Susan and Stan are what America in the 21st century is all about: multicultural and tech savvy. Susan’s family is from Vietnam and Stan’s is from Russia. Each side’s wedding traditions blended perfectly at Acacia at Indian Meadows Country Club. To honor their guests, Susan’s family held a traditional tea ceremony. I had never seen this before, but it was wonderful to see each family member come up and wish the couple well and impart words of wisdom for a happy and long lasting marriage.
While all this was going on, the first bands of hurricane Irene were making landfall across Massachusetts. Those on Stan’s side kept reminding Susan that Russians believe it is lucky to have rain on the wedding day, so wedding crasher Irene was actually a good thing. Whenever the rain would let up a bit, I would go outside with the couple and my second shooter, Stacy Vachon, who kept me and my equipment dry by holding an enormous umbrella over our heads. We must have been quite a sight! But Susan and Stan made the most of it.
After the tea ceremony Susan got into her western wedding dress and then we set up a big reveal. It was adorable to see Stan’s face light up at the sight of Susan in all her wedding finery. Then it was show time. The Acacia staff beautifully set up the reception room to serve as the ceremony location in record time, since doing a whole out door ceremony under umbrellas would have been a tad bit inconvenient. The couple had their friend officiate the ceremony, and he worked a modern twist into it. To make the marriage truly “official”, he asked for the bride and groom’s smart phones so that Susan and Stan could update their relationship status as married on Facebook mid ceremony. This got a good laugh from the guests. Only after this did he say, I now pronounce you man and wife, you may now kiss your bride. Oh how Facebook has changed our world!
Status Update: Time to party!!! Having a great time at Susan and Stan’s Wedding!!!
The reception was an absolute blast with DJ Bindley Sloane serving up some of my favorite songs and MCing the Bride and Groom game. If I could go back in time, I would have had him DJ at my own wedding! He was THAT great! Speaking of great, so was the FOOD. Rather than going with the traditional American wedding fare, the Acacia provided a DELISH 10 course Vietnamese dinner. They also honored Stan’s Russian heritage with bar dedicated solely to Vodka drinks.
Last, but CERTAINLY not least, Stan got up and gave an incredibly moving speech. He thanked Susan’s family for teaching him that family isn’t just important in life, life IS family. Stan went on to describe how wonderful Susan is, and that he is so excited for the day that the two of them are old and gray because that will mean that they had a lifetime of spending each day with one another, and he couldn’t think of anything more wonderful than that in the entire world.