Location, Location, Location



View from the inn of our tent

I realized last night, still in awe of my husband's incredibly touching guest post, that I had not yet written anything about our engagement or about finding our wedding location.  For most couples these two things would not be intertwined.  But for us, they were.  So the logical thing to do is to write about them in consecutive posts.  What's somewhat particular to us is that they're in the reverse order to what you'd expect.

Rich and I are practical people.  Not unromantic, but practical.  I had never lived with a significant other before Rich and knew that it wasn't in my plans to live with a man I didn't intend on marrying.  And, in my typical blunt fashion, I told him so.  Luckily for me he felt the same way.  So when we moved in together in May of 2011 it was fairly inevitable we'd get married.  Our hypothetical conversations about a wedding slowly changed from "if" to "when" and after living together for a couple of months we realized that we didn't want to wait too long.  And while we were comfortable discussing the practicalities of a wedding, neither of us wanted to spoil the fun and romance of an engagement.  Somehow we were lucky enough to achieve both goals.


Just married - beautiful lake in the background

As any realtor or house hunter will tell you, the three most important things about a home are location, location, location.  And for us the same could be said about our wedding.  Choosing the right location was very important.  Knowing we were getting married it took us about five minutes to come to the conclusion that we both wanted to get married in Vermont. Rich no longer had family in his hometown of CT.  We knew we couldn't easily afford a wedding in my hometown of NYC - nor did we want our guests taking out a second mortgage to afford flights and hotels. And our current town of DC is just too darn hot for anything but a winter wedding.  Vermont, a state which we both love and where plan to live (again, in my case) someday, was the very obvious choice.  So, after a week in Northern New York in August of 2011 - though not yet engaged - we headed to Vermont to scope out some potential locations.  I had laid out an entire itinerary for the weekend consisting of four locations per day.  We only had one weekend to look that summer and wanted to make the most of it.  Our first stop was Shore Acres Inn in North Hero, along the eastern shores of Lake Champlain.  The driveway leading to the Inn is right off a main road through the islands and happened to be on the route of many trips from Vermont to our family house in upstate New York.  I must have passed it two dozen times in my years in VT.  I always thought it looked lovely but had never actually set foot on the property.  We knew the minute we did that it was the spot for us.  The lakefront was expansive and pristine.  There were 20 lakefront rooms with a New England, beachy feel.  And the innkeepers were a warm, wonderful couple who took pride in their beautiful spot.  There was a 9-hole golf course, tennis courts, kayaks and swimming dock on the property, which fit perfectly with our desire for our guests to spend the weekend and enjoy Vermont.  They also had Labor Day weekend available.

Enjoying our reception on the lakefront

But we had seven other locations to see.  Just like you can't buy the first wedding dress you try on or the first house you look at, you can't reserve the first venue you see!  So, we thanked the innkeepers and kept moving.  We went to two other places in the Lake Champlain Islands that day.  Neither held a candle to Shore Acres.  It had everything we wanted.  But we still had so many places to see!  Could we really commit without seeing the other locations?  Rich was convinced we could.  But that's his way. He's the decisive one in our relationship.  I'm the one that needs a little more time to make sure I'm making the right decision.  I'm still a pretty decisive person (except when it comes to a menu of any kind, as Rich will readily tell you) but I just need more time than he does to make big decisions.  But, convinced Shore Acres was meant for us, buoyed by their Labor Day weekend availablity (and slightly terrified someone else might snag it if we waited!), we called and put down a deposit and held a block of rooms.  It was that simple.  We were done!  And the bonus was the rest of our weekend was now free to enjoy Vermont, which we happily did.

Rich left Vermont that Monday morning while I stayed for work.  That night, I drove back to the Islands and met my mom for dinner to show her the spot we had chosen.  Because we weren't yet engaged, we decided to only tell our parents we had chosen a location.  Everyone else could wait until the engagement, even our close friends and our parents close friends.  So as my mother and I sat at the Shore Acres Restaurant for dinner that night, I swore her to secrecy.  Told her she could share this news with even her best friends.  What I didn't know was she was already keeping a secret of her own....

The unbelievable sunset on the night of our wedding