DIY Rustic Yellow + Gray Barn Wedding {ByCherry Photography}

Jennifer and Rob met through one of Jennifer’s bridesmaids and Rob’s best man at an after-work party. Jennifer told Rob she wasn’t looking to be in a relationship but after a few months of hanging out with mutual friends they couldn’t deny the attraction any longer. They started dating and soon became inseparable. Three years later Rob was down on one knee (see story below). These two love birds created a fun rustic theme for their barn wedding venue, overflowing with DIY details and the most wedding signage I’ve ever seen! They also used the ample space in the large barn at Camarillo Ranch to set up tables to play flip cup, never skipping a beat to have some fun!

From the Bride…

The Proposal:
We dated for about a year when we started talking about marriage. Rob told me that I could plan things so that when we actually got engaged, the wedding planning would be easy. I always showed Rob rings that I liked and always gave him a little nudge when we walked past a jewelry store. We were dating for almost 3 years when we got engaged.

We had planned to go up to his parent’s cabin in Utah for our 3 year anniversary along with friends (including the two that introduced us). We had planned to stay until Tuesday, but I insisted that we left Monday morning because I just really wanted to get home since I had a lot to plan for work – I was teaching summer school at the school I had been substitute teaching at. Apparently because I insisted on leaving a day early, I ruined his plans for proposing. He told me afterward that he wanted to take me on a ride to a spot that he really liked and propose there. We were leaving and driving down the road that led away from his parents’ cabin. He pulled over on the side of the road and told me that he had forgotten to do something and he started messing with something in the back seat. I thought that he had forgotten to put something away. He came around to the other side of the car and was so nervous that he forgot to even ask me to get out of the car. He kept saying “Jen!” but I wasn’t really paying any attention. Finally he said “Jen you need to look at me” and he was down on one knee and asked me to marry him. Of course I said yes! We knew that we wanted to get married the next summer, since I was finishing my masters and subbing it needed to be in June sometime after school ended but early enough so that we could go on our honeymoon before the next school year started for me. We quickly started looking at venues when we got back to LA and visited Camarillo Ranch and fell in love. We put a deposit down and started planning for a June 14 wedding.

Details of the Day:
I was determined to save as much money as possible so I planned, planned, planned via Pinterest and figured out a lot of DIY stuff. We spent the night before doing the bouquets and the centerpieces ourselves. I bought tablecloths off of a website so that I could sell them afterwards instead of renting. I sewed fabric bunting, painted canvases, collected decor, and browed eBay and Etsy for affordable items. I even bought the groomsmen’s pants from Express on Black Friday because they were 50% off. Who cared if it was 7 months before the wedding. We bought the shirts from Macy’s clearance section. We did not want a $50,000 wedding. We were extremely fortunate to have so many friends help with set up the morning of and make our wedding go so smoothly and look so great.