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A + D

Congratulations Amy + Dallas!

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The wedding was beautiful, the food delicious, the dancing fun. We had a great time with our friends!

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[NOT my name!!]

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Grooms: Please be sure to always toast your bride! Dallas gave a beautiful speech to Amy, and it was unlike any other wedding we’ve been to <3

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Details

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Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Maybe I’m a huge prude, but I’m surprised that you included that picture in an otherwise really nice post :-/

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    • im curious too! i think i’d only not take my husbands last name if it was something horrible sounding!! is it a tradition in your family?

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    • I just couldn’t imagine being anyone but my self! Some might say a name is just a name, but I feel so much identity in mine that becoming Katherine Monson was just not imaginable.

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      • I can totally relate to this, except I did change my name. I love my husband very much, but I wish I hadn’t taken his name. Even after almost 15 years as Alison Smith, I still don’t feel like Alison Smith. I think it’s too late to do anything about it now. 🙂

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        • Just wondering if any of you have kids? Of course, I love my maiden name and feel very connected to it but in the end my now immediate family of husband and three kids is that of my married name. Can’t imagine us having different names!!

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          • Yes, I have one daughter, age 9. She has my maiden name as her middle name, to keep the connection alive somewhat. I’m a very traditional, conservative type of person; I’m a stay at home mom and I like the idea of the ‘traditional family unit’ but I suppose this desire to have kept my maiden name has a lot to do with my own feelings of having lost my identity somewhere along the way.

            Or, perhaps it has more to do with the fact that our last name is Smith. I mean, how boring is that?! 😉

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            • My parents hyphenated & I love my last name, even though people can be a bit stupid about it, when they ask my last name, etc. 🙂

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            • I’ve always wondered what kids with a hyphenated name will do when they get married, if their fiance is also hyphenated. Will they quadruple hyphenate their kids? Has anyone out there had to figure that out yet?

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              • I think it’s up to the kids and depends on the names.

                If Sarah Jamiaomaboieonhl-Nanoiahdsnw marries Jim Smith-Jones, she might choose to take his hyphenated name completely – or maybe they just become the Jones’!

                Or if Kath Kiehne-Younger marries Matt Maxwell-Monson the could become the Younger-Monsons.

                In both traditional and non-traditional scenarios, I think you have to let the woman (and man!) decide when the time comes. Other cultures have been doing the hyphenated name thing for ages.

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                • Thanks for the response! I’ve always wondered about that. I love that we have the freedom to choose what works for each of us.

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                • And other cultures have been patrilineal for ages. I think the problem with hyphenated names when marrying is they either have to be changed or the person’s partner has to take it. In either case that is at odds with your insistence that you couldn’t imagine changing your name because ” I couldn’t imagine being anyone but myself” yet you want to give children a hyphenated name which they will have to change. Don’t you want them to remain themselves also?

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      • Interesting! You have a cool last name anyways..my last name is so boring i can’t wait to get married to change it!

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    • I didn’t take my husband’s name either. I am also bothered when people assume that I did, and even more bothered when people express judgment about it. It’s 2011, not 1950! Ultimately, I feel like changing or not changing your name is a very personal decision, and it was one that I had a difficult time making when I got married.

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      • Delurking to add my 2 cents. I didn’t change my name when I got married. In my family, one sister didn’t change her name (me), one hyphenated hers, and one changed hers. It’s a personal decision. It doesn’t bother me when strangers assume I have my husband’s last name, as it is the cultural norm; however it does bother me when people who know that I didn’t change my name call me by my husband’s last name. My kids both have my husband’s last name, and it rarely causes confusion, which is easily cleared up. (Oh, and we plan on stopping by GH one of these days, once our summer routine is in place)

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          • It’s illegal in Quebec to take your partner’s last name and if you have children, they usualy take the father’s last name. We had a few years (in the 1990’s) where kids had both names but that didn’t last long because some of them had long names like Jean-Dominic Fontaine Grondin for exemple…that was long to write on a piece of paper. So parents just came back with giving their kids their father’s last name.

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        • I am the same way – I hyphenated, and when strangers just use one or the other it no longer bothers me (took a year or so for that, hah!), but when people I know can’t be bothered to remember or purposely just use my husband’s name, I am like “you should know better!”.

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      • “It’s 2011, not 1950!”

        Yeah, no one changes their name in 2011. Right? I don’t think anyone even gets married in 2011. Right?

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  4. Kath I almost never comment but I must say I think you & your friends have had the most beautiful weddings I’ve ever seen! Must be the scenery over there in wine country – plus I love a good green and neutral color pallate -just gorgeous!

