Traditional With a Twist: Elisabeth & Mike Somerville

Mike and I met through mutual friends in Washington, DC, where we both live. We hit it off immediately; and after a few very happy years together, we bought a house in Virginia just outside of DC. Mike proposed during a trip to a bed and breakfast on the Eastern Shore in October 2008.

Planning a Wyoming wedding from the East coast in eight months ended up being a lot easier than we initially thought. Mike’s sister Amy was a huge help with both suggestions from her Jackson friends as well as her great taste and ideas. She introduced us to her friend Sarajane Johnson from Lily & Company who did a wonderful job with our flowers and décor, as well as Leah Chace from Jackson Hole Event Company who became our wedding coordinator extraordinaire. With Leah’s help, we planned a gorgeous event with lots of personalized details.

We wanted our wedding weekend to be casual and fun, focused on our favorite people in the world, and on our love for each other. We also wanted to highlight Jackson, so we planned a host of activities—an evening at the Jackson Hole Rodeo, a group hike to Taggart Lake in Grand Teton National Park, a happy hour at Snake River Brew Pub and a rehearsal dinner and cocktail hour for all of our guests at 43 North restaurant. These events allowed us to spend time with our guests and gave our guests the chance to get to know one another before the big event.

Our wedding ceremony combined traditional wedding elements with our own modern, personal take. We asked our friend Brigette Courtot to officiate our wedding – something she had never done! Brigette’s own wedding to her partner Norah in Vancouver in 2007 highlighted for us the meaning and value of marriage and really inspired us. We worked with Brigette to craft our own vows that emphasized our equal partnership and unconditional love. We asked close married friends to read the Irish Wedding Blessing and an essay on marriage from Edmund O’Neill, which they read from leather-bound journals that we gave to them. The wedding ceremony was a reflection and a celebration of our relationship, our love and our friendships – it was chock full of emotion, laughter and a few tears.

The cocktail hour and reception incorporated lots of fun details and aspects of our lives and personalities. During the cocktail hour, chalkboard directional signs covered in fabric pointed the direction and mileage to the places we have lived over the years. A good friend made runners for the bars and matching napkin rings for each of our table settings (she also made my veil!). We had a display of our childhood and family photos hanging in a window which made for some laughs. Another friend made the programs, menu cards, and place cards (she also did the calligraphy for our invitation envelopes). Instead of favors, we donated a book in each of our guests’ names to 75 children at Bright Beginnings, a child development center in DC for homeless children. (I volunteered with Bright Beginnings for years and served on the board.)

For the reception, local Jackson band Soul Impressions got the evening started with our first dance—Al Green’s Let’s Stay Together. My cousin Lila Urda sang us a Shania Twain song. It was a great party! To cap off the night, we headed outside for a bonfire with s’mores and sliders and held a superlatives presentation for our guests. It was a hysterically funny night cap to a spectacular weekend. Afterwards, we ended the night with a sparkler exit. It was the perfect ending to a very happy day.