Happy wedding day Audball!

[audball]

Oh Audball, that sounds so marvelous!! Congratulations yet again!
Even the hiccups didn't sound so bad! Eagerly awaiting any pictures!

Thanks WD! You're right -- I hesitated to even say "things that went wrong", because while they weren't as planned, they were all just fine in the end!

 

[antiquesparkler]

Oh my gosh Audball, I am over here tearing up! What a beautiful and magical wedding! I am so happy for you both!

Everything sounds amazing and the little things that went wrong sound minimal. Perfect! Please stick around and help all of us out or at least check on us once in a while.

 

[Mico]

Using my lunch break at work today to try and write up a synopsis of our beautiful wedding day for you all!

We left home the day before the wedding (Tues 10/29) bright and early. We got up just before 4am and we're fully packed in the car and on the road by just after 4:30am. Every mile we drove made me a bit more anxious! I had been nothing but excited up until the point we left and every second I got more and more nervous! Having never seen the place we were getting married, having never met the vendors we'd hired to handle the details, we had lots to be nervous about! The drive went pretty quickly and we made in into Savannah just before 11am. The Kehoe House is BEAUTIFUL!!! Just breathtaking. We couldn't be happier with our choice to get married there.

Lucky us, the people who were supposed to be staying in our chosen room the night before us were no shows for their reservation so instead of having to wait until 3pm to check into our room, we were able to check in right then! That was wonderful because we were able to get completely unpacked and didn't have to worry about leaving our things around (either with the concierge at the inn, or worse, in the car) until we could get into our room.

Our room was beautiful! Antique furniture and very specious. We had a bay window and breakfast nook and we got the largest bathroom in the whole house complete with a claw foot tub!

After getting settled into our room and getting everything unpacked, we worked out the details with the concierge for our wedding day. We had originally signed up to have the ceremony in their outside garden, but after reviewing all the ceremony space options, we changed to one of the indoor options. Both outdoor options were on the side of the home and the street that goes up that side of the home is full of metered parking. I wasn't excited about the idea of lots of parked cars in the background of our wedding photos. Not to mention, The Kehoe House is one of the most historical homes in Savannah and every.single.trolley tour in the city goes by the house and down that side street. I swear they were by every 5-10 minutes. We decided to get married in their large double parlor room in front of the bay window (with TONS of natural light) and 14' ceilings. It was gorgeous and we were happy we made the choice. After hammering out the final details, we walked over to the courthouse to get our marriage license. This is something else I'd been super anxious about, but it was a breeze. We were in and out with our license in less than 20 minutes. We both felt much more relaxed once we had that in hand.

We also made a visit to the florist who was SOOO SUPER NICE! She took us in back of the shop and showed us our flowers (not yet assembled) and hashed out assembly. She attached DH's grandmother's bracelet to my bouquet for us which was my something old. I never met her, she passed in last year right before our first anniversary. DH's mother lent it to me to use and it was a beautiful peachy pink color that went so well with my dress.

The rest of the day, we just walked around and checked things out. Scoped out places we wanted to visit and just relaxed. Between the drive, the nerves, and everything, we were in bed and completely asleep around 9:30pm. I was happy about that because we both slept good and hard and didn't wake up tired. We both got almost no sleep the night before that because of the nerves and anxiety about leaving for the trip.

Wedding morning! We woke about 1 hour before our breakfast service. We snuggled in bed and straightened up our room since we'd be having pictures in there before the ceremony. We had our breakfast on a silver tray in our little nook. We both got banana foster french toast (so good!). DH had cheesy grits and sausage with his and I had bacon and potatoes with mine. We also got coffee and orange juice. We then had about an hour before hair and makeup started and we just relaxed together and soaked it all in. Up until the last second, I wasn't decided on whether I was going to have my hair styled up or styled down. Based on the weather being a touch warmer than we anticipated, I decided to wear it up and was happy I did. The weather did end up being pretty nice, a few degrees cooler would have been more ideal, but it was a really beautiful day.

