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A Martina Liana Bride for a Beachy Jewish Wedding in Delray Beach, Florida, USA

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It’s always a pleasure to write up the wedding of one of our Real Jewish Brides, and today’s is no exception! We love that Dawn and Harley made their Jewish wedding all about family and friends. With a “basketball team-sized” wedding party, friendors aplenty, a delicious kosher pareve cake from Smashing The Glass Recommend Vendor Ana Paz Cakes to include kosher-keeping guests, and plenty of family participation in the ceremony, the couple’s day was truly centered around the people they love.

Dawn, a career counselor, and Harley, an online entrepreneur, chose to hold their elegant beach-themed wedding at the Delray Beach Marriott in Delray Beach, Florida, out of deference to their many out-of-town guests.

Their day was captured beautifully by Jack Bates Photography, which is owned by a friend of the couple. Their videographers were also friends–Shelley, the female half of the husband and wife duo behind Gibson Production, even did double duty as a bridesmaid!

And did we mention that Dawn chose her gorgeous Martina Liana gown a whopping 14 months before the wedding?! She made an appointment on a whim after learning about an end-of-season sale, and, despite having barely begun her search, knew she’d found the one.

We’re sad to say goodbye to Dawn here on STG, but we’re sure you’ll enjoy reading about the day in her own words!

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Jewish wedding Delray Beach , Florida USA_0023

Jewish wedding Delray Beach , Florida USA_0023
How we met

Dawn, the bride: in the summer of 2013, Harley and I both joined JDate. He was moving to South Florida by himself from Montreal and looking to make a connection, and I may have been a bit bored in graduate school looking for some Jewish romance! Although neither of us actually lived in Palm Beach County at the time (he still had a few more weeks in Montreal, and although I am originally from Palm Beach I had one more year of graduate school in North Florida), we both indicated that we were from the area and showed up in each other’s searches. We began messaging, Facebook-ing, texting, and Skype-ing (to ensure that neither one was a 60-year-old cat lady) every day until we finally met on June 24th, 2013… just hours after he had officially moved to the United States!

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Real Blogging Brides: Clare – putting the ‘Jew’ into our very ‘ish’ ceremony

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Image: Lin & Jirsa from Alina and Raphael’s wedding on Smashing The Glass
 

Clare will be marrying Chris on 5th May 2018 at Laura Ashley The Manor in Elstree, UK.

THREE FACTS: (1) Clare is not Jewish but discovered Smashing The Glass via her Jewish sister-in-law and during her wedding planning journey it has (in her own words!) became her favorite and most useful wedding blog (2) She finds STG refreshing in a sea of wedding blogs as she loves reading stories of couples for whom the ceremony itself is as pivotal as all the other details. (3) Due to falling in love with so many amazing Jewish weddings through the blog, and then booking a wedding consultancy session with STG founder, Karen, it confirmed to her that there were a number of Jewish elements she was going to bring into her wedding that symbolise a lot of things that are very important to her and her fiancà© in their future marriage – she will be having a ‘Jewish-inspired’ wedding!


Beautiful rituals

Now with only three months to go until our big day the planning has reached a crucial stage of multiple to do lists and a constant state of panic – have we forgotten something/someone/got enough time left to create the day of our dreams?!

All of the big things are now booked and it’s only the finer details to be arranged. One very important factor to be confirmed though is our ceremony plan.

Back in 2016 when Chris and I were first engaged I began to search high and low for the right person to perform our ceremony. We wanted a very personal ceremony, incorporating different traditions that were meaningful to us.

Chris and I both have some similarities in our religious views and backgrounds but neither of us are ‘practicing’ anything as such. I have always been fascinated by others beliefs and have been known to be extremely quizzical of other people’s backgrounds. Weddings in particular are a wonderful opportunity to gain insight into some beautiful cultural traditions.

Whether it’s been Catholic weddings, Jewish, Hindu, or a combination, I have often observed certain rituals that I think are really beautiful and thought to myself – I’d really like to do that one day. Regardless of how or where you were brought up or of your ideas on religion, many of the rituals from different religions can contain meaning and symbolism for any couple.

Image by M2 Photography from Yana and Archita’s multicultural wedding
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Real Jewish Brides – Amanda: How To Deal With The Stress Of Wedding Planning

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Amanda will be marrying Adam on 25th March 2018 in a Jewish wedding at Braxted Park, UK.

THREE FACTS: (1) Amanda & Adam met outside in a bar in Tel Aviv (2) Adam has a ridiculous sense of humor (as described by Amanda!) and we love him all the more for it (3) Amanda & Adam’s wedding is 100% focused on all the people and things that mean the most to them. You can click here to read all Amanda’s planning posts to date.


The stress of planning a wedding is no secret. According to Zola in the US, 71% of couples said that wedding planning is more stressful than moving house or finding a job. In fact, according to the same survey, a whopping 86% of engaged couples experience at least three stress-induced symptoms including heightened anxiety, difficulty sleeping, short temper and headaches.

Reading this, I can definitely relate. Although I consider myself fairly laid back both generally and while wedding planning, I have found myself struggling when the pressure has become too much. For me, these moments fall into 3 key categories:

  1. Price-Shock
  2. Blame Game
  3. Will it be all right on the night?

Your pressure points might be different, but are likely to overlap somewhere. So here I offer my advice on matters of wedding stress and how to overcome it.


Image by Niv Shimshon (STG Vendor) from Asha and Matt’s Jewish wedding

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Real Jewish Brides – Mel: The Chance To Be Creative

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Mel  will be marrying Mitch on Sunday 18 March 2018, in a Jewish wedding at Warren Weir at Luton Hoo, UK.

THREE FACTS: (1) Mel and Mitch met online on JDate (2) Their Jewish wedding will be classy and traditional with plenty of modern touches  (3) Mel is a member of Smashing The Glass’s private Jewish & Jew-ish Brides Facebook Group. Not yet a member? Come join us here!

FAMOUS SIMILARITIES

What do I have in common with Albert Einstein, Ben Stiller, and Lisa Kudrow (aka, Phoebe from Friends)? Other than being Jewish, we are all left-handed.

As well as allegedly being more likely to have a higher IQ, they say left-handed people are more creative than right-handed people. How true this I don’t know. But it does (kind of) set the scene for this blog.


Image by Stacey Able from Melinda and Tobin’s wedding
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Real Jewish Brides – Charlotte: My Best Bridesmaids Dress Shopping Tips!

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Charlotte will be marrying James on 26th August 2018 at The Brewery, in London, UK.

THREE FACTS: (1) James proposed to Charlotte in Florence… on her parent’s 36th wedding anniversary (aaaah – we love that!)  (2) They are planning a Jewish urban-rustic wedding in East London (3) They have already decided on their wedding hashtags — it’s #dropitlikeitshart !


Bridesmaid dress shopping tips!

When bridesmaid shopping I instantly thought about the scene from ‘Bridesmaids‘ where they are comparing the prices of designer dresses — “But it’s a Fritz Bernaise!” And equally the scene that followed…”It’s happening!” Or being the bridesmaid who has 27 dresses that are completely outrageous was good enough inspiration for these handy tips!

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Image by Jeremy Standley from Lisa and Joey’s Jewish wedding
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