Abi + Eileen’s Strong Mansion wedding – May 1, 2011

Abi and Eileen’s (collectively known as Abileen) true wedding day was actually the day before their celebration at Strong Mansion near Sugarloaf Mountain. Since same sex marriage isn’t legal in Maryland, they had a small ceremony the day before in DC. Rabbi Fred performed both ceremonies but waited to officially sign the marriage certificate during the Ketubah signing on Sunday with all friends and family there to witness. Abi and Eileen’s day started with them getting ready together and helping each other pick our their jewelry for the day and their shoes. Eileen wore a necklace that belonged to Abi’s mother and Abi wore a Richard Nixon tie clip that had belonged to Eileen’s father on the bow of her dress! The most unfortunate part of the day was that the weather didn’t cooperate. Both women were great about doing their portraits in the drizzle but it was just too much to ask everyone to sit outside in the rain for the ceremony. So it was moved inside the house which turned out to be lovely. Highlights of the ceremony for me were the game of Rock, Paper, Scissors that decided who would place the antique house ring on whose finger first. The rings themselves were very cool…literally houses and they’d been in Abi’s family forever. The real rings went missing during the ceremony so they had a very intimate ring exchange during their Yechud (private time) with only me as a witness. The other shot from the ceremony that I loved was the two of them simultaneously breaking the glass. The reception really got underway with the Hora and the look on Eileen’s face while she was on the chair, was priceless. The guests entertained the two of them while everyone clapped and cheered. Right before the pie cutting (a beautiful heart shaped strawberry-rhubarb pie), the brides entertained their guests with a rendition of “Abba Dabba Honeymoon” on the ukelele.