Christmas Day Magic at Nevada Beach

Drought is a bad thing, except when you’re a bride in a sleeveless dress who wants to get married on the beach in Lake Tahoe Christmas Day. It is hard to believe this photo was taken Christmas Day, but it was! The lake was like glass, and the sun shone brilliantly.

My couple was a spontaneous one; they’d just moved to Tahoe two weeks before Christmas with their bird, whose name is Birdie. They had been together for eight years, and her grandmother had prayed fervently throughout 2013 that this was the year they would finally tie the knot.

They consulted a seer who told them December was a very auspicious month for them to wed. What day of the month could be more auspicious than Christmas, when the whole world is just a bit more jolly and peaceful and filled with hope and goodwill? Christmas it was, then! Birdie had a chest cold, so he could not attend. Chewbacca the wedding dog was happy to fill in for Birdie.

I love all my couples, as anyone who’s read my wedding blogs knows. I love my loud couples and my fierce couples. I love the feisty couples. There is a special place in my heart, however, for my gentle couples. This Christmas couple was the gentlest of couples; they make me hope it’s true the meek shall inherit the Earth. May it happen during their lifetime together!

Kathryn was in rare form as the wedding photographer; maybe it was the day, and maybe it was the couple. The wedding started at noon, which is the hardest time of day to shoot. People end up with Pinocchio noses from the shadows of a sun that’s directly overhead.  She wasn’t thrilled about the big Bernese Mountain Dog attending the wedding, and thought he might pose problems. He has attended so many weddings, though, so he knows to just lay at my feet and gaze up into the couple’s eyes. He was no trouble at all, and Kathryn was able to shoot some spectacular shots of a spectacular day. The wedding made our Christmas joyful!

Happiness to all!

Pamela Camille, Reverend

http://www.laketahoeminister.com

 

Style and the Outdoor Wedding

What I love most about performing weddings is that every couple is unique, and every bride has an attitude about style. I just met at the roller derby park to confer with a roller derby bride about her style ideas. She told me many times she wanted “no mushiness,” as she and her groom are not mushy people. Her wedding will take place at the park in North Shore, and her bridesmaids will wear orange and white, halter top polka dot sundresses with bridal flip-flops. Her short gauzy sundress will be white, and she’ll also wear bridal flip-flops. Since the park is at the beach, I strongly recommended platform flip-flops; the platform keeps sand and dirt off newly painted toes.

The lovely couple in the photograph above married at Kiva Beach in Autumn; all those golden aspens provide the most gorgeous backdrop you would ever want. Autumn is a good theme for colors in the bouquets, and you simply don’t need to do much decorating for an outdoor wedding at Kiva in Autumn.  Spawning red salmon add another color to the style palette in October. I have one Kiva couple this October who are hoping to get bears in their photographs. (The bears have so much fun, fishing for salmon in Taylor Creek in October, my couple will probably get thier wish!)

The time and the light of your ceremony is part of the wedding’s style, especially so for outdoor weddings. The soft, peach light of summer sunsets makes everyone’s faces beautiful and becomes a character in the ceremony. In Autumn, the color in Tahoe is gold: The sand and the light are both gold, and the aspens are gold. If you are marrying on a green grassy lawn, green is a strong color that will also become a character in your wedding. The green grass sharpens the green of the pine trees, and you’d better have colors that go with green in your ceremony! Playing with colors and light and attitudes and style has a lot to do with why wedding planning is so fun.

Happiness to all!

Reverend Pamela Camille

http://www.laketahoeminister.com

A Meadows Beach Wedding

Meadows Beach is a special, quiet place available only to the few who know it. There is a trail through Tahoe Meadows that leads through the big meadow to the beach. You can stare at Mt. Tallac while you walk, which inspires happy feet. In Spring, it’s pretty swampy, but by summer, it’s dry and crackling with leaping grasshoppers. The water is very shallow at Meadows Beach, so you must wade forever to get to water deep enough to swim.

I know a woman who visited from Texas last summer; she ran from Camp Richardson to Regan Beach along the water–no small trick!  Along the way, she decided that someday, she wanted to get married at Meadows Beach. Today, she is engaged, and planning her Meadows Beach wedding for next summer.

One first step toward a Meadows Beach wedding could be renting a house close to the beach. For spontaneous couples wanting a quieter, less crowded beach for their ceremony, a simple walk through the meadow to the beach would suffice. Leave your pooch at home, as the folks at Meadows Beach are very cranky and adamant about the “No Dogs” policy.

My favorite Meadows Beach wedding I performed was between a Welsh woman and a Brazilian man. Amazingly, they had traveled from Brazil for this wedding. They rented a house in The Meadows and walked to the beach from the house. The bride was barefoot, and wore a simple summer slip dress of the most sumptuous mauvey-pink silk; the groom’s silk shirt was a close match. The sunset that night was absolutely orange-sicle apricot; the peach roses, rosey-mauve peonies and apricot Peruvian lillies decorated the scene and scented the air. This couple had traveled rough waters and across many skies to reach this magical evening, but the heavens blessed them with incomparable beauty. I loved the music of their accents as they spoke their loving words to each other; to join two poets is a blessing, indeed!

Happiness to all!

www.laketahoeminister.com