Wedding Stories: Triple 7
Ashley West swears that she’s not superstitious. Yet, she and her fiancé, Nate Johnson, got married on 7/7/07.
“We didn’t actually choose it on purpose,” West said, “but Nate and I are both teachers with school commitments during parts of June and August, so we wanted a July wedding—ideally, the first weekend in July.”
“When we realized that the first Saturday in July was 7/7/07, we kind of did a double take,” West said. “The more we thought about it, though, the more we thought that it might be kind of fun.”
Planning the Big Day
West and Johnson became engaged in June and started investigating their options for reception halls, caterers, florists, etc., right away.
“We thought that we would be fine, since we were planning a year in advance, but it really was crazy: most of the really nice places that we wanted were already booked,” West said. “Some hotels that we talked to told us that they’d heard from some people as much as six months to a year before we called them…so it was a little shocking to find out that some people had given almost two years’ notice for the 7-7-7 wedding date!”
Given the limitations on their desired wedding locations, West and Johnson decided to hold their wedding ceremony and reception at home in Johnson’s parents’ backyard. This decision enabled them to save both money (and stress) on reserving a church and reception hall, as well as cutting back costs on flowers and other decorations.
“When we called florists, even that far ahead of time,” West explains, “some had already received orders for 7/7/07. We were a little bit worried about things getting lost in the shuffle of that day [with so many other couples getting married], so we decided to just order a minimal amount, and then use backyard plants as decorations, since Nate’s parents have a really nice garden.”
Browsing for Alternatives
“I’m glad that we did that,” West said. “Our florist actually told us, ‘Thank you for not working me into an early grave that weekend,’ because she predicted having a lot of huge requests for the 7/7/07 wedding date.”
West admits to initially being disappointed by how busy most wedding places seemed to be on her chosen wedding date, but ultimately she is thankful that she and Johnson made alternate, more cost-efficient plans.
“I was willing to be flexible,” West said. “I mean, initially I did envision the traditional wedding with a florist and caterer in a reception hall, but calling around and hearing how crazy and busy everything was going to be made me think about options I might have not thought about before. Because most places told us that 7/7/07 was going to be really busy, we decided that we wanted to avoid the stress. If we’d picked a different day, I probably would have asked for more in terms of flowers, catered food, and decorations…but I actually think that this was a blessing in disguise, because it forced me to improvise and simplify and think, ‘Well, what do I really want in my wedding, and what can I probably live without?’”
West laughs when she describes some of the stories she’s heard about other couples getting married on 7/7/07. She has a friend who lives out of state who was getting married on that date and had seven bridesmaids and seven groomsmen in her wedding party.
West has also heard other stories through the grapevine, such as seven-course meal plans or arrangements featuring seven chairs around each dining table.
West was content with her own low-key arrangements. “The really nice thing about getting married at home on such a popular day is that we didn’t have to compete with other people for wedding or reception space,” West said. “My friend was having a ceremony at a country club at 3, but they needed to be out of there within the hour because another couple was coming in to use that same space at 5…so it was nice to not have that concern.”
Although West and Johnson’s wedding plans were not focused on the “7-7-7” theme, they did buy into a bit of 7/7/07 superstition: they got married at 7 p.m. that evening.
“Honestly, we didn’t think about it that much,” West said. “On a July day, with an outdoor ceremony, we just thought that it’d be cooler to have the ceremony in the evening. I mean, we could have scheduled it for 6 or 6:30 pm, but we figured that as long as we were getting married on 7/7/07, we might as well take it one step further!”
A Day to Remember
Despite not intentionally choosing 7/7/07 as her wedding date, West is excited about one thing: how easy it will be to remember her own anniversary.
“This will be a good thing for both Nate and I,” she says. “We both have really bad memories when it comes to holidays and birthdays, so hopefully 7/7/07 will be simple enough for both of us!”
“Whenever I told people I was getting married on 7/7/07,” West continues, “they always had some kind of story to share about something that they read in the news or someone else they knew of who was getting married on that day. People really do have strong reactions to it, which probably wouldn’t have happened if we’d chosen July 6th or 8th…so it’s definitely been a memorable journey!”
Thanks to Ashley and Nate for sharing their story with us!
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