After hair/makeup, we only had about 5 minutes before the photographer arrived and got started with detail shots. This is one of my only regrets of the day, that we should have allowed 15-30 minutes longer here so that we didn't have to rush. He needed about 30 minutes for detail shots and he got there at 2 (our arranged time). Ceremony started at 2:30 so I forgot to factor in time to get dressed. He worked quickly and did the pictures in about 20-25 minutes, but then we had to rush to get dressed instead of being more relaxed and taking our time.

It was all fine, though! We didn't get as many helping each other get ready shots as planned, but we still have some and we made it on time! Our officiant was changed with just a few days to go because of a family emergency that had him move out of state. It worked out for the best because we ended up with an amazing officiant who does these all day long. He used the ceremony we'd written and was super nice. He's apparently the most requested officiant in the South Georgia and South Carolina and even married a few celebrities! He has also been on Say Yes to the Dress and Four Weddings (which I watch!) so I thought that was pretty cool.

We had our ceremony and weren't interrupted at all despite our ceremony start time being 30 minutes before daily check-in time. The concierge put a sign on the front door of the house that said "wedding in progress, use side entrance" (which is one level down) and nobody came in at all during our ceremony or cake time. It was perfect. We cut our cake and had milk from a vintage milk bottle in our champagne flutes with our chocolate chocolate cake. Yum.

After cake, we took some photos on the entry way stairs inside the home and in the 4th floor loft space. Then out and about for more pictures on the front steps of the grand home, Forsyth Park, Whitaker Square, and other beautiful spots our photographer found (or already knew about). He got shots of us leaving on our carriage ride at 5pm and we had a little break from posing and just had an hour of quiet together seeing Savannah's most beautiful spots. People yelled congratulations to us the whole time and it was so wonderful. They dropped us off at the designated spot and our photographer picked us back up to take us across the river from some sunset and silhouette shots. He then took us back to the right side of the river where we got some shots by an old theatre with a lit up marquee sign and some slow exposure shots in the after sunset light.

We then went to dinner at The Olde Pink House. We got there about 15 minutes before our reservation time and were super excited because we'd heard such great things about this place. They were crazy busy despite it being a Wednesday night, and told us it would be our reservation time before we could sit. That wasn't a problem and we waited outside on a bench and took some more pictures. A nice man even took a few shots of us together. We were asked three times by different hostesses about our name and reservation time despite having made reservations 5 months in advance. We weren't sat until 15 minutes after our reservation time and then (even though we were told they make special table accommodations for wedding couples), we were walked in and sat at a two seater table just inside the front door next to the hostess stand. It was loud and terrible. My DH is never one to complain, but he wouldn't even sit down. He went to the hostess and complained. We were prepared to leave. We had to wait another 15ish minutes, but they ended up seating us in the Vault Room which has only one table and is candle lit. It was a neat room being an old bank vault, but it wasn't well ventilated (ie: warm) and the room is used as their wine storage so our dinner was interrupted 3 times by bartenders coming in to restock what they were out of. We ordered drinks, appetizers, dinner, and dessert. Our dinner came out wrong and had to be sent back to be fixed. Overall, while the food tasted good, the place is definitely a tourist trap that I found to be totally underwhelming for the hype it gets. We did have a nice meal, but I'll probably never go there again.

After dinner, we walked slowly in the cool night air back to our room for the night! It was a totally beautiful and amazing day.

The next morning we had breakfast in our room again (all the same choices except DH switched from the french toast to apple pecan pancakes). We hit lots of shops on River Street and bought our first married Christmas ornament for our tree this year. We got some delicious sweets from a candy kitchen. We had a wonderful day.

