Intersting Website Find: "Offbeat Bride"

I kind of have an obsession with weddings - the ceremony, the vows, the happy tears, all of the planning that goes into the reception and the always beautiful results...and mostly, the dress. Seriously, I browse through wedding dresses on bridal shop websites on a regular basis. I even have my own picked out already - let's just hope it's still around by the time I get married. (My dream dress before that was an extravagantly gorgeous wedding dress I saw on the cover of a bridal magazine at Borders. I made my dad by the magazine for me. I was fourteen. I still have it. I refuse to throw it away.)

I'm a fan of mostly traditional weddings: A white or ivory dress; standard ceremony/vows; the traditional reception (the couple feeding each other a piece of cake, the bouquet toss, the garter toss, the first dance/bride and father dance/groom and mother dance), etc. The farthest my future wedding plans (yes, I've made them...in my head, not for real) would go outside of tradition is having the ceremony somewhere other than a church.

However, as I've recently discovered, some couples go as far outside of tradition as throwing tradition away completely.

Welcome to "Offbeat Bride," a website/blog that features non-traditional weddings. We're talking Halloween-themed weddings (luckily the colors were white and orange, not black and orange), carnival-themed weddings, pant suits over dresses, bright green dresses over white dresses...I could go on. Instead, I think I'll just let you explore the site for yourself.

But first, a little background. "Offbeat Bride" was created in January 2007 as a way to promote the release of Seattle author Ariel Meadow Stalling's book, "Offbeat Bride: Taffeta-Free Alternatives for Independent Brides." Updated daily, the blog features photos of and stories about real-life offbeat weddings as a way to offer other offbeat brides advice, ideas, and inspiration for their own unique weddings. The site is also meant to encourage couples, who want to show off their unique personalities/relationships, to break away from tradition and embrace individualism.

I don't think I would be doing the site justice if I continued trying to explain it further, so if your in to non-traditional weddings, bold wedding fashion, and unique wedding photography, check out "Offbeat Bride" for yourself. Enjoy!