Wednesday, September 3, 2014

Wedding Wednesday: Our Send Off!

Wedding Wednesday

Happy Wedding Wednesday!

A quick housekeeping note: 
As my wedding posts wind down, Kristyn is stepping up!
Kristyn from Chits and Giggles is my old partner in co-hosting linkups crime and is back to co-host!
Kristyn will co-host with me through my last few posts and then take over once I am finished.
End housekeeping note. :)

I'm really excited to share our send off with you today. This is all thanks to my Mother-in-Law who planned it! I am so happy that she took charge because we had no idea what we wanted to do. We just knew that we did not want to deal with sparklers. Even though sparklers are pretty, I am clumsy and sparklers don't exactly pair well with clumsy.

Andrew's Mom was a genius and thought of glow sticks!
How unique!
I have never in all of my Pinterest research and wedding planning seen a send off including glow sticks! Yay!!
(Isn't it funny how excited I get when I know the things we did AREN'T on Pinterest and I know NO ONE else who has done the same thing?!? Am I alone in this excitement??)

Here are a couple of cute, albeit blurry, photos, but you get the idea:


  
It was such a thrill to go through the glow-filled tunnel amid cheers and high fives!

Not only did our send-off include a tunnel of guests waving glow sticks, it also included a ride around the city in a pedicab! Andrew's Mom contacted ECT Pedicab and arranged for our little jaunt around Columbus. The owner of the company drove us!

 I love this photo of us hugging our new moms before riding off!






Our videographer stayed for the whole event, so we have a clip of this in both of our highlight videos! I'm so happy he was still there for it and I'm very thankful guests took their own photos! The send off is a huge reason why I am happy that we had a wedding hashtag!

Our ride was awesome! Columbus added some cool features to downtown that I had not seen. It was also really fun to point out places to Andrew, like places my friends and I bar-hopped in college to theaters to the site where the best mall ever stood that is now a really cool concert and event venue. Oh, memories!

The best part of the ride, though, was the cheers from Columbus folks! Many people were out and about on the lovely April evening, so we definitely had audiences wherever he pedaled!
Everyone who saw us yelled and cheered and made us giggle. It was so fun! Of course our driver honked his horn around the crowds to draw attention. My mouth hurt from smiling so much! It felt like we were in our own private parade and everyone was so excited to cheer us on!
Well, some jerks said things like, "what were you thinking, buddy?" to Andrew and other such anti-marriage comments. But that silliness was few and far between. I was really impressed by the genuine encouragement from Columbus that night.

Our driver rode us around downtown for about 40 minutes and took us straight to our hotel.
Honestly it was pretty magical to have that alone time with Andrew immediately following all of the excitement from the day and events leading up to it. Riding around Columbus was the perfect way to relive the day, reflect on the sacrament we celebrated, thank the good Lord for all of the incredible generosity of our family and friends, and celebrate our new adventure as a married couple. I am beyond grateful that Andrew's Mom planned a send off for us. Otherwise we probably just would have left without fanfare, and what fun is that?!?!

Did you have a send off at your wedding or do you plan to have one in your upcoming wedding?
As a wedding guest do you like send-offs? I have always personally liked them. It's a fun last hoorah, if you will, to celebrate the couple...and is also the perfect signal to the fun groups of people still up for partying to organize an after-party if there wasn't one already planned!

And for Pinterest/Instagram:



Missed a Wedding Wednesday post? Here are the big ones:

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NC Belle In Boots

7 comments:

P!nky said...

So fun! We didn't do a traditional send off, but we had a dance floor send off which was great :)!

Samantha said...

So fun!! We plan to do a fake sendoff in the middle of the reception, so the photographers can leave early. I wanted to do sparklers because I think they make pretty pictures, but my venue doesn't allow it. But I'm pretty excited about what we've decided on because I have only seen it once on Pinterest!

Anonymous said...

I love it!!!! So cute with the glow sticks.

Meg Taylor said...

I love this send off!! We have no idea what we're doing yet for ours haha!

Rebecca said...

I love the pedicab idea! From the way you described it, it sounds like a relaxing end to the day.
We left in a 1934 Chevy. It was fun!

Jen said...

This is a great idea! I loved the idea of sparklers, but my Mom feared that everyone drinking beer/wine, mixed with fire, was not a good mix...ha! Your glow sticks send-off definitly a great idea and very Pinterest worthy :)

Ericka said...

I love the idea of glow sticks and the pedicab!! We didn't have as end off...my husband and I stayed and helped clean up after the reception was over...and then we drove to our hotel. Your send off was definitely something I've never seen before, so unique!