    (And sad I missed a scandalous pic? As if anything you ever post is really a “scandal” hah!)

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  12. Kath, amazing images…wow.

    I have been seriously bitten by the photography bug recently and spend my time on professional photography blogs and wind up looking at tons of wedding photos b/c that’s so common and I had to consciously tell myself, wait, this is Kath’s blog. Not a professional wedding photographer’s website!

    Seriously. Amazing. Shots.

    The bride looked beautiful, you looked great, everyone looked like they were having a ball. And based on the first commenter, of course, I’d love to know what the big bruhaha picture was? But it’s irrelevant. The photos you DID post all rock!

    🙂

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  13. I so enjoyed these wedding photos. You always do such a nice job of capturing the moments at large events, Kath.

    Hope you and Matt have a relaxing play day!

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  16. What a beautiful wedding. My groom wrote my own vows which is kind of like toasting me. It was still amazing and I’ll never forget that moment. 🙂

    Glad you had a great night.

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  24. Kath, your pictures are amazing! I especially loved your dress, it looked so nice on you and good for a summer wedding 🙂

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  26. what a beautiful wedding! I love all of the outdoor pictures; looks like it was a perfect night for a wedding 🙂

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  29. The napkins were my favorite part =) I just love the string lights everywhere and the sparklers instead of throwing rice or blowing bubbles. So clever, fun and beautiful (which I imagine would describe the bride and groom based on these pics!). There’s something about a June wedding…they always seem to come out well!

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  32. My college friends and I always talk about how much fun all of our weddings will be someday… I cannot wait for them! Your photos are stunning, I especially love the one of the couple with the vintage car, its such a cool contrast.

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  33. Aw this looks like such a beautiful wedding – and the bride!! She’s stunning 🙂 I can’t wait until my college friends start getting married!

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  34. Wow! The bride’s dress was beautiful, everything you captured looked amazing; from the location to the table decor, string lights, and of course the food! And on a comPletely different note, I may have convinced my hubby to take a long weekend in Charlottesville so I can visit your bakery; his only requirement may be a decent area for road biking!

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  35. Looks like a beautiful wedding..

    IN OTHER NEWS! Friday at work I was bored and started reading the news on CNN. I saw a familiar face on the right hand side of the screen! Your face and name was on an advertisement for OpenSky!

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  43. Oh my gosh, that looks like a total fairytale wedding. The decorations are to a T. It should go into better homes and gardens special edition or something. Or theknot.com. Love the twinkle lights on the ceiling in the reception.

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  44. I love that it’s wedding season and it gives me a chance to see all the creative things people come up with for their big day. I’m not planning to get married for a LONG time but still it’s fun to see all the different idea (like the photos with the pink Cadi- love that!)

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  47. What a gorgeous wedding! I wish we had something like that around here. I am getting married next year and plan on taking his name. I totally feel like it’s a personal decision. I don’t really have any attachment to my last name so maybe that’s why it’s easier for me to let it go. For some reason, I am looking forward to becoming a family unit with him by taking his last name.. might sound weird to some, but just something special to me.

    Great pictures and love your dress!

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      • I totally agree with you Lindsay, it was an easy decision for me to take the hub’s name, and I couldn’t imagine not sharing the same name as my children… plus I think hyphens are just messy. But such a personal decision!

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  49. long-time reader/fan, first time commenter. you have inspired me in so many ways and I love your example even more since you didn’t take your husband’s name! so many women get pressured into it.

    thanks for your example that a marriage can be strong, loving and supportive even with two different last names. 🙂

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  50. It looks like it was a beautiful wedding. Congratulations to your friends.
    You blogged so many wonderful things about the wedding, I just wish you had left off the things you weren’t happy with, such as wrong name on place card and no wedding cake. We would never have known the difference and the bride would never have to read about it on your blog.

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    • I was thinking the same thing. I hope the bride isn’t a regular reader as it would be a kick in the teeth to read a friend call out things about your wedding in front of thousands of people.

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      • We joked with Dallas + Amy – they know I’m just lightly mentioning. Not real “complaints.” Took out the second though.

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    • I was thinking the exact same thing, and I came back to this entry comment about it. Do you ever think that those joking comments may be hurtful to the bride and groom, especially when they are pointed out on your blog? It was such a nice entry…that rubbed me the wrong way.

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  51. I wanted to comment my true feelings on the practice of taking a man’s last name in marriage, but I think I’ll spare everyone the ~drama~. Really, reading through some of these critical comments makes me reconsider my drive to be a blogger. Take a chill pill people!

    Gorgeous wedding!

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    • Not sure people are being exactly “critical”… mostly just sharing their own thoughts/decisions…I think most bloggers better have pretty thick skins!

