonce. Say what you want – I loved it!

My first throw didn’t go so well. The bouquet ended up hitting something on the ceiling, and it landed on the floor – Turning it into a mad dash from the kids to get the bouquet.

{guest photo}

I tried it again, and it turned out much better.

Mainly because my best friend, MOH A, caught it!

David chose the song for the garter toss and he chose the Mission Impossible theme song – ha. Random, but comical.

Do you see that bright blue shirt right in the middle? That’s MOH A’s boyfriend. He was inches away from catching it – Wouldn’t that have been perfect?!

Instead, one of our friends’ younger brother (who’s still in high school) was the lucky one.

{See my DIY garter?}

I wore two garters so I wouldn’t lose my KU garter that my mom made me. I wish I’d gotten a pro picture of them, but thankfully BM S snapped this one while we were getting ready:

{guest photo}

I know the bouquet/garter tosses are controversial in the wedding world now, but I’m so glad this was one tradition we kept. Everyone enjoyed it, and these memories and pictures are some of my favorite from the day!

*All pictures in this post (unless otherwise noted) taken by Becky of Stamp of Life Photography*

Need to catch up?

 

We started on Thursday.

We decorated Friday morning.

We rehearsed.

We got pretty!

I put on my dress. 

We had our first look!

The guys had their turn.

The girls stole the show. 

We got some fun bridal party pictures. 

We took bride & groom portraits.

We took care of the formal portraits.

We took pictures with the kiddos.

We spent time hanging out waiting for the ceremony to start.

The grandparents and parents were seated.

It was finally time for the processional.

A step back to the playing of the slideshow.

The ceremony started. (Part 1)

The ceremony continued. (Part 2)

The ceremony ended. (Part 3)

We had a little fun with our recessional. 

I shared our ceremony details. 

We made our grand exit.

And then made our grand entrance!

We listened to touching toasts.

Then it was time to cut the cake.

We had our first dance!

We danced with our parents.

You Make My Dreams Come True: Special Dances

After dancing for the first time with my new husband, it was time to dance with the other important man in my life. My dad is my hero, hands down. He’s always supported me, and he’s been the dad that every girl dreams of having. David has so many of the same qualities as my daddy, and I’m so glad – He’ll be an incredible father some day.

When I was thinking about my dance with my dad (way back in December of 2009!) I blogged about our relationship and about the song I’d chosen. I also mentioned the slideshow I planned to make of the pictures of my dad and me. The slideshow was a huge success (although the execution of starting it on time was not so great – again, thanks to the employees of our awful venue) and my dad loved it!

{I have no idea why ‘girl’ isn’t spelled correctly in the beginning or why the text isn’t clear – It was in the one we played!}

The mother-son dance immediately followed our dance. David has always been really close to his mom, so it was nice to have a special time to honor their relationship. We made a slideshow of pictures of David and her as well, and they danced to 'My Wish’ by Rascal Flatts.

With the dances finished, there were only a few ‘important’ moments remaining. Up next is the bouquet and garter toss – And believe me, our guests definitely didn’t hate it! The pictures from the tosses are some of my favorite of the entire night!

*All pictures in this post taken by Becky of Stamp of Life Photography*

Need to catch up?

 

We started on Thursday.

We decorated Friday morning.

We rehearsed.

We got pretty!

I put on my dress. 

We had our first look!

The guys had their turn.

The girls stole the show. 

We got some fun bridal party pictures. 

We took bride & groom portraits.

We took care of the formal portraits.

We took pictures with the kiddos.

We spent time hanging out waiting for the ceremony to start.

The grandparents and parents were seated.

It was finally time for the processional.

A step back to the playing of the slideshow.

The ceremony started. (Part 1)

The ceremony continued. (Part 2)

The ceremony ended. (Part 3)

We had a little fun with our recessional. 

I shared our ceremony details. 

We made our grand exit.

And then made our grand entrance!

We listened to touching toasts.

Then it was time to cut the cake.

We had our first dance!

You Make My Dreams Come True: Our First Dance

When the cake had been cut and everyone had a chance to get a piece (or two) we went ahead and had our first dance. I wanted as much dancing time as possible, and we also knew several of our older guests/high school teachers/etc would want to leave after the ‘main’ parts of the reception were over.

Leading up to the wedding we’d gone back and forth about doing a fun first dance (a la Rock the Reception) since my best friend, MOH A, and I were both on the dance team in high school and taught the guys dances during spirit week. I had these grand visions of starting our first dance normally and then having the music skip and the video of one of the boys’ high school dance routines (with A and I leading them) come on the screen. It would’ve been hilarious. And so much fun. But MOH A also lives 8 hours away and was only in town for a week before the wedding. You may remember I left a LOT of projects to finish during that week. There was just no time to choreograph and teach a dance routine.

Looking back I’m still kind of sad it didn’t work out, but I also know it would’ve made the week leading up to the wedding a lot more stressful than it already was. And I would’ve been anxious about ‘performing’ in front of all of our guests. So our first dance was simple and uneventful… and perfect. We talked about how we couldn’t believe we were finally married, we laughed, we kissed, we sang to each other, and I cried a little. I love those memories.

There was never any question which song we’d dance to if we did a ‘normal’ dance, though. True Companion by Marc Cohn has been our song throughout our whole relationship. And I’d been waiting for YEARS for these lines to be true for our relationship:  ‘So don’t you dare try to walk away. I’ve got my heart set on our wedding day. I’ve got this vision of a girl in white – I’ve made my decision and it’s you alright. And when I take your hand, I’ll watch my heart set sail. I’ll take my trembling fingers and I’ll lift up your veil.’ Feel free to play the song to really set the mood for the pictures!

{I love that she caught me singing!}

 

 

{The fact that I can tell David has a huge smile on his face just from the laugh lines by his eyes makes me so happy! I’m so thankful for this shot!}

We were honestly in our own little world the whole time we were dancing. I really hate being the center of attention, but I wasn’t even concerned about everyone watching us. The four minutes flew by, and I immediately wished I could go back and repeat it as soon as the song ended. But I still had my other favorite man to dance with – My dad! Up next, the father/daughter and mother/son dances!

*All photos in this post taken by Becky of Stamp of Life Photography*

Need to catch up?
 

We started on Thursday.

We decorated Friday morning.

We rehearsed.

We got pretty!

I put on my dress. 

We had our first look!

The guys had their turn.

The girls stole the show. 

We got some fun bridal party pictures. 

We took bride & groom portraits.

We took care of the formal portraits.

We took pictures with the kiddos.

We spent time hanging out waiting for the ceremony to start.

The grandparents and parents were seated.

It was finally time for the processional.

A step back to the playing of the slideshow.

The ceremony started. (Part 1)

The ceremony continued. (Part 2)

The ceremony ended. (Part 3)

We had a little fun with our recessional. 

I shared our ceremony details. 

We made our grand exit.

And then made our grand entrance!

We listened to touching toasts.

Then it was time to cut the cake.