That night, we had THE MOST AMAZING meal ever. We wish we'd eaten there for our wedding dinner, but you live and learn! We asked our photographer where the best place to eat in Savannah is and he recommended this place. We also heard 3 other locals recommend it. They do not advertise in the city so it's a well kept secret! It's 10% the size of The Olde Pink House and is 80%+ local and farm to table. They also feature exotic options including kangaroo and elk! Everything was delicious. We got reservations (our concierge set it up) with two hours notice and when we got there, we were greeted with a box of treats that had a "Congrats Mr. & Mrs. LastName!" on it. Service was top notch, food was AMAZING. In addition to the little treats, we got a complimentary amuse bouche. We ordered duck fat and black truffle oil hand cut fries for an appetizer (SOOO Good!). The make different breads for the table and the day's feature was a cinnamon chocolate feather bread and a blood orange corn muffin with candied toffee. Holy cow yum. DH go the exotic specialty for dinner which was elk with so many delicious things. He also got a side of Gator. I got "Duck Not Pie" which was a deconstructed duck pot pie. It had smoked duck, a wedge of salt/pepper puff pastry, baby bliss potatoes, roasted corn, toasted hazelnuts and was topped with pears poached in port wine. YUM. For dessert we had amaretto creme brulee with chocolate cherries and their signature dessert, tempura fried banana beignets with handmade vanilla ice cream and cinnamon sugar wonton strips. Everything was amazing. We will definitely be eating there again every time we go back. We're just going to pretend that's where we had our wedding dinner. If anyone is in Savannah -- check it out, Alligator Soul.

That night after dinner we did a ghost tour for Halloween and finished the night up with Mocha Chocolate Chip ice cream (we shared) on our walk back to the inn.

We checked out the next morning and I cried because I was so sad to be leaving. We are sooooooo thrilled with how everything turned out and are soooo pleased with our decision to elope. I'm a happy happy happy Mrs. Audball.

Thanks to everyone for the support along the way!

ETA: So the things that went "wrong". Because, well, something always goes *not* as planned on the wedding day, right? I feel extremely lucky in that the things that went "wrong" for our wedding really weren't big deals -- but there were a few things to note.

1. We planned for an outdoor ceremony. After getting there, evaluating the space options and looking at the weather, we chose to marry inside. We do not regret this choice in any way, but it was a change from the original plan.

2. We did not have enough time to relax and enjoy the detail pictures and getting dressed before the ceremony. We did not budget enough time for this and rushed to get dressed. The fallout of this is that we will not have all of the getting ready shots we planned to take, but we did get some. The other thing we missed was in DH's outfit. He was supposed to be in his suit pants/socks/shoes, dress shirt tucked in with his tie, vest, and sleeves rolled up. We forgot to roll up his sleeves until half way through the day, well after the ceremony, and with a majority of our pictures already taken. We did roll them up for the remainder of the day and shots, but I'm disappointed we forgot.

3. Cake topper! I had twisted/made the veil for my bride Starbucks to face a certain way with the bride on the left. We left the cake toppers with the concierge to set up and the bride ended up on the right and the veil part wasn't sitting right. I didn't swap them since they were stuck on the cake but I did fix her veil when I saw it. I have on idea if I fixed it before or after our photographer got photos of it. The way it was the hook for the ornament string was visible. Hopefully I fixed it before he captured it. If not, oh well.

4. Dinner -- obviously as described above. Not the service or food we were expecting from the hype (or the price). We do feel luck y that we had the opportunity to have such a wonderful meal the next night, though!

And that's it!

ahhhhhh!!! Congrats!!! I have sooooo been waiting for this!

 

[audball]

Oh my gosh Audball, I am over here tearing up! What a beautiful and magical wedding! I am so happy for you both!

Everything sounds amazing and the little things that went wrong sound minimal. Perfect! Please stick around and help all of us out or at least check on us once in a while.

Thank you!! It was amazing and I really wish we could do it over and over again! I will absolutely be sticking around here!

 

[audball]

ahhhhhh!!! Congrats!!! I have sooooo been waiting for this!

Thanks Mico!! I'm so excited to share!

 

[liaerfbv]

I've been lurking in BWW because DH and I are thinking about doing a vow renewal and the Kehoe House is on my short list to check out! I'm assuming you did the package? I know you said you ended up getting married inside - what location did you use? I found the pictures on their website of the indoor location were lacking, so I'm very interested to hear where you got married and how it worked!

I'm so happy for you that you had the wedding of your dreams!

