Our Wedding at Honeymoon Acres in Ramsey, NJ
Our Wedding | Heather and Terrence Huie | Honeymoon Acres, Ramsey NJ | Apollo Fields
Despite attending and photographing countless weddings, I never knew how I would feel on my wedding day. Would I get cold feet? Would I cry helplessly at the altar? Would my vows live up to what I hear in my heart? I really wasn’t sure, but now I can say that it was without question the best day of my life. Typically I avoid using superlatives and hyperbolic statements like “the best day of my life,” because I believe they don’t really tell you anything, but it was the best fucking day of my life. (I usually don’t use curses either, but I guess I’m breaking all my rules today.)
On Saturday, October 6th, 2018, a quintessentially grim and misty northeastern autumnal day, I wed Heather Erny in front of our closest friends and family at her aunt and uncle’s farm in Ramsey, NJ. Honeymoon Acres, as aunt Pam and uncle Rick like to call it, is a beautifully-manicured farm splashed with wild sunflowers and potted mums, a vintage 1950’s Ford with big round headlights and an entire family of farm animals. The amount of work that Pam, Rick, and both of our families and friends put in to wrangling all of the animals (roll call: 1 pig, 1 horse, 1 donkey, 2 goats, 1 cat, and 4 dogs), making all of the food, and assisting in the general logistics of the day will have me grateful for many years to come.
For those of you who don’t know, Heather and I decided to make and serve all of the food for our wedding day. Many called us crazy, as we only arrived in New York on October 1st from our road trip back from Colorado, leaving us five days to set the place up and prepare all the food—but with the help of our family and friends we did it. We made a fresh pasta bar consisting of truffle mushroom linguini, vegetable lasagna, pumpkin and butternut squash ravioli and a classic spaghetti and meat sauce. As we ladled and scooped generous portions to our guests donning our respective aprons, I couldn’t help but speak with an Italian-American accent to move the line along like I was running my own Long Island deli. We didn’t plan to serve everyone ourselves but we were having fun, so we did—to our relief nobody went hungry.
As dinner waned and the scotch shed opened, our wedding was now in full swing. The small potting shed that we converted into a whiskey tasting room exploded with laughter, warmth, and old stories. The dance floor in the garage-turned-banquet-room jumped beneath the Edison lights, uniting the older and the younger in a musically-induced exuberance. All around there were smiles, especially from the farm animals living their best lives as moonlight entertainers. Fairytales aren’t just for storybooks, anymore, I thought.
Then came the speeches. Justin and Grace spoke on mine and Heather’s behalf’s like they knew the most intimate thoughts inside our diaries. Great friends never fail to recognize the greatness in those closest to them, for they keep their company for those exact reasons. It’s only until we throw each other on stages with microphones that we realize how well our friends really know us. We should do it more often, for all of our sakes.
Perhaps the thing I was most excited about our wedding, with exception to swigging whiskey on the dance floor as “One Bourbon, One Scotch, One Beer” by George Thorogood played, was to announce the surprise Heather and I had for Pam and Rick. For twenty years, Pam and Rick have been going to Negril, Jamaica, in late winter, but for the past few years financial troubles have stymied their tradition. As a way to say thank you for hosting our wedding, Heather and I asked the Dj to play their wedding song from when they got married on Honeymoon Acres in 1996. When they tried to retreat to their seats after the song’s conclusion, we kept them out there and told them we’re all going to Jamaica in three weeks and the animals are already taken care of. They cried. We cried. Everyone cried.
On a day filled with so much love, I cherished every minute. Even when Heather and I stood at the “altar,” a bunch of red begonias that Rick planted in the shape of the heart, as a light rain fell upon our shoulders, I remained grateful. During our ceremony, our officiant, David “Killer” Miller, spoke with equal parts comedy and soul, the very reasons we chose him. On a day where the bride and groom are supposed to be celebrated, I’ve never felt more part of our communities.
Here’s to everyone who helped, whether giving the animals haircuts or drinking whiskey in the scotch shed, because without you, it wouldn’t of been the best fucking day of my life.
Photography: Alexis Cohen & Derek Morf for Apollo Fields
Venue: Honeymoon Acres, Ramsey NJ
Dress: Maggie Sottero
Flower Crown: Allendale Flowers
DIY Wedding Tip: Buy a KitchenAide and Make the Food For Your Wedding
Apollo Fields Wedding Photographers | DIY Wedding Tips | Cook Your Own Food For Your Wedding | How To Feed 100 People | Ramsey, NJ Farm Wedding
Many called us crazy, others called us stupid, some called us crazy and stupid. But for us, hosting a dinner party, albeit one with 100 guests, was just another day at the office. We knew it would be hard work to make the food for our own wedding, but when we thought about doing that which defines our relationship on our wedding day, making a fresh pasta bar and serving it to our guests was simply something we had to do.
