Wedding Wednesday - Picking a Venue

This was one of the hardest decision Michael and I had to make. Usually people have an idea of where they want to get married. We didn’t. All we knew was we wanted this:

• We wanted to get married in fall 2012 (preferably October) in MN
• We wanted an outdoor ceremony
• We liked the idea of a tent for the reception

We both enjoy the outdoors, love the fall, and didn’t want a super long engagement. We just can’t wait to be married and make it official! But we knew we wanted to celebrate with family and friends so it was important to us that they are included in this special day, so an elopement was out of the question (well, it was never really an option, but you know what I mean).

Michael and I got engaged on Saturday, December 17, which was the first day of my two and a half week vacation (one of the things I like about my job). So while Michael worked the week before Christmas, I spent literally the entire day, every day, doing wedding research. I created a Google Doc and was busy Googling, calling, emailing, etc. all day long. I joined the knot, explored blogs, and looked at photographers' websites for venue ideas. I tried to find a place that was available on a Saturday next fall that would allow us to do an outdoor wedding with a tent. No such luck! Finding a place that would do a tent was virtually impossible. The one place that told me they would said that in addition to paying for all the tent rental stuff, we’d also have to pay the room fee and minimum for a reception hall in case of inclement weather, doubling the price tag. So we decided we could do without the tent, and I started a new branch of research.

I started looking at barns, resorts, parks, etc to find a place that would do an outdoor wedding next fall, and that had a reception space on-site as well. Again, no such luck! I thought people were moving toward shorter engagements these days (that’s what all the magazines say anyways), but apparently that is not the case. I could not find anywhere that was available on a Saturday in September or October 2012. So we decided we could without an outdoor wedding next fall, as long as could find the perfect place to get married and it was sometime in 2012. Again, I started a new brand of research.

I looked at libraries, museums, and reception centers in Minneapolis. My Google Doc had more than 50+ venues and way too many columns. Everywhere had very limited availability, if any at all, and it mostly in early to mid-November. Michael and I agreed that if the place was right, we could do without our dream list items from above. Our wedding wishlist was quickly fading.


One night, I got an email from a museum I contacted. Not only did they send me the specs – pricing, availability, etc. – they also sent me a video link that a videographer had done on a wedding there. I watched it and I was INSTANTLY  in love. It was so beautiful! I could also tell it was late fall wedding so the dates available to us would be similar in look. I showed Michael when he got home from work and he loved it too. We made an appointment to see it the next day, and we were both so excited! 

Well, our excitement quickly turned to disappointment as we toured the space and talked to the head caterer. I was turned off within the first three minutes of the meeting, as we learned that the ceremony could not start until 7pm at the earliest (the museum is open until 5pm as a public space so vendors could not come in and set up until then) and we had to be out by 11pm. A four ceremony and reception? And having vendors set everything up? Not ok with us. We hated the idea of asking many of our family and friends to travel in for such a short event. We also didn't like having to spend a lot of money on a florist and relying on them to do the decorating. We wanted to do that ourselves. And we did not love the layout of the space. The video did a good job of hiding a giant open rotunda in the middle of floor where the dinner would be. Only half of our guests would have fit in that room, sitting in a weird circle, and everyone else would have been seated at tables down the hallways. Talk about making guests feel like they were on the D-List! We scratched that off our list pretty quickly and went in the holidays feeling pretty bummed about our lack of options.

On Christmas Day, we talked to Michael’s parents about our struggles and they were helpful in coming up with places they had been to for weddings, and asking their friends. Michael’s dad asked us what we wanted and we told him – "outside, tent, next fall." I said I couldn’t find that anywhere that fit the bill and said “maybe we should just do it in your backyard?” I was totally kidding but Michael’s dad said “How about the cabin?” I had thought about that before but since it’s not my family’s cabin, I had kept that idea to myself. Michael didn’t seem too excited about it so we moved on and I resumed my research.

The second week, I tried thinking even more outside the box. I looked at places in WI, northern MN, and even a winery in Alexandria. We toured a few more places in the Minneapolis area, but still were not falling in love with anything. We stopped at the winery in Alexandria, and were surprised that we liked it as much as we did. But it still didn’t feel like it was right to us.

As we drove to ND, we started talking more and more about the cabin idea. Suddenly, Michael was on board with this idea. We could get married outside, on any day we wanted, and we could have a tented reception. It seemed so perfect! I had a photographer in mind and emailed her from my phone to find out her availability next fall. She replied pretty quickly that she didn't have much in October so we thought maybe we’d look at other photographers, even though I had my heart set on her. When we told my parents about the cabin, they were excited about the idea, but concerned about the timing. October in MN can be cool, and you never know – a blizzard could happen (I’m dead serious). They encouraged us to consider September. So I emailed the photographer and she had September 8 and September 29 available. Sept 29 was out because I have a huge work event on Oct 5-6 and I didn’t want the wedding to be close to it. So we thought about September 8. 9/8/12. We liked it! Plus, there are so many fun things around that date: my sister and b-i-l’s anniversary (9/11); Chad and Michelle’s anniversary (9/13); and Kristen’s birthday (9/9) so it would be great to be around those people close to those important dates. We asked the photographer to hold the date for us for a week (and she thankfully agreed) so we could further explore this option.

The next weekend, Michael and I went to the cabin for his birthday. On our way up to the cabin, we stopped and met with a rental vendor, just to get an idea for things. The meeting went great and we left there feeling really good about things, and all the things they could do for us. The next day, we spent the afternoon measuring and staking out where things will be: ceremony on the front lawn facing the lake and tented reception in the backyard. The tents will fit and so will all the chairs in the front lawn. So we made our first wedding planning decision:

We are getting married on 9/8/12 at Michael’s family’s lake cabin!

It felt so good to finally make a decision, as we had been throwing around so many different things.  And now, we are making even more decisions. We have a photographer booked, and I am psyched to work with her. We also have our wedding colors selected and I’m going wedding dress shopping with my mom this weekend. We are in the process of booking our rental vendor, as we have to bring in everything – tent, chairs, tables, etc - as well as our caterer and DJ. Once those things are done, I will feel like a huge weight has been lifted off of our shoulders, and making the smaller decisions, like cake, bridesmaid dresses, and stuff like that, will be easier to do.

We are thrilled that we are going to get our dream wedding scenario and while getting there wasn’t easy, it sure feels good to know that we didn’t settle for something else. We have a lot of work to do this spring and summer to get the cabin ready, but it will be so much fun to make it look exactly how we want it to look. It will be representative of us as a couple and has important meaning to the both of us. We are just so thankful and lucky that we are able to do this, and we cannot wait for big day.

Only 226 days to go!