JENNY and MARY
July 28, 2017 // Stacy Smith Studios
“ T
alk about love being blind,”
says Mary of her budding relationship
with now-wife Jenny. After hitting it off
when Jenny came up from Rhode Island
to visit her best friend slash Mary’s roommate in
New Jersey, the couple spent two years commut-
ing back and forth to see each other just about
every other weekend. “We would think nothing of
a five-hour drive, sometimes longer because getting
through Connecticut was horrible. Obviously it was
worth it in the end, but once I moved here we were
like, ‘Wow, I can’t believe we did that,” Mary says.
And yet, it seems their experiences had pre-
pared them for wedding planning, granting
them the virtues of perseverance and patience.
Following Jenny’s dreamy OceanCliff proposal
on Mary’s birthday (complete with Russian doll-
style gifts that eventually gave way to the ring), the
two decided to pay homage to their mutual love
for visiting New England wineries and brewer-
ies by holding their rustic nuptials at Hyland Or-
chard and Brewery in Sturbridge, Massachusetts.
But when things didn’t work out with a previous-
ly-hired, outsourced wedding planner, they didn’t
fall apart. Instead, Mary reached out to their rent-
al company. “Kate from Boston Rustic swooped in
and she crushed it,” she says. “I could cry at how
great she was.”
The one thing that technically didn’t pan out?
Their first look. Jenny and Mary had originally
planned to take their formals prior to the ceremo-
ny in order to fit time constraints, but they changed
their minds just two weeks before the big day. “We
thought about the investment... All the time, all the
sweat and energy that went into planning every-
thing, and we realized that we just didn’t want to
give that moment up,” Mary explains. Both women
agree that it was one of the best decisions they made.
They avoided one another the morning of, each
getting ready with their respective bridal parties
in separate rooms of the hotel they were staying at,
and then met at the altar that evening. Jenny and
her father walked down the aisle first (preceded by
Mary’s adorable niece and nephew and the couple’s
Pomeranian, Foxy), and then it was Mary’s turn. ➻
RHODE ISLAND MONTHLY'S ENGAGED 2018 | 117