There were no ‘love letters’ or ‘flower proposals’, albeit he proposed to me asking for my hand in marital bond directly, and we happened to get married on THE VALENTINE’S DAY! I wanted the content of our wedding invitation to reflect our own story rather than just introducing ourselves and so our Invitation read thus!
“When we met we had no idea of what was lying ahead of us,
When we spoke we understood there was something special about us,
And when we got along, our Smile became laughter and our days became Joy.
Little did we realise that we are a perfect pair like the burgers and fries,
And so we decided to tie the knot and become Husband and Wife
Pronouncing an everlasting vow to share a home, family and life.”
That is exactly the story of how I got hitched to my office colleague. Btw, my name is Priyamvatha a “Tambrahm” girl settled at Chennai. My guy and I knew each other for four years and we were in relationship for three years before we got married.
We were informally engaged since 2014 January and that is when Shopzters came in to my life. My wedding being the ‘First wedding of the Sixth generation’ of our family, it was very much dearly awaited by the kith and kin and it indeed turned out to be one worth the wait.
‘Our Engagement was fixed on December 6th, 2015 but owing to the Chennai rain we had to postpone it by 4 days and so it happened on December 10th 2015. My in-laws had picked on Ronak Catering services, and they won the hearts with their delicious food.
Three Unique things about my wedding!!!
1. We had a perfect traditional Janavasam on February 13th evening and had hired the trademark Janavasam car, which turned out to be a super funny evening. The women of the bride’s family were looking gorgeous in different shades of blue for the Janavasam evening and Pink for the Muhurtham morning. Whereas for me, it was a complete ‘orange and pink themed’ wedding.
2. We had planned a colour co-ordinated wedding and the main events were colour themed.’ My wedding sarees across all the events (sparing my Vratham for which I had picked a complete traditional green and maroon) beamed either in a brilliant orange or pink or both and atleast had a hint of orange or pink.
And most of mine and my sister’s sarees were made to order from a weaver at Kancheepuram, where we had handpicked the colours and motif of the sarees. I had also stopped by at Varamahalakshmi for a few other sarees. My reception lehenga is from Femina.
My nine yards was loved for its delightful combination of pink and lime green which I had picked up from Rangachari cloth store. My mom’s nine yards was also loved for its unique shade of red, which was made to order from the weaver.
3. Half of the jewellery collection was from both of my grandmother’s stash. And rest of them were bought at Malabar gold and Sri Palsani Jewellers (especially for diamond). I also bought a ‘two in one’ hip chain from OKJ, which could also be used as haram if needed. My muhurtham Jhumka which drew attention was designed by me and a gift from my in-laws from Sri Abirami Jewellers T.Nagar.
The one piece of jewellery which stole the entire show was my ‘pattanchuthi’ (traditional head accessory), made out of original vadaserry stones, it is my proud inheritance from my grand mom and is much older than I am. This piece of head accessory was worn by my mom, athai etc during their respective wedding and seemantham.
My entire family had our blouses stitched at “Menaka Embroidery”, and they had done an amazing job on our blouses. Few of our guests particularly photographed our blouses for design reference.
My make-up and hair-do was done by Dharani for my Betrothal and Janavasam and Prakruthi for my Muhurtham and reception. Susan did the mehandi for my entire family.
One of the best choices I made was the photography. Manoj and his team from ‘@manoj-sasidharan# Photography’ did a wonderful job and most importantly were very patient and accommodating throughout the shoot and after. We loved the candid shots where all the precious emotions of our family especially of my parents, sisters and grandmoms were beautifully captured.
My parents had picked on Ambi catering services for the wedding which again was the best choice, and there wasn’t a single guest who did not enjoy the sumptuous food. From the starters till the desserts they were nothing less than perfection. For our reception they served naturally made orange ice-cream in natural orange pulp which became a ‘super-hit’!
The wedding invitation which my parents had printed for muhurtham and reception were much appraised for its unique design and wordings and we got the entire family tree of 5 generations printed on the cards. We picked on Dream cards for all the fancy cards and Sudha Printers for ‘Manja Pathrikai’. I can’t describe how informative shopzters was throughout the part of planning and I really wish they go on forever to help us plan my sister’s and future daughter’s wedding!
A word to the brides-to-be: Spend lot of time with your family and don’t fret about last minute delays, they are bound to happen and will actually turn out to be an amusing memory later!!
