Valerie W. (long hair and pants), Occupational Therapy doctoral student & Valerie S. (short hair and dress), Social Worker
One sentence sum-up of the wedding vibe: A day full of love, welcome, and vulnerability.
Planned Budget: $5,000
Actual Budget: Slightly under $5,000
Number of Guests: 92
Where we allocated the most funds
I like to tell people that the way we were able to plan a $5,000 wedding was to set a line item budget of $500. $500 for a live band for contra dancing, $500 for each venue, $500 for food, $500 for photography (three hours, amazing deal from our amazing photographer!)… and on to smaller items. There are other approaches to low budget weddings, but for us this worked.
Where we allocated the least funds
We essentially had to be careful on every line item. Our budget met our tone: a humble wedding with lots of hospitality and lots of love. It could have felt like an aesthetic compromise but instead it let the vulnerability that we set as tone in our ceremony shine through our party as well.
Food: We self-catered our wedding and hired some folks who are doing a year of volunteer service to serve. It was a simple homemade meal of enchiladas, chips, salsa, and salad. We made and tested so many enchiladas the year before, and settled on two vegetarian options. With the help of the volunteers and a good friend we made 288 corn tortillas from scratch, and then made twenty-four pans of enchiladas, which we froze (after much testing to ensure quality!). We wanted to feed everyone, and we wanted it to feel like they had come over to our home for lunch. It did: delicious with wonderful conversation.
My dress: It is a non-wedding dress, and I found it marked down seventy percent. I loved it—the lace, the color and a short dress! It wasn’t all that a dress could be, but I will wear it again. I had earrings made from my grandmother’s opal ring to wear, and I wear them often with great delight.
What was totally worth it
We created extra opportunities to see our guests and to extend our circle with low-key, no cost events. We had a hiking trip on Thursday, our rehearsal was an open invitation to the Portland food carts, we had an after party where we invited a broader guest list, and a day-after brunch at our favorite coffee shop for family and a few friends. We loved extending the party and spending time with our favorite people who had traveled and taken time off work for our wedding.
Focusing on our ceremony as the main event throughout the wedding planning process kept us grounded in the who and why of it all. Unable to get married in our own Catholic tradition we had played with many ceremony ideas. We eventually asked Chris Craun at St. Michael and All Angels Episcopal Church if they would be willing to host us and marry us. The church was adorable, and having a minister who is a married lesbian herself was the most wonderful gift. We got to know her through our pre-marital counseling and will continue to visit their church—it was good to have a pastor on that day. Her homily spoke of the power of vulnerability and service, two themes of the music and readings we had chosen. My sister-in-law sang “I Want You to Be My Love” by Over the Rhine as we processed in together. We created a foot washing ceremony to wash each other’s feet before our vows to begin our marriage in vulnerable service to each other. I cried as we entered, and again as we washed each other’s feet. We wrote our own vows with the support of APW tutorials. By the time I was ready to kiss her I was just jumping inside with excitement and started hopping in place.
What was totally not worth it
Trying to control all of the things we cannot control, from dirty floors at our reception venue, which gave me nightmares, to the legal status of gay marriage in Oregon. It didn’t matter. We were wed in front of ninety-two members of our community in the most sacred ceremony. Two days later, we were standing outside the Multnomah County building when the judge announced that the ban against our marriage was out, we had a license in hand a few moments later, and were legally wed that afternoon, again by Chris, our pastor from St. Michaels. And I never noticed the floors, bathrooms, or anything else on the day of the wedding, and stopped caring if others did.
A few things that helped us along the way
Doing things together: meaning us plus all of our people. We are both helpers, and it was very hard to ask for help, but I am so glad we did. We included handwritten notes in our invitations, asking local guests to bring pies for the pie bar. Whenever I felt my energy lag during the planning process I thought: “PIE! Everything will be okay!” I’ve helped and participated in many weddings, but reading APW really filled so many gaps. Especially making room for the hard stuff and remembering (over and over and over) what you really care about.
My best practical advice for my planning self
Trust the wedding magic. Magic takes the ordinary and makes is extraordinary. Being so close to the details made me think I knew exactly what was coming on our day. We had worked on projects for a year, starting with marionberry jam favors the summer before, to sewing sock monkeys for the kids in the dead of winter, to making two hundred and fifty feet of bunting flags. I had worried about so many things. I had made all of these choices with my wife confidently for the right reasons, but still I worried that our wedding would leave people feeling flat. What we discovered was that people had come for us, and together we filled the day with tears, laughter, and hugs. From getting ready together in the early morning, to hugging our families and our bridal brigade as they joined us at the church, to contra dancing with everyone the entire day was so much more than I ever dreamed or dared hope.
Favorite thing about the wedding
Valerie W.: Dancing together, with all of our guests, and dancing in the rain at the end of the night.
Valerie S.: Feeling so whole and full of happiness, and being surrounded by our community.
STAY TUNED FOR Valerie and Valerie’s legal CITY HALL wedding this afternoon!
