In this dark time we’re living through, we could all use an extra infusion of Jewish joy. And there’s something about Jewish weddings – the unbridled love and emotion, the continuity and hope for the Jewish future – that comes through better than just about anything else we can think of.
That’s certainly true of the beautiful, heartfelt Jewish wedding of New Hampshire couple Robbie and Jeff. The two grooms centered their big day around their own unique love story, and starting with their choice of venue, Temple Israel in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, where Robbie completed his conversion to Judaism, everything about their wedding was ultra-personal. This came through most clearly of all when it came to the duo’s vows, which told their story in an ultra-moving way.
Naturally, the couple wanted to make sure their ketubah was something special, and they found just the thing in their hand-painted tree of life ketubah by the wonderful Nava Shoham from Smashing The Glass Recommended Vendor 1800ketubah.com. Don’t miss it in the wonderful images from Jeffrey Rivkin Photography!
There’s lots more to say about this joyful Jewish wedding, but we’ll let the grooms take it from here…
How We Met
Robbie and Jeff, the grooms: We met in late 2017 through a mutual friend at a Halloween party were we live in Dover, New Hampshire. Jeff was in a relationship at the time, and initially we were just acquaintances at social gatherings, and became gym buddies. When Jeff became single a few months later, Robbie quickly jumped at the opportunity to get closer with the buff new guy with beautiful blue eyes, and the ability to carry an intelligent conversation.
“Jeff was fairly new to the area and didn’t know many people, so Robbie would invite him over to his place after the gym and cook him up some chicken, steak and veggies on the grill while we’d drink wine and get to know each other.”
Being that we were both in our 30s, we both approached the relationship with vulnerability and honesty. Neither of us was wasting any time. We shared our trials and tribulations over those initial dinners, and that’s when we really started connecting. Robbie has a thing for guys who have faced adversity and overcome it, so he was attracted to Jeff from the moment they started getting to know each other.
At around the three week point in our relationship, Robbie blurted out “I love you” after a few glasses of wine and a deep conversation. Jeff played his cards a little closer to his chest, and replied “thank you,” but the reality was that he was instantly drawn to Robbie’s boyish smile, his overflowing empathy, and effortless swagger.
The plot twist to the whole story was that Robbie had just been laid off from his job and was about to move away, eventually planning to land on the West Coast. On a romantic walk along the Marginal Way in Ogunquit Beach, Maine, Jeff tried to end things on a high note, not wanting to get more attached knowing Robbie was leaving. Robbie wasn’t so willing to let go. “I felt crushed as soon as the words came out of Jeff’s mouth. I knew I was going to be living in New England for at least another year before leaving to the West Coast, so I pleaded with Jeff to keeping seeing me and let things play out on their own.”
Thankfully, Jeff agreed, and we ended up maintaining a long distance relationship for about 13 months, roughly 145 miles or 2.5 hours apart. During that time, Robbie found a new job that allowed him to work remotely, and in August of 2019, he moved back to Dover, New Hampshire to live with Jeff full-time.
In January of 2021, we were out walking our cavapoo, Coal, and laughing hysterically as we watched him gliding on the ice on our long driveway. Then, Jeff told Robbie to look up at the stars. Jeff always “stops to smell the roses,” so Robbie looked up too, only to see a completely overcast sky. Confused, he looked back down and saw Jeff getting down on one knee, with a huge smile on his face, and an open ring box. He asked Robbie to marry him, and Robbie asked, “are you being serious?” Jeff replied, “I’m on my knees in the snow with a ring in my hand. Does this look like a joke?” Then Robbie said, “Yes. Yes. Oh, my God, of course.”
Having already been planning to propose to Jeff himself, Robbie went ahead and did a second proposal to Jeff that July at the top of their favorite mountain, Mt. Chocorua, in New Hampshire’s White Mountain region. He got down on one knee near the edge of the mountain at the top while Jeff was looking around, and said, “what do you think about the view over here?” Jeff turned around and Robbie popped the questions. Of course it was already a done deal at that point. Jeff said yes, too!
