Jamie and Eddie

You know a movie is epically bad when it’s used as a hyperbole during wedding vows.  “I remember watching Indiana Jones & the Crystal Skull, sitting next to you when we were dating”, said Jamie to Eddie under the overwhelmingly blue sky on a private stretch of beach at Manasota Key, “thinking to myself ‘this is such a bad movie’, but I would watch it every day if it meant I could sit next to you”.

Jamie & Eddie’s vows were like that.  They wrote them themselves and they were funny and touching and personal all at the same time.  Those were the hallmarks of their whole wedding, like the rows and rows of flip-flops made available for the guests walking over the hot sand, all different sizes, clipped up and hanging like fresh laundry on a sunny day.

Even the very place the ceremony was held at was deeply personal, her grandmother’s (when I introduced myself to her, she told me to call her ‘Baba’, like the rest of her grandchildren) house on the water.  It has been a place for the family to gather at for thirty years and it was full of memories, some recent, vivid and cracklingly crisp, others from early childhood, faded and worn around the edges. 

Their family partied like few I’ve seen, all the way to the end of the night.  Beaming, Jamie came over to me and asked me why I hadn’t danced yet.  Half joking, I replied “they haven’t played outkast yet”.  She laughed as she turned and walked to the dj.  Yup you guessed it, hey ya was the next song. 

Reception hosted by Nikki Swanson at Pelican Pointe of Venice

Floral by Elegant Designs Floral Art Studio

Hair and Makeup by Natalie's Salon

DJ Black Tie DJ's

Jamie was having a hard time bustling her dress, so the guys thought they'd bustle Eddie, to sympathize

guess which artist Katie (in the blue bridesmaid's dress) is dancing to, haha