Wednesday, February 12, 2014 • Vashon-Maury Island Beachcomber
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Married beneath a Vashon lighthouse A Point Robinson wedding makes for a memorable day
Marla Smith Photography
By NATALIE MARTIN Staff Writer
I never dreamed of my wedding day as a girl. I never talked about wedding colors with friends or married my stuffed animals. In adulthood I didn’t give weddings much thought either, and certainly never pinned about them on Pinterest. So when my boyfriend Nick got down on one knee last year, I knew I wanted to get married, but I had no idea what that wedding would look like. The two of us considered all sorts of settings for our big day. There were elaborate gardens, country clubs with water views, even barns that rented out for weddings. But none of those places felt like us — not to mention they usually charged an arm and a leg. We soon realized that the perfect spot for our nuptials was right on Vashon, a place I already lived and a place we’d both fallen in love with since I began working at The Beachcomber three years before. Why not say “I do� at a beach where we’d strolled the shore many times picking up beach glass, where we’d poked starfish during the low tide festival and where we knew the keeper of the lighthouse personally? Our wedding at Point Robinson was like nothing I could have dreamed up as a girl. On a mercifully sunny day last August, we said our vows in front of a sparkling blue Puget Sound, beneath a driftwood arch assembled by our friends. We did little decorating for the event, as Point Robinson is full of natural beauty. A verdant hillside was the backdrop for the day, and the events unfolded on a lawn surrounded by driftwood and rustling beach grass, all set off by a striking red and white 1915 lighthouse. After the ceremony, our friends and family enjoyed the beach and climbed to the top of the lighthouse. Dinner was a simple but elegant spread, the main dish being sockeye salmon my husband’s uncle caught in Alaska, prepared by a caterer his family knew. For drinks, we offered Vashon-made Cliff’s Beer and wine we picked up at the local grocery store. A large vanilla cake from Snapdragon was topped by a hand-painted bride and groom, and small
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Marla Smith Photography
berry and apple tarts were served. As the evening waned, I threw my bouquet from the top of the lighthouse and guests took to the dance floor — a large, homemade floor we borrowed from a generous neighbor and pieced together the night before. Our minister danced; so did my 89-year-old grandmother. Just when we thought the day could be no more lovely, the sun began to sink and melted into a colorful sunset, drawing those who weren’t still dancing down to the water. Nick and I stole away for a quiet moment together on the beach. The cliche exit by sparklers we had planned was ruined, of course, when half of our guests suddenly had to catch a ferry. We quickly distributed the sparklers anyway, and all had a laugh waving them around on the lawn. One of my favorite moments of the night came during the toasts, when Captain Joe Wubbold, who’d helped us for months with our wedding arrangements, gave what he called a captain’s blessing. He said he hoped the aids to navigating our new life together would be “on station and watching properly,� providing good direction just like the working lighthouse before us.
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Built 1896 Three bedrooms (queen beds); one bedroom (twin beds), full guest kitchen, all rooms have private baths. Close to town, on bus line, newly remodeled.
Exceptional Value — $85 per room
THE BEACH NEXT TO THE NORTH VASHON FERRY DOCK.
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OWNED AND OPERATED SINCE 2010 BY BONNIE MCCALLISTER SUMMER 2014 DATES AVAILABLE
206-650-0766 CONTACT @ VILLAVASHON . COM
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