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      • If you want to express an opinion, Jessie, you could start by not using sarcasm as a passive aggressive way of making a point. I fully understand the concept–in fact, my comment was simply to express MY opinion!

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  54. Lovely pictures, Ms. Younger! 🙂 When I got married in NYC, it was changing your name that was optional on the marriage license…it wasn’t assumed you’d take your husband’s automatically (which I didn’t).

    I also miss wedding cake–the last wedding I went to, last summer, had cupcakes. Which at least had buttercream, but aren’t exactly cake, with frosting-separated LAYERS.

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  55. I loved my last name (I had it for 40 years!) and my husband’s is a bit of a mouthful. But we discussed the name change thing and while my husband said it was completely up to me, I could tell that it meant a lot to him to have me take his last name. So I did. And I’m glad I did. I don’t feel it diminishes me or who I am in any way.

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  56. The photos of the wedding made me want to have ANOTHER wedding! Can we all have a few weddings over our lifetime?
    If you ever desire to change careers, you have one to explore- photography!
    I took my husband’s last name happily, because we both left our families to form a new family. In sports, the team isn’t The Lobos with a few Warriors thrown in- they’re all the Lobos, or all the Spartans, or whatever (sorry, athlete here). So, it made sense to me that we have the same name. And now that we have children, it just enhances our “team” spirit! 🙂

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    • I really like your “team” metaphor…I’ve never heard anyone explain it that way before and it’s really clear. My husband and I are both legally Mylastname Hislastname (so a double last name with no hypen) and our kids will be too. I love that our new family has a totally unique name that no one else in our families of origin share. So I guess we created a new name for our “team!” 🙂

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  58. I had been wanting to ask you about the whole keeping your maiden name thing before, so thanks for addressing it now. I’m nowhere near getting married, but I do wonder how I would approach the dilemma. I think the younger (pun unintended) you are at marriage, the easier it would be to incorporate a new name into your life. If you have established a professional identity with your maiden name, I can see how it would be difficult to switch to a new last name though. While it may not be obvious that you’re married if you keep your maiden name, it also will not be obvious if you get a divorce too ;). Regardless, as long as you know who you are and that you’re married, that’s all that really matters.

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  61. you take such gorgeous photos!
    beautiful wedding- loved your dress too 🙂
    xoxo

    it took me two years to switch to tom’s last name.. and i still wish i would have kept mine!

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  62. Great pictures and a happy day! I too am sad that I didn’t spot anything controversial! 🙂

    I don’t know if I ever really considered changing my name, and I don’t mean to hurt the feelings of anyone who chose otherwise – it’s totally your choice. However, I think the convention of the woman changing her name is a totally outdated and worse than sexist custom that represents a change of ownership of the woman’s person and a change of her identity from “someone’s daughter” to “someone’s wife.” I am married, but I still belong to myself. It’s the freaking 21st century, for heaven’s sake. I honestly can’t understand why someone *would* change their name without long, hard thought.

    I do work in the news media, and it’s a lot more common. I have a lot of coworkers who didn’t change their names. I am the first such person my in-laws have experienced, though, and they are totally confused by it. I think my mother-in-law thinks I’m breaking some kind of law!

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    • Even if the tradition is routed in paternalism, you could choose to look at it in a different light. Rather than looking it as “giving up” your identity, you could look at it as your husband “giving” something to you. I wouldn’t want to give MY name to just anyone and would consider it a special gift. That said, I always assumed I’d change my name, but my last name is so much prettier than my boyfriend’s 😉 We’ll see when the time comes. I would care about his input.

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      • I do see where you’re coming from, but to me that’s just putting a positive spin on what really is an archaic, sexist custom. If tradition were for one person in the marriage to change their name and the stats were generally equal, maybe – but the tradition is for *the woman* to change her name. So I look at it as something that’s not for me. 🙂 Your mileage may vary!

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  63. We don’t even get to choose in Italy. You just keep your maiden name 🙂 I got married in the USA but kept my name. I agree with occula, and … why doesn’t the man change his name for a change 😉

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  64. I’m so glad I thought to check your blog for wedding photos! These are the first photos I’ve seen of our wedding – thank you so much for capturing the details with such care. You truly are a great photographer. And so sorry about the name goof! I know you understand but just cause there seems to be so many comments about it – to be honest, I just got exhausted with all the tiny last minute details that went into planning the wedding (I might encourage others to enlist the help of a wedding planner) and didn’t do the fact checking that I should have. At a certain point you just need to delegate and get things done and hope everyone has a good time. Thanks for the great photos again!

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