Location is Everything....

Ohio and I knew right off the bat that we wanted our wedding to be very relaxed and we wanted to have both the ceremony and reception outdoors. We also wanted it to have a home-spun feel. Since Ohio is the only person in his family who does not live in the Midwest, we also wanted to pick a location that would be fun for them to visit.

We also knew that we didn't want to blow our entire budget on a venue.

We immediately began our search for a wedding venue, knowing we could not plan anything else until this was decided.

Soon after beginning our search, I fell head-over-heels in love with a local ranch that also does weddings, Fausel Ranch. It is an amazing venue and seemed to have everything we wanted and more. The price was a little higher than I had budgeted for- but because they only book one venue there a weekend, you can do set-up and breakdown on the day before and the day after your wedding. Because we would be having a very DIY wedding, I thought this was a huge benefit.

There was one downside that ended up being a deal breaker for Ohio. The wedding would have to end by 10 p.m. to be in compliance with local noise ordinances. Since Ohio is also a part-time wedding DJ, he really wants late night dancing at our reception, and having to end our reception by 10 p.m. just wasn't going to happen.


Once that location was ruled out- we started looking at locations around Lake Tahoe. I love Lake Tahoe, and its a great location for an outdoor wedding. Immediately we were drawn to Sugar Pine Point State Park. Sadly, the current budget situation in California (Closures of California's state parks have been proposed several times over the past few years due to budget cuts) made both of us nervous about choosing a state park for our wedding venue. We didn't want to risk planning our wedding to take place at a location that might be closed or unmaintained by the time our date rolled around. We were also concerned with the weather in September- it could be too cold for our guests.

Then one day when I was searching the Internet for wedding locations I found Lavender Ridge,a cute lavender farm outside of Reno that looked perfect! It was in a good location, it was really pretty and quaint and best of all- it was reasonably priced! I sent my Mom (who lives in the Reno area) over to investigate and she called me with glowing reviews.



Isn't it beautiful? We both thought so, but we were not 100% sure that this was the right location for us.

How many locations did you consider for your wedding?