Mike and Ariane | The Wedding Video It Took 13 Years to Make

I cried for years that we had no wedding video… or so I thought. That is, in fact, the reason we started WeddingMix in 2011. We really are passionate about people getting an edited video from the most important moments of their lives. So passionate that we shook off the golden handcuffs of high paying jobs to devote ourselves to lives in a startup.

We wanted every couple to have an easy way to get a memento from the video that their friends and family shoot at their event. It’s too hard to do anything with emailed cellphone video. You can’t easily download it from YouTube or Facebook. And here’s what happens to those lovely 2 hour tapes unedited tapes (or DVDs) from relatives:

• they don’t get watched (this was us)
• they get stored in the basement and flooded (this was us, just a couple of months after the wedding)

 

In my mind, we had no wedding video. We may have watched 15 minutes of each tape (VHS, taped over PBS) once before the flood. What I didn’t know, is that my gorgeous husband had painstakingly unrolled the tapes and dried them out, saving them, hoping to do something… someday. This was WAY before we ever started editing video. So, I knew nothing about it and he didn’t even remember.

The Value of Your Memories

Why was it so important to me to have video?

• Our wedding was a (high end) DIY extravaganza
• We had a LOT of friends and family fly into town whom we hadn’t seen in years
• Our photographer was awesome but didn’t get ANY photos of our historic venue
• Looking at Mike on that day, I thought it was definitely not possible to love him more, and now I can tell you I was totally WRONG

We had what, at the time was a sizable budget, due to generous parents and both working at good jobs. We decided to spend the majority of it on an awesome bar band, The Killer Flamingoes, and on one of Mike’s relatives… Uncle Jack Daniels. Our band budget was larger than anything else. Our booze budget was larger than food. I think it was actually double the food budget. So, you can see that our budget priority was having fun.

That meant DIY for almost everything else. So, I learned to sew and made the dress. We learned to emboss and made the invitations. I had been a cake decorator, so I made the cake. DIY is definitely NOT for everyone. And not all of our attempts were successful, so please don’t think I’m suggesting to cut pro’s out of your wedding budget.

I’m from the east coast with family all over the country. Mike also had family all over the country. And a LOT of them flew into town for our wedding. And had a LOT of fun… see the note about Uncle Jack Daniels. I wanted to see the video of them getting a little crazy on the dance floor. There’s the video of Mike’s cousin blocking my cousin during the bouquet toss so that his girlfriend could catch the bouqet. There’s me dancing with our friend Surf, who died in an accident just a few years after the wedding. They’re all memories I wanted to see again.

Our poor photographer had a VERY long day. Getting ready started at 6am. Our ride for the location shots bailed, so he wound up driving us around. By the time of the reception, he was pooped. I don’t blame him at all. He did a fabulous job of making two very non-photogenic people look great in the same photos at the same time. So, I’m absolutely not complaining about not having any shots of the Masonic Temple of Detroit. But, I was sad about it. I thought there had been some good video of the interior on the tape my sister shot… but it was gone.

And to examine the last point, the video shows how incredibly in love we were. I love seeing the way we looked at each other. And yet, 13 years later, I can tell you that it only gets better. The love deepens in ways you couldn’t conceive. And you get these funny rose-colored glasses that make me swear as good looking as he was back then… he’s 10 times more gorgeous now! Thank you for sharing in my anniversary gift to my husband.