Welcome foolish mortals to the masquerade wedding that slayed all

The offbeat groom: Jeffrey, Flight Attendant

His offbeat partner: Kevin, Teacher

Date and location of wedding: Rock Wall Wine Company, Alameda, CA — October 31, 2015

Budget: $16,000

Our offbeat wedding at a glance:

My favorite holiday is Halloween and my favorite ride ever since I was little at Disneyland was The Haunted Mansion. My husband Kevin is a big theatre person — he directs and choreographs shows when he is not teaching. We wanted to combine all the things we love into one big celebration for our friends and family. We decided that we would get married on Halloween 2015 as it landed on a Saturday. We both thought a masquerade would be a wonderful way for our guests to not only celebrate our love, but also the holiday.

Tell us about the ceremony:

The ceremony opened with Paul Frees' wonderful spiel from the Haunted Mansion, "Welcome Foolish Mortals" and went right into music by Danny Elfman from Edward Scissorhands. The center aisle had pumpkins lit up and the stage featured wine barrels and beyond that the city skyline of San Francisco, CA. The groomsmaids held silver lanterns on their way down instead of flowers. Our ordained minister was our best friend Carissa who made us recite a love spell before putting the rings on each other.

Tell us about your reception:

Having been known for throwing huge themed parties in college, I knew that I would have to go even more for our wedding. I wanted our reception to be a huge celebration, filled with color, laughter, and great music. A lot of the decor was DIY such as carved pumpkins and jars with black or purple lace around them with different embellishments. We had a psychic on hand for readings, a photo booth, and (since it was Halloween) a candy bar for people to enjoy. You found your table by picking up a bottle of poison and sitting at a table themed to different Halloween tarot cards.

Since my husband Kevin is a choreographer, we knew that we had to have a flash mob dance. Our wedding party was scattered throughout different tables so we started with the big dance number from Beetlejuice's "Day-O," going into the monster mash, and finally following up with "Thriller." We also had live singing from some theater friends for the mother and son dance. For our first dance, we danced to "Unsuspecting Hearts" from Carrie the Musical, because why not?

What was your most important lesson learned?

The most important lesson I learned from our wedding is to have one place where everyone in your party can go to to ask questions, whether this is on Facebook, Google Drive, or a good document.

Vendors

• Photography: Ben Krantz
• Venue: Rock Wall Wine Company
• Cake: Whisk Cake Creations
• Day-of coordinator: Jason Lloyd

Gallery

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