9.10.2019

Our Wedding Week Schedule, Events + Why We Planned It This Way


I think the biggest question from this week was what was our timeline?? Why was it a week? You got married on a Thursday? And I'm here to explain IT ALL for you. I think it will make a lot more sense after this post! Enjoy :)


I don't even know where to begin with this story!! I guess it dates back to my sister's wedding in Saint Lucia. She had a very small and intimate wedding on the beach with both parents and siblings all staying at a house we rented for the week. Andrew and I had the best time and loved how special it was for everyone. Fast forward a few years, (before Andrew and I were even engaged) we were sitting eating Provisions in Nantucket talking about what we'd want for our wedding.

We talked for about an hour how we think we wanted it to be on the island since it was so special to us, how it would work so everyone would have to travel (not just one side of the family), and more importantly if we could swing it. We also discussed how much we loved my sister's wedding and wanted to do the same: a small, intimate ceremony with our immediate families only, and a rented house for the week.

Our original plan was to get married in Nantucket, hang out for the week, and then throw a party for our family and friends back in New York. We still wanted to celebrate with everyone and make sure no one felt excluded (like our Aunts/Uncles/Cousins) and looked very seriously into renting a boat on the Hudson for a night to throw a reception party.

But it just wasn't fitting. Something wasn't right. And while exact details are foggy, I know around August of last year, my friend Louise and I talked about having everything in Nantucket: getting married, renting the house, having the small ceremony BUT then inviting everyone out to party for the weekend. It just kind of clicked and that's when everything started coming together. 

I very vividly remember devising a plan for the week and waiting for the right moment to present it to Andrew. At that point, he had been saying no to so many ideas. He even denied my plea to move it to Italy in 2020 so I would have more time to plan.

Andrew and I were driving to his parents, and I told him I had a plan for the week, but he wasn't allowed to say yes or no until the end of the weekend. I needed him to mull it over before crushing my dreams and sending me back into another stress-induced panic. I laid it out, and within a minute he said he liked it and I immediately texted my family. By the end of the weekend, we were locked in on a date, a rough schedule, and that's when the ball started rolling!

The main reason we scheduled this into a week is because of the house rentals. Usually, large houses on the island have a minimum stay, and most of the ones we were looking at were all a week (Saturday to Saturday). So it just kind of was forced upon us, and since we had our friends + family out for the weekend, we needed something to do during the week. (I will have a separate post about the house with the link, how we found it, the saga and a video of the house we did rent).

Since our main priority was having a small wedding with our family, we decided to move the ceremony to the middle of the week. We first checked with everyone to make sure they could be there and then decided on Thursday, September 5th. That way we could have a full day to ourselves before everyone else came in for the weekend. It's also why whenever I talked about the wedding I said it wouldn't be very traditional in the sense of a typical timeline and it would all make sense after the wedding.

Also, as a side note, everything about my life is very public. And while I love sharing my life with you all, I also wanted to save some just for us. And it's why I didn't share our actual wedding date. Instead, I shared our "public date," which was September 7th with you all. We created two sets of "Save the Dates" and invitations and the ones that I shared on the blog + social were the ones sent to our extended family and friends. It also helps explain why I would cover some dates but not others. Sorry to anyone who may have felt deceived, but I hope you understand why now!

So let's get into the actual events (that I will share more about when we get our photos in)!

Tuesday: Travel Day
Tuesday was the start of our house rental and basically a day for everyone to get to the island. It worked out well (being the day after Labor Day) because it saved us a ton of money since we were officially in the offseason. My MIL and I flew in, Andrew each drove a car and took a ferry, and everyone else flew in throughout the rest of the day! We did a lot of errands that day like grocery shopping, setting up the house, picking up packages, etc. And just hung around the house while everyone got in.

Wednesday: Rehearsal Day
On Wednesday, Andrew and I took our guests out for two different events: he took the boys golfing, and I took the girls, my dad, and the kids sailing. This was our little way of treating everyone to something fun on the island! After that, we had some time to walk around the island, picked up Provisions for lunch, and met back at the house to set up some more. We also rehearsed at the exact time of the wedding, finalized timing, and received our table + chair rentals. For dinner, we went to Breeze in the Nantucket Hotel that was hosted by Andrews's parents. 

Thursday: Wedding Day
This was the big day!! We spent the entire day at the house from getting ready, to the ceremony, dinner at the house catered by a chef, and then pool + games after. 

Friday: Welcome Day
Friday was a wash weather-wise (thanks to Dorian), so we just hung around the house, recovered, cleaned, went into town, met up with friends and got ready for the welcome party that night! We had to cancel the food truck that was scheduled and instead just decided to get it catered, so people didn't have to wait outside in the bad weather. The welcome party was at the house, and that was our first time seeing our family + friends for the weekend!

Saturday: Reception Day
Thankfully the storm rolled through quickly, and by 11am the rain stopped, and by 2pm, the sun came out. Unfortunately, anyone traveling Saturday had their flight + ferries canceled so Andrew's extended family were stuck in New York unable to attend. During the afternoon, we invited everyone to Cisco for beer and a good time lol. Then we went our separate ways and got ready for the reception party that night at a restaurant on the island. That night was the informal reception party followed by an after-party at The Chicken Box.

Sunday: Travel Day
And then it was time to go home! Almost all our friends and family had the same flight back to Westchester Sunday morning, so that made for a fun little reunion at the airport. The day consisted of shuttling people to their flights, cleaning the house up and packing up the cars to go home. My parents, my FIL and Andrew and I were the last few left so we checked out around noon and grabbed lunch at Bartletts Farm. Then we were off on the ferry and ready for the long drive home. 

AND THAT WAS THAT! Crazy right? It was really a marathon lol, and we didn't have much downtime, but we did have a lot of fun. My MIL kept saying the one word for the week was "epic." While I agree, it was also a little exhausting -- emotionally and physically! I would do it all again but also not haha. I'm sure fellow brides can understand!!

Any leftover questions you guys have about the timeline of the week? I'm happy to answer them below, just LMK!

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