Thoughts From a Minnesota Winter Wedding

As I was planning for our Minneapolis/St. Paul, snowy, cold, Minnesota wedding, I was getting a little frustrated. Around here, most people get married anytime between April and October. Most people avoid the snow at all costs. Most people desire to get married in the beauty of lush green grass, or on one of Minnesota's great lakes. The idea of having a blizzard on your wedding day has a tendency of turning people away from a winter wedding in Minnesota. Not us!!! We decided to get married during one of the coldest months of the year. January.

With about 60% of our guests arriving from out of town, there was some risk in planning to have our wedding in January. If we were to get a fair about of snow it would keep many people away. We were lucky though. I was a beautiful, January day. Cold, but perfect in every other way.

So, because it was difficult to find many ideas for a winter wedding, I thought that I would share some of our ideas from our wedding in hopes that it may send a little inspiration your way if you are planning a winter wedding. 

We wanted to have illustrated invitations so we passed on our ideas to friends and they put together a unique and creative invite that fit our personality perfectly.

We got married at Westminster Presbyterian Church, in downtown Minneapolis.


My two year old niece was our flower girl. She doesn't like to make messes so we knew that she was not going to be throwing flower petals down the aisle. Instead I made a flag for her to wave as she walked down the aisle with my godson.


One thing that we found was that many of our vendors were more than willing to work with us and offer discounts because we were getting married during the "off season". We chose to have our reception at the Embassy Suites in downtown St. Paul.  This hotel had so much character. It had a very homey feel to it and that was exactly what we were looking for. The staff was great and they were so willing to work with us. We would highly recommend them.          

Sweat Peas in Woodbury did our centerpieces and floral arrangements. White hydrangeas, evergreens and hypericum berries were our flowers. We also chose to have cheesecake for dessert from Muddy Paws. Both were great to work with.

We had our guests sign a pair of wooden antique skis instead of a traditional guest book and each guest left the evening with a jar of homemade strawberry jam that Noah and I had made from one of my grandmother's recipes.

Finally, I want to be sure to recommend our photographer, Alison Lea Photography. She did a great job. We love all of the photos that she took and feel that she captured our day in wonderful ways.