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Today I’m going to tell you all about our wedding day! How we prepared for it and how it was. I’m going to tell you about the favors and the food we served. It was an amazing day!
I just love weddings!
Many of you know that we got married in 2014 in Istanbul. Then when we moved to the US in 2015, we thought of having a second wedding in the US for Kyle’s side of family and relatives as many couldn’t attend our Istanbul wedding. We were not sure about the date until late April, 2016, and we decided we wanted our wedding to be on August 14th.
We didn’t have much time to prepare as we had to get back to Ithaca for Kyle’s graduation and then back to Istanbul (which never happened), so we decided to go with a venue that provided everything including food and decoration, and that’s how we decided to choose a cooking school for our venue.
We had the theme of “food and travel” for our wedding as those are two very important parts of our lives. We both love travelling and flying transatlantic has been a part of our relationship since we fell in love. Knowing how much travelling and maps makes us happy, we chose the template below for our wedding invitations which turned out wonderful!
Following the theme, we decided to pack the wedding favors ourselves which included a teabag of one of our favorite teas, an almond butter blondie that I baked the day before the wedding (yes, I’m a food blogger, that’s why) and the best part, a small cute bottle that was filled with half Meyer Lemon Infused Olive Oil and half Elderberry Balsamic, both by Capay Valley Ranches that were sent to us. I have to tell you, if you like olive oil and balsamic, Capay Valley is a great choice! Both products were very fresh with a deep flavor and made great favors for our guests!
Look how cute the favors turned out!
And in those cute map-themed boxes (which we assembled ourselves) we had the blondies.
The food at our wedding was absolutely wonderful. We had the dinner family style and everyone enjoyed it. It included blue cheese potato gratin, steak, Persian style chicken skewers, Shirazi salad, warm Thai rice salad and so on!
Everyone was saying that this the food to remember and that’s what we wanted to hear!
We were quite happy with the food, too!
We had a three tiered cake, two vanilla with coffee buttercream and one chocolate with whipped ganache. So good, so delicious!
Our wedding photography was done by Jos Rivera who did a marvelous job with his team, capturing all the great moments of our wedding. We were and are very happy with his work. My make-up was by Mari from Faces By M and she did a great job! That make up didn’t even need a touch up because it was done so well!
Our first dance song was something that we will never forget:
Our wedding day was a wonderful day as we had everyone we love in one place. I do wish my parents, my brother, his wife and my niece could be there, too. I’m very grateful for having such a great family in this side of the world and if it wasn’t because of them, it would have been very difficult to live in a place so far from my parents and family. It was an honor to marry my best friend one more time and you know what? I think I’m going to marry him over and over again!
So beautiful Shadi!
Thanks Meghan!
Ah, it’s so long since my wedding day but it was such an unbelievably good day I couldn’t sleep until about 5am the next day because I really, really, did not want it to end. Good on you for having a second wedding day – I am so jealous – in a good way! You both look fabulous and gloriously happy.
And of course – wishing you a lifetime of love & happiness together.
Weddings are the best Jane! Thanks a lot!<3
You and Kyle are too cute! I love seeing pictures of your day. You look so beautiful and happy! Those favors are too cute too – love that you made blondies 🙂
I wish you could be there Rachel! It was a great day! 🙂