This Week: THE LISTIES GOT MARRIED 👰🤵

You’ve read the subject line, so let’s just cut to the chase—WE GOT MARRIED! 💒 

After more than eight years together, we (Emily and David, a.k.a. The Listies) tied the knot in Stanhope, New Jersey at Waterloo Village Historic Site on 10/21/23 🌳

Before we get back to our regularly scheduled listing, we wanted to take a few moments to recap our wedding—of course throwing in a few lists along the way 😉

PRE-CEREMONY PLANNING 📒

As you might expect, there was A LOT to do before we even got to the altar—2 years of engagement, 10 months of actual planning, 14.5 vendors, and 185 invitations later, we finally made it!

The 0.5 vendor is our original invitation “designer,” who screwed the pooch (literally, he tried to draw our dog and it was horrifying to behold… he also gave off an angry vibe, so we left him for greener pastures).

Our real invitations and save-the-dates were crafted by the wonderful Amy at Greenwich Letterpress. We wanted to evoke the classic romance of the Casablanca movie poster to our invitations, and Amy really delivered!

The first thing we actually did on the day of our wedding was get beautified! Emily wore a dope dress from Kleinfeld, and David donned a dapper suit from BD Tailormade 👰

Of course, you can’t look this good and not take a million pictures, which is why we turned to two amazing talents in Jenny Flora (photographer) and Matt Alt Films (videographer) 📷

Pretty much all the photos you will see in this edition of The Listies newsletter come courtesy of Jenny and Matt!

THE CEREMONY 💏

Stepping up to the “altar” was a surreal (and admittedly awkward) experience, but nobody could have prepared us better than our officiant, Rev. Maureen Jeffries!

In the months leading up to our wedding, we met with Maureen to discuss our plans for the ceremony, as well as what makes a truly successful relationship and marriage 🕊️

And it was Maureen who suggested we infuse our love of movies, music, literature, and lists into the ceremony by compiling our Top 10 Quotes About Love 💌

COCKTAIL HOUR 🍸

The real fun begins after the ceremony, because that’s when you can start eating! From cocktail hour to dinner and dessert, all the food at our wedding was provided by Jeffrey A. Miller (JAM) Catering 🥘

JAM Catering basically runs the operation at Waterloo, and was one of the big reasons we chose this venue in the first place. Apart from the fact that Waterloo Village is a beautiful, 19th-century canal village, complete with working gristmill, historic houses, and the most incredible fall foliage, we were drawn to the FOOD!

Not to make you jealous (or nostalgic, if you were there), but we had some delicious food stations at cocktail hour, including soft pretzels with a variety of sauces, “BBQ in a jar,” and a massive paella 🥨

Our cocktail hour also featured the funky musical stylings of the Street Beat Brass Band, who also provided music for the ceremony 🎺 

Jeff and the Street Beat team were a last-minute addition and we couldn’t have imagined a better outcome—they even learned both of our parents’ songs!

THE RECEPTION 🪩

Ceremony? Check. Cocktail hour? Check? Taking a photo with Waterloo Village’s resident alpacas? Double check! It’s reception time 🕺

We wanted to go all out with our reception and make it really reflect us as a couple, so we added a handful of “Em & Dave” touches—packs of custom movie trivia on every table, an inflatable movie screen from FunFlicks playing Casablanca and Mamma Mia!, and a DJ that refused to play the Macarena… literally 📽️

Our DJ was the first vendor we hired, and we chose them specifically because of their name—No Macarena. They specialize in making sure you only hear the music that you love on your special day, and they truly lived up to their promise!

DJ Pete curated a brilliant reception playlist (which is linked below) based on David’s extensive recommendations 🎶

And in the interest of fitting another list into this newsletter, we decided to rank the Top 10 Wedding Songs for the Dance Floor 💃

Some other reception highlights included the popular photo booth (courtesy of Metro Photobooth Bus), Waterloo’s coffee bar, pizza and s’mores by the fire pit, and the much-appreciated shuttle service (courtesy of John and Lisa Hahn) 🚐

THE HONEYMOON 🍹

🚨 BONUS LIST ALERT 🚨

…and that’s all folks!