Real Weddings: Madison and Alex's Elegant Spring Wedding

For today’s Real Weddings feature, we are going to interview the bride, Madison, and learn more about her and Alex’s love story! This stunning wedding took place here this summer, and we are in love with everything the bride and groom did to make it their special day. We loved the custom programs they had made, the super fun band that performed, and the first look that featured her three brothers seeing her for the first time. (We’re a sucker for brother/sister 1st looks. They are seriously our new favorite thing!)

Tell us the short story of how you met one another.

Alex and I met each other about 10 years ago. We met through family and mutual friends but because I was 13 and Alex was 17 we never looked twice at each other. Five years later, Alex reached out to me to tell me happy birthday. We started catching up, talking every day, went on a few dates, and haven't looked back since.

Tell us about the proposal

In December 2017 Alex and I went to Disney World with my family as my birthday present (from Alex). Our first day in the parks we started out at Epcot. My mom actually was very sick, throwing up about every 30 minutes so I was insisting we go back to the hotel and just rest until she felt better. She continued to push through saying she was okay and that we needed to go to Magic Kingdom because everyone wanted to see the castle. We go to Magic Kingdom and start to watch a show in front of the castle. Alex walks off to go find a bathroom and ends up calling me and saying to come to this little wishing well where there was a better view of the show and the castle, and not crowded by people. So we all go over there and start taking turns taking pictures together. When Alex and I take a picture he gets down on one knee (IN THE MOST MAGICAL PLACE ON EARTH) and asks me to marry him. It was so sweet and special because Alex knows that Disney World is my favorite place to go on vacation and truly my favorite place in the world.

What was the most memorable moment from your wedding day?

Alex and I both agree that the most memorable moment from the day was our first look. The whole day leading up to this moment all we could think about was wanting to see each other. Once we saw each other, it felt like a breath of fresh air and that we could finally enjoy our day together. We both cried (a lot) and just enjoyed the moment talking, hugging, and exchanging our gifts to each other, which was also a very special moment. It was the sweetest moment feeling like there was no one around except for us.

Why did you choose White Oak Farms?

White Oak Farms was the first venue we looked at and when we left I told Alex "it's going to be hard to beat that one." We loved how naturally beautiful it was. It didn't need any extra decorations. It is so clean, elegant, and timeless. It was big enough inside and outside. It really just checked all our boxes. It also helped that Stephanie was the kindest, most welcoming, easiest person to work with throughout our entire experience, even that first day we viewed the venue. If we did it all over again, we wouldn't change a thing.

In a few words describe your theme or style for your wedding.

Classic, Simple, Elegant

Is there anything else you think future couples will find interesting / helpful about your wedding?

We planned the entire wedding from out of state. It didn't make it any harder (like we thought it would). Stephanie was always available to answer our questions or just talk us through basic wedding things that we didn't know about. I think it's really helpful to do the entire weekend package if you are able to. It was extremely wonderful being able to start decorating Friday morning, having the rehearsal dinner on site and spending all day Saturday at the venue. It's also really helpful to have some sort of wedding planner, day of coordinator, liaison-type person. That takes a lot of stress and pressure off of the bride, groom, and family. Oh and of course, give yourself plenty of time to plan if you can. Alex and I planned for 18 months and having a longer engagement definitely made it easier and less stressful. We also had a "late night snack" (100 single Taco Bell tacos) come in around 10:00 pm and that was a huge hit with everyone.