The Deposit Has Been Paid, We Are Getting Married at a Museum

Marine Corps Museum Semper Fidelis Memorial Chapel

 Last month James and I did a walkthrough at the National Museum of the Marine Corps. It wasn't really planned, but I am so glad it happened! Remember how upset I was that we lost Glen Garden? Well, this is a better venue and CHEAPER! (ayyyeeeee)

You know we had some drama in April concerning the venue, but we got it all straight and decided to renew our commitment to each other.  We kind of let other people's expectations of our wedding event got the best of us. I tell you, wedding planning is a CHALLENGE!

James and I promised to focus on building our new life with each other, and not let anything or anyone come between us. We realized that we lost sight of what was most important -- us. And believe it or not, we hadn't been communicating properly which took a heavy toll!

One thing we have always been good at is being open with each other, and we learned that if we are not open, then we begin to build animosity. We literally almost broke up!

The drama is over now. We really like the museum and the museum chapel. We decided to rent the Overlook in Leatherneck Gallery and Tun Tavern. I love that we have a ready made theme. And people will be entertained just by the venue alone! We are holding the wedding right before the museum closes, so our guests can walk around and see the exhibits while James and I take photos. Nobody will be bored!

The museum is perfect. It has everything that we both want:

-- Accommodates up to 200 people (now James can invite all his peeps)
-- Sleek modern design with a garden feel (the chapel is in the woods and the whole thing is made up of wood and big old windows so the view is amazing, which satisfies my desire for a garden wedding)
-- Price point is right (and tax deductible) We wanted to spend less than $10,000 total, and we WILL.
--  Unique venue that makes for great memories and pics (I love to leave a lasting impression)
-- Easy to locate and close to my home (Don't want all the out-of-towners getting lost) You can see the museum from I95.

View from the altar area looking back toward the entrance.The benches now have cushions

View from the back of the chapel near entrance

During our walkthrough, we also settled on the catering. We opted for a two-hour standing reception with cash bar. We will have heavy hors d'oeuvres served and a self-serve gourmet cheese fruit and nut platter with assorted gourmet crackers.  We chose an array of appetizers from vegetarian to seafood. Everyone is covered! James was adamant about choosing special table linens for some reason. The catering manager said she's never had a groom so involved. I told her it's not as great as it seems because he keeps getting in my way. She just laughed and James grinned.

We concluded our meeting and put down the deposit. We are officially on to the next phase of wedding planning. I'm not exactly sure what that is, but I've created our wedding website and sent out invitations to our closest family and friends in order to get a preliminary headcount.

Here is my list of things to do/things that are done:

We still need to secure a pastry chef to make our cupcakes and cakepops.

Flowers are taken care of! My uncle will make my bouquet. I am so honored as he is a world class floral designer. Very well known in that business.  One of my best friends volunteered to handle the table decorations and James' sister will decorate the chapel.

I know which favors I will order, so I guess that's out the way too.

I would love to take dancing lessons with James for our first dance. (Not sure that will happen)

I am meeting with a makeup artist this weekend, so hopefully that box will be checked.

I have to come up with a program for the wedding day. That shouldn't be difficult.

We already have our bachelor/bachelorette party invites and FB event set up. That party will be amazing! It's a costume party set to the MARTIN show. James and I have our costume ideas already and they're top secret but guaranteed funny.

I guess my next move is formal invitations. We have decided to go with the electronic invitations in order to save money, and to keep things simple. It's so much easier to track RSVPs with the evites.

Next week James and I are heading to the tailor to look for him a suit.

I got measured for my sample gown. The seamstress is officially underway!  We are looking for the perfect shoes too. That is proving to be more difficult than I had imagined it would be.

I think that's it. Im sure Im missing something, but these are on my immediate radar at the moment.

Curious about the wedding website? Well feel free to check out our wedding website HERE (don't mind the pics. We had to postpone our professional shoot due to rain)

We will be on the second deck, so here is the view from the Overlook

Tun Tavern (the tables will have table cloths and stuff)