This wedding was truly a family affair! Grace hand created a lot of her wedding: she sewed the banners, arranged the flowers (including bouquets), and made the table signs. Another special touch is that friends and family contributed recipes for the dessert table. The ceremony was outdoors on the front lawn of a family friend’s home and the reception was at a local arts center and museum. The bride and groom tied red string to their ankles based on an East Asian tradition ‘Red String of Fate.’ They carried this theme into their favors, which were wrapped with the same red string. Grace and Ben met in high school and eventually had a cross-continental long distance romance as Ben was stationed in Japan during a large part of their courtship. The stayed true to themselves as Grace loves art and Ben loves music – he even jumped on stage during the reception to join his old bandmates, the Wee Beasties. Grace’s childhood friend Tess played violin during the ceremony, and Tess’ mother sang a jazzy version of “Mrs. Jones” for the couple’s first dance, with Grace’s dad, a jazz professor, playing the piano.

For the ceremony there was an acoustic trio of guitar, violin and double bass and they played instrumental versions.
Processional: Postcards From Italy – Beirut
Recessional: In the Aeroplane Over the Sea – Neutral Milk Hotel

At the reception there were two groups. The first was composed of the bride’s Dad, some of his coworkers from the jazz program at the University of North Texas, and Dana Isaac, a good friend of the family who has a beautiful jazz voice.
First Dance: Have You Met Miss Jones? – Frank Sinatra (sung by Dana Isaac who cleverly changed the lyrics to Have you Met Ben Jones?)
Second Dance: You Ain’t Goin’ Nowhere – Bob Dylan (sung by the bride’s father, Mike Steinel)

The second group was Wee-Beasties, a band that is made up of many of their friends and Ben’s brother. Some of the songs they did were:
White Wedding – Billy Idol
Metro – Berlin
Runaway- Del Shannon
Misirlou
When a Man loves a Woman – Percy Sledge (the groom joined them on this one to play keyboard)

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Photos: Heather Mount Photography