Matt and Chariti's wedding in Devon, Alberta

The story of our wedding

After being engaged for 3 years, we finally tied the knot during the second Covid summer in Alberta. We were prepared to only have 10 of us at our ceremony due to restrictions, (and no formal reception) and because our parents are all separated this meant it would just be us and our wedding party, which consisted of our 4 best friends, my 2 younger brothers and my husband's younger sister. 18 days before our wedding, provincial restrictions changed to allow 20 people and outdoor receptions of the same amount - which meant we could have our parents there with us and it meant the world!! We scrambled to find a new reception venue 15 days before our wedding and in the end, the day was pure magic. Myself and my bridesmaids got ready at the prestigious Fairmont Hotel MacDonald in Edmonton, while my husband and the groomsmen got dressed at our home in West Edmonton. It was a blazing hot Saturday, 30º+ and not a cloud in the sky. We had a beautiful, intimate ceremony at the University of Alberta Botanical Gardens, in the Aga Khan Amphitheatre, located just outside Devon, AB. My husband, accompanied by his mom and step-mom, and our wedding party walked down the aisle to the Schitt's Creek cover of "Simply the Best", while I walked down to an acoustic version of "Can You Feel the Love Tonight". Since it was just 20 people total, everyone who attended was able to be part of our ceremony, either giving us away to each other or standing as our witnesses. We also live-streamed the ceremony through Zoom for our friends and family who couldn't be there in person (we received rave reviews as everyone could stay in their air-conditioned homes and have a few drinks!). Our ceremony was blocked off from the public so it truly was very intimate and special. We included a land acknowledgement before our ceremony to honour and thank the First Nations peoples for the land we were able to use for our wedding, and we incorporated personal vows to each other that left everyone dabbing away tears and laughing at how in-sync my husband and I are (without discussing our vows with each other, we both mentioned how long we'd been together in terms of days and months, and how we love to annoy each other). After walking out as husband and wife for the first time to the "Victory Celebration Song" from Star Wars, we spent some time capturing beautiful photos in the Botanical Gardens. As we were getting a little hungry, we took our limo to a nearby Dairy Queen for blizzards and chicken fingers - our first meal as a married couple. For the reception, we had dinner and dances at a small farm just outside Spruce Grove, AB. Complete with plenty of waters for everyone and individually packaged meals from our caterer, we had a great night of dancing, laughter, and happy tears. After dinner, my husband and I went out to the highway for a "drive-by reception", where friends and family who couldn't be with us in person were able to still see us on our day. It was also a time for our guests to relax and digest their food before getting into the dances. We actually didn't have that many visitors - so it was more of a chance for us to take a moment to ourselves and realize we were finally married!! Once we got back to the reception area, my husband and I had our first dance to "Live Forever" by Kane Brown - an underrated love song that we fell in love with a couple years ago. Then my dad and I danced to "I loved her first" by Heartland, and my husband had a dance with each of his moms. The biggest hit of the night was probably our dessert: cinnamon buns and edible cookie dough from a vegan cinnamon bun shop in Edmonton (Cinnaholic). My husband hates cake and we felt donut walls and candy bars were way overdone, so cinnamon buns it was! We also wanted to go a little further in our uniqueness and looked into a "cinnamon bun cake", which we just wanted a large bun stacked on top of an even bigger bun, to create the illusion of a 2-tiered cake - and the shop was able to bring our vision to life! Because of how hot it was, the icing was melting on all the buns so it was an excuse for everyone to eat lots! We also ordered plenty of extra baby buns so all of our guests were able to take an empty box and take about 10 buns and cookie dough cups home for another day's treat. We ended the night by playing the shoe game and dancing to a variety of songs from Ozzy Osbourne to I Knew the Bride to Dancing in September. At the very end, our late-night pick-up was a huge party bus for my husband and me (we only requested a black car pick-up!) and we went back to the Fairmont Hotel for a 2-night stay-cation for our first few days as newlyweds. Thanks to our friends, family and wedding coordinator (Olivia Fata Events), our wedding day was more perfect than I could have imagined or planned in any universe!