First off, I have to thank KitchenAide for making such a reliable product. Without Fernando/Fernandina (our unisex name for our KitchenAide), Heather and I would’ve worked pasta dough by hand until we could barely hold a fork and knife. Instead, we managed to churn out four fresh dishes to accommodate veg heads and meat lovers alike. The crowd favorite was the pumpkin and butternut squash ravioli served in a sage brown butter sauce; followed by the vegetable lasagna with herbed ricotta; long slices of zucchini and fresh tomato; then it was a classic — spaghetti and meat sauce made with fresh tomatoes and roasted red peppers; and finally a dish for the more nuanced palate, the truffle mushroom linguini. Fern handled the entire workload like a champ as his/her constant purr eventually became white noise in the bustling kitchen at Honeymoon Acres.
But Heather, Fern, and I can’t take all of the credit. With any great event, it comes down to the team who can pick up the slack when they’re called upon. Whether it was Heather’s sister, Mary, and her fiancé, J, rolling out pasta dough and making raviolis with a handy tool our family friend Dr. Amy gave us, or my brothers Matt, Tom, Kevin, and sister-in-law Morgan dusting cutting boards with flour and popping those raviolis into boiling water, everyone played a crucial part. I remember the first thing I saw after I got all dressed up in the back room was coming into the kitchen to see Matt wearing Heather’s apron with flour all over it. It made me so happy.
Serving Our Food To Our Wedding Guests:
Perhaps my favorite part of the wedding, though, was when Heather and I served the food to our guests before serving ourselves. We originally planned to only serve the first few plates, but we were having so much fun that we didn’t even want to take our seats. When we finally reached the end of the line, we walked through the barn into the dining room to a resounding applause. People were so grateful for the fresh food, but they were even more excited to share that they’d never been to a wedding where the bride and groom were the last people to be served. It didn’t even occur to us that the newlyweds are usually the first to eat because every time we hosted a dinner party at our Colorado home we’d always served our guests first. We didn’t think dinner at our wedding should be any different.
When Heather and I first started hosting dinner parties in our home in Colorado, we were amazed by how much fun it was. Perhaps it was me turning 30 and leaving the Jameson shots in Irish pubs for someone else (or some other time :)), but there was something about new and old friends brushing elbows around our table that meant something more to both of us. As we now settle into our interim Long Island home the reason became very apparent when a friend of ours came over for a few fingers of whiskey. It was the simple act of bringing people together, about creating community, about filling a space with jokes and laughter that provided us with happiness. I didn’t know at the time but that’s why I felt the way I felt when I saw Matt in Heather’s flour-dusted apron on our wedding day—it was him being part of our community.
There are few days when our communities come together with such a fervent energy to contribute to a cause, but our wedding days are such opportunities. We’ve seen families and friends fall flat and we’ve seen people band together and the result always lies within the glue or gluten that holds us together (Sorry, I couldn’t resist the pasta joke!). Here’s to everyone who played a part, including Dawn and Sandy who volunteered their time to bartend and make the rest of our food look pretty when it came time to serve those most important to us.
For those getting married, remember that the miscues of your wedding day will be forgotten in time, but the efforts of your communities will linger in your heart like the flavors of a delicious meal. Don’t be shy, be bold, and do that which defines you. With a little bit of luck and a lot of thought, your communities will have your back.
Your Immeasurable Friends,
Terrence & Heather
How To Make Homemade Pasta
This is one of our favorite foods to cook for guests (usually sub 100 people, but who knows!) because it is SO easy and who doesn’t love pasta? And fresh pasta is just the best! For real, once you have the homemade stuff, you’ll never go back to boxed again.
We love it so much that we have an entire recipe – perhaps our favorite one – in The Immeasurable Cookbook dedicated to the stuff. Which, *shameless plug* you should totally go out and buy now if you haven’t already.
Before we decided to take on all of the cooking for our own wedding, we used to make the dough by hand and use a super simple, cheap hand crank pasta maker. I hate having a ton of kitchen appliances because I think most of them are a waste of space and money, but this is one of the few that I can’t live without. Plus, there is something so great about getting your hands dirty in a mound of flour ;)
The Recipe:
Remember how we hate measurements?? Well, you guessed it, you won’t find any here either! But you don’t need them for pasta (trust me, you OCD kitchen people… you know who you are). If you really want to learn, unfortunately you’re going to have to come over to our house for us to teach you and then we’ll force you to stay and eat the deliciousness and drink tasty beer and whiskey. Ohhhh noooo ;)
Photo Credit: Derek Morf shooting for Apollo Fields