As I mentioned in a post last week, two dear friends of mine will be getting married quite soon. Ashley and her fiance are planning a low-key, outdoorsy wedding on Labor Day weekend and have only just started to plan because they only just got engaged. In addition to offering congratulations, I offered to help out by finding wedding inspiration they might like. For most (if not all) of this week, I’ll be using Ashley’s own words as my inspiration. Without further ado, off we go!

The wedding will be at 3 pm, reception to follow at my parents’ place on the Snake River. It will be a HUGE ASS BBQ involving all manner of food. There will be impromptu dancing, all manner of unscripted toasting, motorboat/fishing rides up and down the river, 4-wheeling for the boys, a bottomless open bar, and a campfire. There will be fireworks at dusk and general merriment until the last person stumbles off to bed.

While it’s not quite fireworks at dusk, sparklers are a fun way for wedding guests to add a little light to the bride and groom’s special day. In this picture taken by emtboy9, sparklers become wedding decorations when taken out of their boxes and put in what looks like a flower pot. Ashley could up the ante by displaying sparklers in decorativevases at each table, perhaps as a centerpiece.

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It’s Mother’s Day, and this seems like a good time to bring up a topic we haven’t talked about very much of late here at Manolo for the Brides: moms.

The conventional wisdom about mothers and weddings is that it’s a time mostly spent trying to take over the plans, living out her never-quite-met dreams of romance. The same conventional wisdom assumes that she will spend the rest of her natural born days trying to poke holes in the marital relationship in order to save her precious, perfect child from that fiend (s)he married.

Are there mothers like that? You bet your sweet bippy there are. I’ve met a couple and they are the stuff of legends about monsters under the connubial bed.

The good news is that these monsters-in-law are actually a pretty tiny minority.

But what about the care, feeding, and etiquette rules for dealing with more reasonable maternal parents?

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…I need you in my house, ’cause you’re my home.

(You’re My Home, Billy Joel)

I was about seventeen the first time I heard that song. It made me wibble. I went around humming it for weeks.

As the years passed, when I ran across the song I still liked it, but I didn’t think of it that often. Somehow, though, it’s been stuck in my head for the last couple days. What put it there? A news story I ran across that – like the song the first time I heard it – kind of made me wibble.

Dante White, 28, was thrown out of his mothers’ house when he was just fourteen. He’s been living on the streets in Washington, DC ever since.

Nine years ago, he met Nhiahni Chestnut, 39, who was also living on the streets after losing everything to alcohol and drug abuse.

The two instantly clicked. They fell in love and have been doing their best to carve out a life together, despite the dire circumstances of their lives. But they wanted more. They wanted to make their love official. In short, they wanted to get married.

When White mentioned this to a member of his Bible study group at Grace Episcopal Church, Margaret Davis sprang into action. She felt that money should be no barrier to marriage.

“In good Grace church congregation fashion, everyone got behind the idea: one person managed flowers, I helped with the wedding rings, one woman made the cake, someone helped with the tux and someone else with the bride’s gown,” she said.

Another member of the congregation even arranged a two-night honeymoon stay in a Potomac hotel.

White and Chestnut were married by Pastor John Graham, and had their first dance to jazz classic Take the A Train at the donated reception. They shared a chocolate layer cake.

The couple will return to the streets after their honeymoon, but White is determined to find a way to change that, too. He wants to find a place they can call their own where they can “cook pork chops and rice for ourselves.”

Again, the parishioners of Grace Church are doing all they can to help out. They’re looking for affordable housing for the couple, and gathering up donated household items.

As Davis says: “Love will get them through so much, but at the end of the day they do need housing.”

In honor of the new Star Trek movie, I have to let my geek flag fly and feature one Star Trek wedding cake and one Star Trek wedding cake topper that reader and friend oh_chris found on Cake Wrecks. While The Beard and I chose not to include the United Federation of Planets or Star Fleet in our nuptials, I can’t fault those who do because I harbor my own sci-fi fetishes (as does Twistie, I happen to know).

I especially like how nice a job the cake maker did with the Star Trek communicator tier. Sometimes themed cakes are done in such a slipshod way that you have to ask yourself why the baker even bothered to do anything other than stick a few of those pre-fab sugar thingies on. I’m guessing that the cake designer is a trekkie (or trekker, if you like) and was plenty pleased at that particular commission.

Why is it that some photographers can make just about anyone look gorgeous while others somehow manage to make even the legitimately gorgeous look ordinary? I can’t say that my own wedding photographer fell into either camp — many of his photos were wonderful, but quite were overshadowed by snapshots taken by friends and family. Looking back, I wish I’d spent more on wedding photography because I love photographs. Well, good ones, anyway, like these from Luna Photography of San Diego.

While there’s no denying that Abby and Avi (the bride and groom) are some fine specimens of humanity, I don’t have any doubt that Mike and Paula Luna could have made The Beard and I look just as good on our wedding day. *sigh* I do love the wedding photo album I assembled myself using photographs from many sources, but I can honestly say that not hiring a better wedding photographer was one of the few post-wedding regrets I still harbor.

Feathers show up everywhere in the world of weddings, in bridal headpieces and even in wedding cakes, but I’ve found that full feather wedding gowns are rare beasts indeed… at least in real life. In the heads, sketchbooks, and workshops of gown designers, however, feather wedding gowns come into their own.

Take this creation, for example. Recently presented at a wedding expo held in Nanjing, China, this brilliant wedding gown (valued at $1.5 million) was sewn by eight skilled craftsmen over a two month period using 2,009 peacock tail feathers and 60 Hetian jades. Do I like it? Why, yes, I do, though I am curious to know how they procure the feathers. Pluck them from live birds? Harvest them from dead ones? Maybe it’s best that I don’t know?

One other thought comes to mind: I’d caution any bride-to-be considering this wedding gown to watch out for lady peacocks, who may just go out of their minds at the sight of the grandest male bird they have ever seen in their lives.

• As I write this, I’m engaged in helping a friend plan her upcoming wedding. My job, simply put, is to find inspiration — links to wedding gowns for tall girls, pictures of backyard barbecue receptions that are rustic chic, and everything else related to nuptials. In fulfilling my responsibilities, I came across Emmaline Bride, which is more of a portal than an actual shop.
  

  Whether you’re looking for bridal accessories, wedding shoes, stationery, or your “something blue,” there are links to featured Etsy sellers who can provide you with exactly what you want. Well, sometimes. Currently, Emmaline Bride is suffering from a noticeable lack of links in certain categories. I’m hoping that spreading the word will encourage Etsy sellers who cater to brides and their bridesmaids to get on board because it’s such a clever idea.

• It’s no secret that I love answering reader questions — so keep sending them my way whether you want me to post them or not — but I’m not the only one! If you have a question about shopping for wedding gowns or there’s something you’ve always wanted to know about the inner workings of Kleinfeld (featured on TLC’s Say Yes to the Dress

) you can call 888-593-7377 (that’s 888-59-DRESS) to leave your questions for Randy, Kleinfeld’s Fashion Director, and Nicole, Director of Sales.

 They’ll answer your questions via audio responses that will appear on TLC’s web site.