Author Archive

Destination Wedding Recap 7: Gay Symbols In My Gay Wedding – A Follow-Up

Posted on February 2nd, 2011 by Brian. 7 Comments

Brian
Bio: Date of Marriage: Civil Ceremony in New Haven, CT on September 7, 2010 and Wedding at Las Caletas in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico on October 17, 2010. About me: I’m a college counselor living in NYC with Tom, my partner of 10 years, and two cats, Toby and Maude. I’m a traveler, an activist, a teacher, a favorite uncle, a knitter, a blogger, and a now - a husband. I’m a lover of all arts and a passionate pursuer of dreams and beer.

A while back, I blogged about incorporating gay symbols in my gay wedding. It was something I felt compelled to do being a proud gay man. I would imagine that all of us consider it when planning our big day. So, as a follow up to that blog, I thought I would share with you how and where I did just that!

As you recall, I had decided to have rainbow hand-made ribbon flowers at my wedding for decoration and favors. I had ordered 100 and only needed 25 for favors, so I had plenty to have fun with.

I placed them in the knots of the bows on our chairs at the ceremony:

Photography by Kristina Hill

Here is a close-up:

Photography by Brian Edwards

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Destination Wedding Recap 6: Our Romantic Luggage Wedding Cake

Posted on January 26th, 2011 by Brian. 7 Comments

Brian
Bio: Date of Marriage: Civil Ceremony in New Haven, CT on September 7, 2010 and Wedding at Las Caletas in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico on October 17, 2010. About me: I’m a college counselor living in NYC with Tom, my partner of 10 years, and two cats, Toby and Maude. I’m a traveler, an activist, a teacher, a favorite uncle, a knitter, a blogger, and a now - a husband. I’m a lover of all arts and a passionate pursuer of dreams and beer.

As you may recall, the invitations to my wedding were passports and the RSVPs were boat tickets, a DIY project by me. I couldn’t pass up the chance to make take this travel theme one step further with the cake!  So, I designed a cake in the shape of a suitcase with patches  to highlight a few of the destinations of our lives. There were four “patches” I wanted:

  • I love NY (because we live and truly love NY)
  • Mexican Flag (because we were getting married in Mexico)
  • Jekyll and Hyde Pub (Tom and I met working in this NYC theme restaurant)
  • Cinderella’s Castle (We were honeymooning in Orlando, FL

With the help of my planner in Puerto Vallarta, we found a wonderful bakery named Pie in the Sky to take my vision and make it a reality. My chocolate, espresso reality! And boy was it a HIT!


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Destination Wedding Recap 5: Our Dinner Table

Posted on January 19th, 2011 by Brian. 9 Comments

Brian
Bio: Date of Marriage: Civil Ceremony in New Haven, CT on September 7, 2010 and Wedding at Las Caletas in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico on October 17, 2010. About me: I’m a college counselor living in NYC with Tom, my partner of 10 years, and two cats, Toby and Maude. I’m a traveler, an activist, a teacher, a favorite uncle, a knitter, a blogger, and a now - a husband. I’m a lover of all arts and a passionate pursuer of dreams and beer.

One of the things I kept pondering over during the planning process was how I could incorporate my civil ceremony into my Mexico wedding. This task was important to me for many reasons: First, not everyone was invited to the ceremony in CT; second, I wanted everyone to know that we did have a civil ceremony and were legally married; and lastly because I wanted it to be in people’s minds and discussions that Tom and I had to travel outside of our home state to get married, which isn’t fair. Finally it dawned on me – I could use the photographs from the ceremony in CT on my dinner table at the wedding in Mexico.

For the dinner table I wanted everyone to sit together because I have always hated the hierarchy of the seating arrangements at weddings! Also, knowing that a marriage to me means the merging of two families into one, I thought it appropriate to have one large family sized table. My overall scheme for the wedding was a mix of varying black and white patterns and solids, so I chose black and white images to match.

Photography by Kelly Prizel

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Destination Wedding Recap 4: Portraits & Wedding Party Photos

Posted on January 12th, 2011 by Brian. 13 Comments

Brian
Bio: Date of Marriage: Civil Ceremony in New Haven, CT on September 7, 2010 and Wedding at Las Caletas in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico on October 17, 2010. About me: I’m a college counselor living in NYC with Tom, my partner of 10 years, and two cats, Toby and Maude. I’m a traveler, an activist, a teacher, a favorite uncle, a knitter, a blogger, and a now - a husband. I’m a lover of all arts and a passionate pursuer of dreams and beer.

Once the ceremony had ended our guests enjoyed a fabulous cocktail hour as the Wedding Party and Tom and I embarked on a photography shoot with our amazing photographer Kristina Hill. We wanted to take full advantage of the island and its many amazing locations so we snapped photos everywhere. We began with a little shoot on the beach followed by more in the jungle. The Wedding Party wasn’t too happy with me forcing them here and there and everywhere and all Tom kept saying was how much he wanted to join our guests for the cocktail hour; but I had to have my way nonetheless and I am glad that I did! Kristina and I had talked about a couple locations beforehand and we really wanted some of them to happen. So they did. Everyone loves them now!

By the way, after the shoot we still managed to get about 15 minutes with our guests at the cocktail hour where we enjoyed our hand picked menu of black and red caviar, fish tacos, chips and salsa, chicken skewers, guacamole, tacos dorados con papa and various types of ceviche served to traditional Mexican music.

It is amazing when you look through your photos after the wedding. So many memories and emotions come up. God do I miss it there. Here are just a few of the amazing images from our wedding party and portrait shoot.

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