We kicked off wedding season this year with a gorgeous multicultural wedding in Arlington. Chris and Marie were married on what started off as a cloudy day, but brightened up in time for group pictures outside, taken by the super fun Daniel McGarrity.

Marie had her hair and makeup done in the house she grew up in. Cori Campbell came up HUGE in the hair department, by doing Marie’s trial the weekend before, and traveling all the way from West Virginia to be in Potomac by 8:00 in the morning! Makeup was done for the girls by the AMAZING Lori Nansi, who then came to the hotel later for the reception to refresh Marie’s makeup and give her a “nighttime” look — what service!

After a traditional Indian ceremony at the bride’s parents’ house, the bridal party and family made their way to Arlington to the beautiful Cathedral of St. Thomas More

Marie’s bridal party had beautiful teal lenghas:

All of the flowers were provided by Jen and Nate’s florist, Maryam Flowers. We LOVE Maryam, she is SO amazing!

I’m seeing more and more cascade bouquets these days. Have you noticed that?

After the ceremony and family photos at the church, the bridal party, transported by the wonderful drivers at Limos, Inc. (Call Elissa there…she’s AWESOME!), headed off to the Library of Congress with Daniel and Neil from Blue Sky Films, one of our favorite videographers. (Here he is in action with his assistant later in the evening…)

I LOVED the pictures from the Library — what a great idea for a photo location, Daniel! (Caution…slight photo overload ahead

After the visit to the Library of Congress, the bridal party headed to the Sheraton National for the reception. Their rooftop ballroom has a great view of the city, especially of the Pentagon and the Air Force Memorial.

(This picture is from the hotel’s web site, just so you can see the view!)

When she arrived at the hotel, Marie made her first costume change of the evening, from her white wedding dress to her traditional sari, which was a gift to her from Chris.

She wore this during the first dance and toasts, but, seeing as how she had trouble moving in it, she soon switched to her lengha.

Marie’s cousin, who is a priest at the Vatican, was supposed to perform the ceremony, but due to the volcanoes earlier that month in Iceland, he wasn’t able to get a flight…or so Chris and Marie thought! Her cousin was able to get there in time for the reception — and he brought with him a blessing from the Pope! WOW!

Chris and Marie had a DELICIOUS cake from one of my absolute favorite bakeries (which is dangerously close to my house) Heidelberg Pastry Shoppe

And, of course at the reception, we had more gorgeous flowers from Maryam! (These pictures are from me, not Daniel)

Thanks to all of the wonderful vendors who made this day great!

If you missed yesterday’s post on Lindsay & Sam’s wedding ceremony, scroll down or click here!  You can also see my non-pro photos from this event right here.  Again, a big special thanks to photographer Greg Gibson for his hard work at the event, fantastic followup, and of course, amazing images:

Ray at Party Perfect hooked us up with this beautiful tent and even a tent attendant for the day:

Inside the tent:

Capitol Catering really did a phenomenal job with the food and service.  Notice the tables have alternating linens of orange and yellow!  Here’s what the whole setting looks like:

Lindsay designed all the paper products herself, including these menus.  Isn’t their monogram to die for?

John at Spot Floral Design really went above and beyond with these beautiful and unique centerpieces.  Each one had three small vases of flowers and three pillars of floating gold candles.  They were gorgeous!

Mike at Blondell’s Accents on Events hung all those Chinese lanterns and also provided uplighting on the tent and trees:

Kendall did a phenomenal job on their wedding cake:

David from MyDeejay.com kept people on the dance floor all night long!  He really did a great job at balancing American and Indian music to keep everyone happy:

And they partied all night long!  I love this image of the tent and the beautiful Chesapeake Bay:

reception-tent-chesapeake-bay

Usually I only post once about any given wedding.  This time I have too many photos!  Today we have images from Lindsay & Sam’s ceremony and tomorrow we’ll feature their reception.  Special thanks to photographer Greg Gibson who got these to me lightning-fast!

Rebecca and I started the day off at 11am.  Here’s the River House at Queenstown Golf Club, all ready for an event:

Since we had a lot of setting up to do I chose to wear some more comfortable clothes then change into my ‘wedding outfit’ later in the day.  Here I am confirming some of the last-minute changes with Lindsay while she gets beautified:

I think all that time in the director’s chair was worth it!  Here’s our star of the show.  Isn’t she gorgeous?

I couldn’t resist this one of Lindsay peeking out the window at her future husband:

Lindsay and Sam chose to see each other before the ceremony, which I am a big proponent of.  It gives couples the opportunity to share a private moment of bliss before the mayhem begins.  Here’s a glimpse at how special it can be:

They even had some time for photos with the bridal party.  This one has to be my favorite.  If you’ve followed us since the beginning, you may recognize one of the bridesmaids.  The gal standing closest to the Sam (our groom) is Mariah!  Mariah was one of our very first brides, then turned into one of our best planners, then started her family off with twins and moved to Minnesota.  It was great to see her even just for a couple minutes here and there:

On to the ceremony!  John at Spot Floral Design set up this beautiful canopy with orange fabric and bamboo poles.  The one problem was that the fabric acted like a sail and kept blowing the whole thing over!  Even after we pieced it together it still provided a perfect spot for their altar.  ::note to self…no canopies when you’re on the waterfront::

Reverend Amanda Tate performed a fantastic ceremony that incorporated Sam’s Indian culture.  Lindsay’s sister and Sam’s brother served as matron of honor and best man:

We passed out small bags of flower petals so guests could toss them at the newlyweds.  Don’t you just love their expression of sheer joy?