A Synagogue Wedding
We got married at Temple Israel in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. The back story is that Robbie was not initially religious when he met Jeff. He had searched for a spiritual home when he was younger but didn’t find a fit. Jeff’s family welcomed Robbie into their family traditions and rituals from the start, even giving his own part of the Haggadah to read at Pesach. Robbie finally felt the sense of connection and tradition he had been searching for his entire youth. He enrolled in an Intro to Judaism course to learn more and instantly felt connected to the tenets of Judaism, and decided to convert, much to Jeff’s delight (Jeff always dreamed of marrying a Jew and having a traditional Jewish wedding).
When we called the rabbi at Temple Israel near our home, Rabba (yes, rabba) Kaya Stearn-Kaufman made us feel instantly welcome, and this is where Robbie embarked on his conversion journey. It’s also the first temple we became members of, and is the oldest synagogue in the state of New Hampshire. We were drawn to the fact that it was a Conservative synagogue, as we both desired a form of Judaism that was more ritually traditional, while still being egalitarian and liberal.
All about the Vows
Our wedding theme was light blue with white florals and eucalyptus. The wedding party wore coordinating shades of blue. The main thing that made the wedding about us was our personal vows, which told our entire love story. Guests who had never met one of us or the other told us later that the vows made them feel like they got to know us and understand why we were together. We used a same day wedding coordinator and she was absolutely fabulous. She helped putting many of the final details together in the weeks leading up to the wedding as well. Her name is Laurie Mantegari from Everyday Details.
Invitation
We got all of our stationary, invitations, place cards, thank you cards, on zola.com. Instead of having traditional mail-in RSVPs, we did all of our RSVPs through our customized Zola website.
Suits
After searching quite some time for suits, and not being able to make up our minds, we were shopping one day for casual clothes at Express and saw 2 pastel suits that really spoke to us. Jeff’s was powder blue, and Robbie’s was baby pink. To coordinate/complement each other, Jeff wore a pink shirt and Robbie wore a blue one. We wore matching navy blue ties. Our best men wore bright blue suits with white shirts and the same matching ties (all from Express) and camel brown leather boots from Bruno Marc
Accessories
We had beautiful handmade kippahs from Sheli Strings store on Etsy. We also got gorgeous leather boots from Bruno Marc.
Maids of Honor
We each had one maid of honor, our sisters. They wore dresses that coordinated with our theme of blues, but they were free to choose the style they wanted.
Ceremony & Chuppah
It was very important to us to have as many traditional, Jewish elements as possible, but we also wanted to ensure that the ceremony was accessible to our non-Jewish guests, so we included a program explaining all of the Jewish traditions and rituals involved in the ceremony. We both circled each other, completed an egalitarian kiddushin, where we both sanctified each other to the other with platinum/rose gold wedding bands.
We made the nissuin special by inviting each member of our wedding party to read one of the sheva berachot, with the rabbi infusing traditional Hebrew throughout each part of the ceremony. The ultimate special touch of the ceremony was the reading of our personalized vows. We wrote them separately, but ultimately told the same story, each of us including details that the other one didn’t to paint a complete picture of our love story. We ended the ceremony by simultaneously breaking glasses, after which the rabbi and congregation broke out in the festive ‘siman tov u’mazel tov’.
Our beloved rabbi, Rabba Kaya Stern-Kaufman, had our ceremony planned down to every detail. So much so that, when she had to miss the ceremony due to falling ill, she was able to call in another rabbi from our community to fill in for her. Rabbi Ira Korinow stepped in to marry us ON HIS OWN WEDDING ANNIVERSARY, and the day went off without a hitch. We thank both of them from the bottom of our hearts for a perfect day. And we were filled with joy to know that Rabba Kaya was still able to watch the ceremony from Zoom.
Ketubah
Our ketubah is something very special! We couldn’t find a single text that spoke to us perfectly, so we decided to customize it by scanning and parsing through dozens of examples. We ended up choosing the wonderful Nava Shoham from 1800ketubah.com and Etsy to customize our ketubah. She worked diligently with our rabbi to ensure that all of the language was perfect. We chose a hand-painted canvas ketubah with a tree of life, called “Rainbow Tree: Seasons.”
Our music choice
We hired a DJ, DJ Rick Bellanti from Bel-Aire Music and Event Lighting. He has an awesome event planning booklet that allowed us to choose the music for our cocktail hour, special dances, and customize the entire event from start to finish in terms of musical choices. Being children of the 90s, there was a heavy representation of 90s and early 2000s music.
