Real Essense of Australia bride Melissa was the 10th person in the world to be diagnosed with her genetic condition and found the wedding dress of her dreams.
Real Essense of Australia bride Melissa was the 10th person in the world to be diagnosed with her genetic condition. Because of her three spinal fusions, she thought she would have a hard time finding the dress of her dreams. To her surprise, she found her dream dress at her first bridal salon. She fell in love with Style D1999 from Essense of Australia the moment she put it on! Melissa and Matt had a low key wedding that included woodfire pizza and a donut wall —yum! Congrats Melissa and Matt!
The Proposal
My husband’s family LIVES for football. Green Bay Football is a way of life, and I was welcomed into the family with many weekends spent tailgating at Lambeau Field. It was only fitting that at one of their favorite places, Matt got down on one knee to ask THE question. We got to celebrate with our friends and thousands of Packer fans, what better way to celebrate?!
The Dress
I was a very laid back bride, but I’m very hard to fit too. I wanted the white dress every girl dreams about, and I knew I wanted details. Lots of lace and pretty intricacies: I love the older style looking dresses. I have had 3 spinal fusion surgeries, and I was the 10th person in the world diagnosed with my genetic condition, so I thought I’d spend many days searching for the perfect dress. I scheduled many appointments with different stores. My first stop was Tie The Knot in Green Bay. I invited my mom to come, thinking we could just browse to find a style I would like, since I didn’t really know what I wanted. Thankfully she invited my aunts, grandmas, and cousins because to my shock I found my dress at the first store! I tried on probably 8-9 dresses, and just as I was about to give up one of the ladies said she had one more dress she thought I would like, but cautioned me because it was 12 sizes too big and was the only one she had. I took a leap of faith, tried it on, and despite the amount of “chip clips” on the back, I fell in love. It was PERFECT. I had that “moment” everyone talks about, I KNEW it was my dress, and my family all knew too.
The Wedding Details
Our wedding was low key, personal, and relaxed. We had the girls burgundy, boys in navy, and ran with burgundy florals for most everything else. We gave everyone an antique key that doubled as a bottle opener as a favor, we let everyone choose their seats so people felt comfortable to move and mingle, and we had wood-fired pizza and donuts on a donut wall for our meal and dessert! It was absolutely perfect. Everyone mingled, ate pizza, and had as many donuts as they could have. We wanted to have as many personal details as we could, and I wanted flowers everywhere. Roots on 9th did an AMAZING job. My bouquet had my sister’s necklace on it to keep her close on my day because she passed away when she was 5. We planted a tree to symbolize our love, and also sealed love letters and a bottle of wine in a box for if we run into trouble and need a reminder of how we felt on 11.10.18, or as a reminder on our 10 year anniversary. We had a watercolor tree for our guestbook that we have hanging in our house now, with everyone’s fingerprints as leaves. It’s my favorite thing in the house besides my husband! 🙂
We had SO many truly special memories of our day. We got so lucky to have perfect weather- some of our wedding photos look like a fall day and others like a winter wonderland! Best of both worlds! After our first look under a beautiful arch at the college where we first met, we crashed a Dance marathon (charity event for local Children’s Hospitals that I had participated in during college) at St Norbert College in our full wedding attire. It was the coolest experience and so special since I poured my heart and soul into the organization during my years there. We originally planned our wedding day for 2019, but due to family health issues, we moved it up to the only date in 2018 that all our vendors could all come to. When we found out our wedding day was on the same day as the event, we knew we had to go. It was meant to be. We planted an olive tree during our ceremony to symbolize our love and friendship together and promise to grow together and nurture each other. We wrote our own vows which made our promises to each other that much more important to us. And, Our donut wall dessert bar was one of our favorite parts too!
Photos by Tricia Dewar
Are you ready to find the dress of your dreams like Melissa? Click here to find an Essense of Australia retailer near you!