I’ll leave you with a few breathtaking images of Lindsay and Sam.  After the ceremony they were able to take these photos because they had done the family portraits earlier.  Greg and his assistant Rebecca were so wonderful to work with and I love what they captured:

Check back tomorrow for the photos of the par-tay!

Remember when we visited the River House back in January?  This amazing venue in Queenstown, MD held Lindsay & Sam’s big bash this weekend.  They tied the knot bay-side and celebrated under a beautiful glowing tent.  I’ll have better photos from photographer Greg Gibson soon but for now I’ll share the ones I took.

The ceremony site, all ready for some chairs:

Ray L. of Party Perfect hooked us up with this fantastic 60′x90′ tent!  The walls went all the way around since it was rather gusty on the bay.  They even left a Tent Attendant all night in case there were any problems:

Inside the tent.  Mike B. with Blondell’s Accents on Events set up these beautiful Chinese paper lanterns inside the tent.  He also handled the uplighting in the tent and on some trees, which you can see in full effect in the night photos later:

Like a lot of DC caterers, Capitol Catering gets their rentals from DC Rental.  They are reliable, have great equipment, and carry just about anything you need!  Here we have some glassware racks on the left, our table linens in the center, some plates in the black crates, who knows what’s in those gray bins (serving utensils?), and high chairs down in the front:

Can you believe that all these racks are JUST glassware?  Each stack has about 8 racks of 25-36 glasses each!

Bobby’s Pottys provided this wonderful luxury restroom trailer.  I’m not kidding — these were nicer than the facilities inside the house!  If you have an outdoor venue and limited restroom options, Bobby’s Pottys did a great job and provided an attendant to stay with the trailer all night:

Alison from Capitol Catering and me, getting started on some of the guest tables inside the tent:

John from Spot Floral Design came up with this beautiful canopy for the ceremony.  It was made of bamboo, curly willow, and had strands of orchids hanging from three sides:

The centerpieces had three low vases of flowers and three cylindrical vases with gold floating candles.  They were gorgeous!

Chatting with the musician from Entertainment Exchange about our cues for the ceremony:

Unfortunately no matter how much you confirm details, plan, and confirm again, things will inevitably ALWAYS go wrong on the wedding day.  This is where having a wedding planner truly makes a difference!  Twice before the ceremony, the wind caught our beautiful canopy and blew it over.  The fall broke every connection between the poles each time.  Unfortunately our florist was long gone to their next delivery and were were left to our devices to fix it.  A roll of clear duct tape ended up being our savior both times:

After the second fall, Rebecca was assigned to standing with the canopy to avoid further disaster:

Sam & Lindsay tying the knot!  They chose to incorporate Sam’s Indian culture into the service by lighting a traditional fire and walking around it.  Rev. Amanda Tate did a phenomenal job with their custom-made ceremony:

After the ceremony Lindsay & Sam escaped to take some portraits.  They chose to see each other before the ceremony so they took the big family shots earlier:

Remember how great Arienne & Rahman’s photos were?  It was a pleasure to work with Greg Gibson again.  Here he is getting “The Shot” with his assistant Rebecca:

Here’s what I saw through my lens.  I can’t wait to see what they captured!

Meanwhile inside the tent, the finishing touches are almost done.  Here, the chef from Capitol Catering dresses each of the salads individually after they’ve been set on the tables:

The catering team is folding napkins to fit Lindsay’s menu cards.  Here you can see just how windy it was!  Check out that tent wall behind them:

Thanks to our wonderful assistant Tracey, the escort card table looked beautiful!  She laid out strips of ribbon, pinned them to the table linen, then slipped each card’s back underneath to hold them in place.  The idea was to set this table outside and let guests find their card during the outdoor cocktail hour.  Unfortunately with the wind, even those ribbons wouldn’t have done their job very well.  I think they looked nice anyhow:

Can you believe our bride Lindsay made all these gorgeous cards?

Here’s a closeup of one of the salads.  Those are figs there around the edges.  Mmm!

The tent looks gorgeous!  Let’s have a party!

David from MyDeejay.com did a great job mixing the traditional American reception music with some great dance music for the Indian guests.  He was a little camera-shy but this is what his setup looks like:

Once the sun went down, the tent really looked amazing!

I was thrilled when I learned that Kendall’s Cakes would be bringing the cake.  Kendall is very talented and does a phenomenal job.  Lindsay and Sam chose to serve sheet cake as a cost-cutting method.  Can you believe that three layers of this cake are styrofoam?  Can you guess which one is real?

Outside, the lighting on the trees was very dramatic:

Congratulations, Lindsay & Sam!  Your big day was so gorgeous and I heard so many wonderful compliments on the food, the decor, and your personal ceremony.  I’m so glad we were able to be a part of your big day.