 

[audball]

I've been lurking in BWW because DH and I are thinking about doing a vow renewal and the Kehoe House is on my short list to check out! I'm assuming you did the package? I know you said you ended up getting married inside - what location did you use? I found the pictures on their website of the indoor location were lacking, so I'm very interested to hear where you got married and how it worked!

I'm so happy for you that you had the wedding of your dreams!

Hi liaerfbv! I could not recommend The Kehoe House more highly! The home is sooo beautiful and Susie and Phil (the concierge employees who do the coordinating for elopements/renewals) are so fantastic. We did book their elopement package. It included two nights stay (we added a night so we could be there three nights/four days), the ceremony, officiant, 8" wedding cake with your choice of flavors, bouquet/bout, champagne with keepsake flutes with your cake, champagne with chocolate covered strawberries on your wedding night (or renewal night), and carriage ride tour of Savannah. Their breakfast every day is also super fantastic and you get to choose your deliciousness and they'll deliver it to your room to enjoy which was so nice. The flowers that are included with the package are roses in your choice of color, but I'm not a big fan of roses and worked directly with the florist to choose something else. She was wonderful and I was happy to have something else!

There are 4 ceremony locations to choose from, two indoor, two outdoor. The two outdoor options are the garden and the side verrandah. The two indoor options are in the parlor or the music room. We had originally chosen the garden, but Susie assured us that after we checked in the day before our wedding that we could see all the spaces in person and change our mind if we wanted to. And we did. The garden is very small and this time of year, there was nothing in bloom and it was covered in dead, wet leaves. Pictures I've seen of it in the springtime are very pretty, but our Fall wedding wouldn't have been very grand with the state it was in so we nixed that. We really thought we wanted to marry outside, but after checking out the verrandah, we just weren't feeling it. I've seen beautiful pictures of couples getting married on the verrandah, but we just couldn't picture it for ourselves. The verrandah is on the side of the house (along President street), and that street is lined on both sides with metered parking and there was a car in every spot the entire time we were there. I wasn't keen on a bunch of random parked cars in the background of all our photos. The other reason we chose inside was because The Kehoe House is one of the oldest/most historic spots and every.single.trolley.tour passes the house and heads down President street. There are so many trolley tour companies that there was a different one passing every 5-10 minutes. That took away the concept of the cozy/private elopement to me.

The indoor spaces are both very beautiful. Much more beautiful than I expected based on the photos. When you walk into the front of the house, directly in front of you is the concierge desk. To your left is an open doorway (no actual door) to the music room. It's a small room, about the size of a bedroom, that has a baby grand piano in the bay window, two small couches, a little desk, and a fireplace. If you choose that room, they'll move the two small couches and you'd stand in front of the piano. It's a beautiful room, but with it being smaller, I didn't think our photographer would be able to move around as well. And it's on the northeast side of the building so our afternoon wedding time didn't have a ton of light coming through the huge windows. So we chose the parlor. The parlor is through an open doorway to the right when you come into the house. The room is huge and has two fireplaces, a seating area with a couch, several chairs, and a dining space on the other end with a table that seats 12 with a beautiful buffet table. The end behind the seating area has a bay window with floor to ceiling windows (impressive since the ceilings are 14'!). They removed the furniture close to the window (some chairs) and we got married in front of the bay window. They put a sign on the front door of the house that said "wedding in progress...use side entrance" and nobody came in at all during our private time. During our ceremony, two trolleys drove by outside and I was exceedingly glad we chose the indoor space.

If you have any specific questions, I would be happy to share! We loved everything about our stay at The Kehoe House and we loved that the package included everything we wanted except photography and hair/makeup. I was glad to choose my own vendors for those and I would highly recommend them if you're looking for someone.

I will go ahead and post a single teaser photo of our ceremony while I'm {eagerly} waiting for the rest of our photos! It's our first kiss in front of the beautiful bay window where we got married. Our officiant, who I also would highly recommend (you get to choose your officiant if you book so if you're interested in who we chose, let me know!), said we could seal our vows with a kiss and was out of the picture frame in about 1 second flat. I love that this isn't posed, it's our real first kiss, and I'm so in love with the photo.

All photography credits go to photographer Luke Smith at Lone Pine Photography.

