If you celebrated our big day with us, then you might recall that Justin and I did something a little different for the unity portion of our ceremony.
We “planted” a tree.
Photos by Alisha Rudd Photography
The traditional candle lighting, sand pouring, and tying the knot stuff just didn’t seem to fit our lifestyle and personalities, but we didn’t want to completely do away with this portion of our big day. So, we did some research and found other couples out there who planted a tree as their unity ceremony, and that idea spoke to my moderately granola heart.
The symbolism behind the tree is simple and beautiful: It represents our relationship taking root, growing, and flourishing as we officially become a family.
The roots anchor, the trunk supports, and the leaves and branches are new growth.
As proud North Carolinians, we chose to plant a dogwood tree. FYI, the dogwood is the state flower of NC — if you aren’t from around these parts, you probably wouldn’t know that.
However, at the time of our wedding, we were renting a townhouse and couldn’t actually plant our tree in the ground.
So, we left our dogwood — which I got on sale for 50-percent off because I’m fairly certain it had been struck by lightning — in its original pot, toted it to our wedding venue, and placed it at the altar.
For the ceremony, Justin and I each took handfuls of dirt and placed it in the pot around the base of the tree, then, together, we watered our not-so-little dogwood.
{Yes, I dug my freshly-manicured hands into dirt on my wedding day.}
It was our intention that when we bought our first home, we would plant the tree in the ground at that time.
That meant we had to keep this thing alive in a pot until we moved, and at the time of our September wedding, we didn’t know when that would be exactly.
Halfway through winter, we were convinced that we had killed our tree.
But, very much to our surprise, spring arrived in Carolina and the tiniest green buds started to appear on the branches we thought were dead.
We could not believe it, and are sure that it is a sign of good things to come.
Now, here we are eight months after our big day; we just closed on our first home and our wedding tree is finally in the ground … our ground.