Robbie loves to sing. He’s always expressed his emotions through song. He’s always dreamed of singing to his husband at his wedding. He’d almost given up hope on the idea after not being able to find a song to match his voice or the sentiments he wanted to express. Then he found a service on instagram (songfinch.com) where he was able to choose a sing-songwriter to write a customized song for Jeff.
The song told our love story from the beginning through the engagements. Just as we neared the end of the reception, I got up in front of everyone and I sang the song, perfectly titled, ‘Unconditionally (Jeffrey)’ by Trevor De’Verteuil (available on Spotify) to Jeff. I think the song meant as much to me as it did to Jeff, because I instantly cried into his shoulder after singing. It was the perfect ending to the perfect day.
Flowers
Jeff really wanted white peonies, but they weren’t in season for our July wedding. So we did a mixture of white blooms, primarily ranunculus, with eucalyptus leaves in the mix. We had boutonnieres for the grooms and best men, bouquets for the maids of honor, corsages for the mothers, then centerpieces and the chuppah. We worked with Kaitlyn at In Bloom Weddings and Events.
Photographer
Our photographer was Jeffrey Rivkin Photography. Robbie has known Jeff since they were around 18 years old. Jeff reached out to Robbie to do a casual photoshoot for a new style he wanted to try out, and Robbie proposed that Jeff do their engagement photos. We’d seen his portfolio and loved his style and eye. After seeing our engagement photos, we couldn’t wait to see what he would do for the wedding. We absolutely love how all of the photos came out for both the engagement and the wedding.
Food and cake
Our catering had to be kosher, so we went with a local expert Mezzanine Catering. We did chicken piccata with broccolini and red bliss potatoes, and then a vegetable coconut curry dish for the vegetarian option. The entire menu was gluten and dairy free!
Our baker was Cake Vegan Bakery in Dover, New Hampshire. We had two vanilla cakes, and two lemon cakes, one of each being gluten free, all of them dairy free. They matched the color and design of our wedding invitation, a beautiful light blue icing with a eucalyptus and white floral design.
Honeymoon
We went on an amazing three week European adventure. We stayed two days each in Lisbon, Portugal, Amsterdam, Netherlands, Paris, France, Madrid, Spain, Sevilla, Spain, and then ended with a week in the Algarve region on the southern coast of Portugal. These were exactly the places we wanted to go, and we were pleasantly surprised when our travel agent came back with the perfect trip for us. Each hotel he booked was boutique and they all had their own unique twists. We used travel agent Mike DiCarlo of Distincte Travel Concierge.
Advice to couples currently planning their wedding
Try to give your family as specific of details as you can give them when planning so that there are no questions, and no stress. We would recommend doing a receiving if you have the time to ensure you can make face time with all of your guests. Otherwise, just stay present and soak up every moment. It will fly by in an instant.
ROBBIE & JEFF’S LITTLE WHITE BOOK
Photography – Jeffrey Rivkin Photography
Ketubah – 1800ketubah.com {offers 10% discount to all members of Smashing The Glass’s Brides Club}
Venue – Temple Israel
Suits – Express
Shoes – Bruno Marc
On the day coordinator – Everyday Details
Flowers – In Bloom Weddings and Events
DJ – DJ Rick Bellanti from Bel-Aire Music and Event Lighting
Catering – Mezzanine Catering
Cake – Cake Vegan Bakery
Stationery/Invitation – zola.com
Rabba – Rabba Kaya Stern-Kaufman
Rabbi – Rabbi Ira Korinow
Kippah – Sheli Strings store on Etsy
Honeymoon – Distincte Travel Concierge
Smash The Glass Pouch – Smashing The Glass Etsy Shop {or join Smashing The Glass’s Brides Club and get one for free!}
If you’re a Jewish or Jew-ish bride-to-be, you’ll want to join Smashing The Glass’ Brides Club. Guided by the world’s number 1 Jewish wedding expert, Karen Cinnamon, Brides Club is the private community for Jewish and Jew-ish brides that removes wedstress and indecision and gives you what you need to plan with confidence during these uncertain times. Join our Brides Club here.