 

[liaerfbv]

Thanks so much for the info!! That photo is adorable! I really love that bay window, it makes a gorgeous backdrop for photos. I'm also looking at the Gastonian (that garden ), but I keep coming back to the Kehoe House because I love the exterior and the location. I will definitely come back with more specific questions for you as I get further along in the planning, but I think you've swayed me with your glowing review. It's always nice to hear a first hand report. We live in FL so we were thinking about doing a short weekend trip just to get a sense of the location and the look of the place, but maybe I'll just wait for your pictures now....

 

[audball]

Thanks so much for the info!! That photo is adorable! I really love that bay window, it makes a gorgeous backdrop for photos. I'm also looking at the Gastonian (that garden ), but I keep coming back to the Kehoe House because I love the exterior and the location. I will definitely come back with more specific questions for you as I get further along in the planning, but I think you've swayed me with your glowing review. It's always nice to hear a first hand report. We live in FL so we were thinking about doing a short weekend trip just to get a sense of the location and the look of the place, but maybe I'll just wait for your pictures now....

Thanks liaerfbv! I completely adore that photo. The bay window is SO beautiful and that room gets the *perfect* light in the early afternoon. We also looked at The Gastonian (they're sister B&Bs run by the same innkeeper), but several things swayed us to The Kehoe House included a personal recommendation (someone I know from high school recently eloped there), the exterior of the home, and the more central location. Additionally, the package price was $100 less and included the carriage ride whereas the Gastonian was $100 more and did not.

We also live in FL! It took us about 5 1/2 hours to drive there from the Tampa bay area. I will definitely post a ton of pictures in a thread when I get them back in the next few weeks.

Any questions I can answer, just let me know! If you go, I hands down recommend you make dinner reservations for Alligator Soul. Hands down.

 

[derbygal]

Oh, your wedding sounds like it was wonderful. Congrats!

 

[audball]

Oh, your wedding sounds like it was wonderful. Congrats!

Thank you derbygal!!

 

[TooPatient]

Love the picture!

Your dress is gorgeous and the shoes are perfect with it!

 

[audball]

Love the picture!

Your dress is gorgeous and the shoes are perfect with it!

Thanks TP! I loved my dress, my shoes, my hair/makeup...everything! I wish we could relive our day over and over again. I cannot wait to see the rest of our photos!

 

[gatorblue]

Awwww, Audball! Congratulations!!! Your wedding day sounds like it was so absolutely amazing! Thank you for sharing all the details with us. Where did all the time go? Seems like just yesterday, you were describing your engagement. Love the picture - even without seeing your faces, I can just see the happiness bursting from both of you! So beautiful.

We are actually leaving for Savannah in the morning, it's stop #1 on our mini-honeymoon road trip. I am totally making a reservation at Alligator Soul right now based on your recommendation!! So a big thank you for that!!

 

[audball]

Awwww, Audball! Congratulations!!! Your wedding day sounds like it was so absolutely amazing! Thank you for sharing all the details with us. Where did all the time go? Seems like just yesterday, you were describing your engagement. Love the picture - even without seeing your faces, I can just see the happiness bursting from both of you! So beautiful.

We are actually leaving for Savannah in the morning, it's stop #1 on our mini-honeymoon road trip. I am totally making a reservation at Alligator Soul right now based on your recommendation!! So a big thank you for that!!

Thank you!! Congrats to you as well! Married this past weekend!! Eek! Where has the time gone!?!

I will definitely be posting more pictures when I get them back from our photographer! I hope you'll share some from your special day as well! Let me know what you think of Alligator Soul! I'm so glad you'll be taking us up on the recommendation!

 

[antiquesparkler]

Your hair/dress/shoes/flowers are amazing! Beautiful! I cant wait to see more!

 

[audball]

Your hair/dress/shoes/flowers are amazing! Beautiful! I cant wait to see more!

Thank you AS! I'm just dying to all the pictures back from the photographer but I'm trying to be patient!

 

[audball]

We have pictures!!! As soon as I get the disk in the mail (we saw them in an online gallery to approve), I'll get an audball wedding picture thread started!!