The Wedding

Talida & Timothy
Houston, Texas
March 8, 2008

Like I promised, the wedding details. :)

As a born and raised Texan, I was thrilled when Tim suggested we have the wedding in my hometown Houston. The wedding was a destination wedding for about 80% of our guests. We wanted to highlight the best of Texas, so we had three main reasons for picking March 8: the weather, the Rodeo, and crawfish season. And it worked so well. Weather was a sunny 65F that day, many guests went to the Rodeo, and in one sitting a group of us ordered 50 pounds of crawfish. The weekend was great, but so was the wedding...

Theme
I've mentioned my love for baking with teas, particularly with the premium grade green tea matcha. Well, Tim and I always knew we wanted our wedding inspiration to come from food. We bonded early on in our relationship over Japanese food, so matcha fit us perfectly. Matcha showed up in our wedding cake and our homemade cookie favors, and the color green was the foundation element for all the floral and decor.

Ceremony
We were married in the beautiful chapel at Memorial Drive Presbyterian Church. The ceremony was, in the words of one of our guests, glorious. Everything was extremely meaningful and emotional, from the wonderful sermon to the music played by close friends and family. We wanted our wedding to reflect our faith and belief in marriage, and we were extremely blessed by the ceremony.

Photography
We had about three hours in between the ceremony and reception, and our photographer Laura of Laura Kay Photography and I had come up with the fun idea of going to a boot store for the wedding party photo shoot. We called up Cavender's Boot City, and the manager welcomed us in. We had a blast trying on all sorts of boots and hats. We definitely drew attention at the store, but the manager was right there encouraging us to use the merchandise as props. See the slide show she put together for us here.

Private Dinner
This was my surprise to Tim that day. I wanted a private dinner for the two of us to spend some quiet time together and actually eat, so I arranged a four course meal with wine pairings at Cova Wine Bar in the Heights. They were extremely accommodating, serving us at 4PM when their kitchen doesn't normally open until 5PM. The food was fantastic, and the wine pairing was superb. Our menu: Snapper Tartar, Exotic Mushroom Salad, Duck Breast with Papaya and Tamarind Sauce, and an Oxtail Ropa Vieja.

Reception
The reception was held at the Westlake Club in Houston's Energy Corridor. It wasn't our first choice, but it worked out wonderfully. The food was great, and Westlake Club's coordinator Jennifer Keefe was simply the best. She was on top of everything and pulled off a great sparkler sendoff. As far as decor, we kept things low-key. We brought in Bright Star Productions to set up some uplighting for ambiance. Centerpieces comprised of pillar candles in plates of coffee beans, and we reused our ceremony arrangements made by Universal Florists.

After Party
Our reception ended around 9:30PM, so we planned to host an after party at the country bar Wild West. We knew our guests wanted to party all night, so Wild West was an appropriate location for the celebration continuation. The club consists of a large dance floor, a spacious upstairs, and a karaoke lounge. We opted for reserving the karaoke lounge, and about 70 guests showed up, two-stepping and singing the night away.

Transportation
White Bentley Continental GT. We lucked out and this came through the week of, and we were thrilled.. what a beauty. Also, the NY license plate made it all the more fitting. From Uptown Exotics.

Veil/Hairpiece
My close friend Cheryl, a print designer for Nicole Miller, was my style coordinator throughout the planning process. She fully understood my style and vision for the wedding, so I trusted her to make a veil that fit the occasion. I showed her all my inspiration pictures, and she created a gorgeous birdcage veil adorned with ostrich plumes and baroque pearls. She also created a matching piece sans veil for me to wear after the ceremony.

Stationery
My mom used to own a print shop, so I've literally looked at every wedding invitation book since I was 7. That said, I got bored of standard invitations at an early age. We decided to go the custom route and design all the stationery ourselves, and David at Minuteman Press printed everything exactly how we envisioned it.

Favors
Homemade matcha cookies, made by my mom and me. See blog post here.

Toasts
While we were waiting for our send off cue, a Westlake employee came up to us, raving about our best man's speech. With all the weddings he works at, he's said heard it all and can predict all the speeches down to the timing. But he couldn't get enough of our best man Dave's original speech; he said he paid attention to the entire speech because he really didn't know what he'd say next.

Both our dads gave speeches too, and they were truly touching. They spoke about watching us grow up, challenged us to always remember our vows, and spoke such encouraging words to us, each in their own style.

After all the speeches, Tim had his own surprise: he took out a guitar and sang Brad Paisley's "The World" to me. Talk about an emotional day! I'd already been tearing throughout the ceremony and speeches, but this was the moment when I really cried.

Wedding Cake
Going along with our theme, we had a green tea wedding cake made by Le Duc Gourmet Bakery. I wish I could have made this myself. :)

Reception Music
Our good friend Andrew was our emcee and DJ, and he definitely set the mood for dinner with some jazz and light R&B. What we most appreciated about him was that he took initiative in switching things up all while keeping the overall theme and mood. Thanks to him, the reception flowed really well.

First Dance Song: "Anyone Else But You", Michael Cera & Ellen Page
Side note: Tim and I are die-hard Arrested Development fans, and we watch everything the actors are in. During that last scene in Juno, we both looked at each other, (me in tears) and we instantly knew that this was our song.

Father/Daughter Dance Song: "In My Life", The Beatles
This is what I call a "Saturday Morning" song. Growing up, my dad jammed on his guitar every Saturday morning, and I always woke up to him singing songs by The Beatles, The Eagles, or John Denver. It's my fondest memory of him, and this is my all-time favorite Beatles song.

Last Dance Song: "The Long Day Is Over", Norah Jones
The last dance immediately followed Tim's song to me, so I cried on his shoulder through most the song. I'll forever associate this song with the emotional ending of our reception.