One Year Wedding Anniversary
Travel is one of my biggest muses. My source of inspiration. A time to collect new experiences, bring them home with me, and paint them. Naturally, when my husband and I were planning our wedding, we knew almost immediately it would be a destination wedding. Any excuse we can get to visit a beautiful part of the world, we will take it, even if that excuse is our wedding.
Today is our one year anniversary, and now more than ever I’m wishing I could explore the world and soak up inspiration with my favorite travel partner.
While we both are pretty good at appreciating the small things in life, we could not have cared less about the small things that accompany a wedding like centerpieces…or….yeah, that’s the only example I can think of because I really don’t care. The first thing we decided on was the location. We didn’t have anywhere specific in mind but did have a few pieces of criteria:
Naturally beautiful. We didn’t want to pack any decor shit or work on making a raw space look like a wedding venue. We just wanted to pull up some chairs, say our vows, and go celebrate!
A city with a major airport, easy transportation.
Less expensive than a wedding venue here in Denver..because dayyuummm! It ain’t cheap.
With relatively easy ceremony location parameters, we searched all over the world and were thrilled when we came across Casa Barthel. It’s a compound on top of a hill just barely outside Florence, Italy. The property has views of Tuscan rolling hills and vineyards, is surrounded by olive groves, cypress trees, gardens, and is seriously filled with beauty at every corner. I was blown away when we finally saw it in person a few days before our wedding. We hadn’t visited it in person prior to the wedding and were hoping the photos portrayed it accurately. And oh my god the photos did not even do it justice. I couldn't beleive I was going to be getting married somewhere so magical.
There are several houses on the property you can rent out, which was perfect for our family to be close by, but still have their privacy. We stayed in their treehouse our first night in Florence and woke up to fresh croissants and coffee waiting for us on our treehouse patio, along with the most stunning sunrise coming up over the hills.
The night before our wedding, Justin stayed at the treehouse, and my sister and I spent the night in the heart of Florence. I was so happy to finally be in Italy after all the planning and waiting for this day. I felt so peaceful as I ate dinner by myself at Locale Firenze (which was incredible!!), finished writing my vows, and counted down the hours until I would be marrying my best friend.
The morning of the wedding, after grabbing an espresso, I was greeted by my amazing photographers, Jane and Anton Iskra and videographers, Happy Together Films. Both are so incredibly talented and amazing human beings. I cannot say enough good things about them.
Being that we just invited our immediate family, we didn’t have any official groomsmen or bridesmaids. It was so nice and low stress getting ready with just my mom and sister. The only thing I was concerned about was the weather. It was showing an almost 100% chance of rain, and we didn’t have a backup plan. We were getting married outside, and that was that. I hoped it would hold off, but focused on the fact that I would be marrying my love in a few short hours, and that’s what really mattered. If it rained a little bit, oh well! Nothing we could do about it.
While it wasn’t a completely dry day, the rain did hold off long enough for us to say our vows. I could barely get mine out because I was crying A LOT…which was to be expected, as I tear up at anything remotely sentimental. And I continued to cry hearing Justin’s promises. His vows made it so clear that he was definitely the one for me. What solidified that even more was when I had snot running down my face from all the crying, and without missing a beat he extended his arm, let me wipe my tears, and snot on his nice suit sleeve, as I had completely forgotten my tissues. That’s definitely the man I want to be married to.
The ceremony was everything I could have wanted. I’m lucky enough to have a sister who agreed to marry us. She did such a lovely job, making me cry just slightly less than Justin reading his vows. I felt so grateful that both of our families were there, making the long journey to support us, and that they got to witness our vows to each other. I felt so much love from everyone I felt like my heart would burst.
After the ceremony, we went to my parent’s house at Casa Bartherl. My mom had plenty of wine for everyone to cheers to and charcuterie to snack on. I had finally stopped crying just enough to down a glass of wine before getting back to taking photos with my HUSBAND!
After wine, snacks, and lots of hugs and congratulations, we headed into the city of Florence to drop off our bags at our honeymoon suite and take a few more photos. As our families also headed into the city to Borgo San Jacopo for a cocktail hour before dinner.
Justin and I were getting pretty hungry and were ready to celebrate our marriage. AT THE EXACT MOMENT we told our photographers we were done with photos, it started to dump rain. The timing could not have been more perfect. We ran through the rain to get to the restaurant, my dress dragging on the wet cobblestone streets, no umbrellas, but we had no cares in the world, we were married!! While darting through the rain, Italians were yelling congratulations to us, cheering, and clapping for us, I seriously felt like I was in a movie.
I feel so lucky to have married my best friend, my favorite travel partner, the man who makes me laugh every day. These photos remind me of what an incredible day it was, and all the love that we felt. They give me hope that we will eventually be able to travel again. We will continue to experience new corners of the world together, always coming back home more in love and inspired.