Wedding: Reception

Finally, the party! Our reception was held in a hotel ballroom, which I have to admit I was hesitant about because I really wanted something with a lot of character that would go with the vintage-inspired decor. Those types of venues are very difficult though when you're planning out of town because you often have to organize your own vendors for catering, linens, furniture, etc. In the end, everything was beautiful and it turned out exactly how we had planned!


I chose to make one menu for display on the escort card table using the monogram from our invitations. The escort cards and other reception signs were DIY projects which I printed on "felt" cardstock. I absolutely loved our guestbook table which included photos of our parents and grandparents on their wedding day, plus a funny photo of Steve and I as kids. 

 

For our card box, we used a gold bird cage with a strip of alencon lace around the bottom and hydrangeas repurposed from the church pews.

Our centerpieces, which were a mixture of high and low arrangements, included pink hydrangeas and dusty miller. 

For the table numbers, we used baroque-style frames which were sprayed antique gold and then covered with wood stain to get the darker color in the ridges. My mom and I then attached scrapbook paper and lace to the glass. I tried forever to find wooden numbers, and finally ended up using an Etsy vendor which worked out great. We stained the numbers and used hot glue to attach them to the lace-covered glass. 

Our cake was not only gorgeous, but it also tasted amazing. We are so excited to eat the anniversary cake!! Our vendor mimicked our monogram from the invitations and added a pearly sheen to the icing. My only beef was that the monogram looked a tad crooked, but I know 99% of the guests didn't even notice. We went with white cake and strawberry mousse filling. I purchased the gold cake plateau to match the gold theme and I think it helped make the cake stand out in the large ballroom.

 

If you are from Pittsburgh or have ever been to a Pittsburgh wedding, you are probably familiar with the cookie table. Members of both families chip in to help bake all types of cookies, like lady locks, buckeyes, pizzelles, Georgia Peach cookies, and other more common favorites like chocolate chip and peanut butter. We had over 1,000 cookies. Probably closer to 1,200 but we sort of lost track when so many of our amazing family members pitched in and made extras. We used the cookie table as our favors and included to-go bags so guests could take some for the road. We had about 2 or 3 bags left, and only one tray of cookies at the end of the night, so I'd say it was a hit! The Florida Gator cake topper was made by my incredibly talented Maid of Honor!

Our first dance was Into the Mystic by Van Morrison. We debated for months on this (okay, I was indecisive and Steve was agreeing to anything just to move on... ha!) but in the end, this was one of our favorite songs and it was the perfect pace for a slow (but not boring) first dance.

I mentioned before that there were some funny moments throughout the day.... Cake cutting was one of them. They didn't provide a little plate for us once we sliced the cake so after cutting a way-too-thin piece, it fell on the table! ha! Steve gracefully fed it to me but I wasn't quite as nice...

After dinner and the cake cutting, we did parent dances. Steve danced with his mom to In My Life by the Beatles and my dad and I danced to a cover of The Way You Look Tonight by Maroon 5.

We have a ton of dancing photos, but these are some of my favorites! Our DJ was so good, he kept guests from every age group on the dance floor all night. We ended up extending the bar twice and by the last song, we still had SO many friends and family dancing with us and singing Piano Man! :)

For recaps of the rest of the wedding, visit the getting ready, ceremony, and wedding party posts!