Couples elope at “Teacup Wedding” every day. One couple went directly to Detroit Metropolitan Airport afterward, for a flight to Hong Kong! Another left “Teacup Wedding” for the hospital, for the birth of their first baby!
“Elope”
Contemporary painting by Joe Moorman at Riverson Fine Art
“Elope”
Original Shadowbox Art by “Working Birds Studio”
I’ll bet that Mr. Red-winged Blackbird had no idea that Miss Red-winged Blackbird would need to pack all of her shoes. Now she’s trying to get the suitcase with the matching outfits out of the window!
Elope or Elopement, what does this word mean in 2010?
wikipedia: To elope, most literally, merely means to run away, and to not come back to the point of origination.[1] More specifically, elopement is often used to refer to a marriage conducted in sudden and secretive fashion, usually involving hurried flight away from one’s place of residence together with one’s beloved with the intention of getting married.
merriam-webster: 1 : to slip away : escape <might have mistaken him for…some scarecrow eloped from a cornfield — Washington Irving>
2 a : to run away from one’s husband with a lover b : to run away secretly with the intention of getting married usually without parental consent
According to the couples I asked, something much less secretive and dramatic than in decades past.
“We take a streamlined approach to everything in our life. So it suited our style to a “Tea” ; )”
“Keeping the focus on getting married to my sweetie, instead of the details of an event that I knew would ultimately consume our time and budget. We left Teacup Wedding, and drove straight to the west side of Michigan and toured the wineries for four, beautiful fall days.”
“We were planning to get married and discovered that we were going to have a baby. Surprise! We spent several months thinking about how we’d plan a small wedding with our families before our baby arrived. An early morning doctor appointment determined that my baby needed to be delivered that day. Another surprise! I called my fiance, he left work, we got a one-day marriage license issued in Wayne County and were married at Teacup Wedding in the afternoon – before I went to the hospital to deliver my baby. So, our wedding date is my son’s actual birth date. It was a very memorable, and busy, day!”
“Money was a factor. What we had saved for a wedding, we spent on major home improvements. We eloped at Teacup Wedding, then had a nice house party celebration with our family and friends later that day – to celebrate our marriage AND remodeling projects! If we had it to do over, we’ve both agreed we’d elope again. We had both been married before, and never gave a thought to anything other than another big wedding with all of our friends and family. When we decided to elope, neither of us expected it to be such a personal and meaningful experience. Even signing our marriage license was special and memorable. We both realized that we didn’t even remember signing our marriage license at our first weddings. It must have been lost in all the hoopla.”
“We had a nice-sized wedding budget – which we spent on a fabulous honeymoon! After eloping at Teacup Wedding, our witnesses drove us to Metro Airport for our flight to Hong Kong – NO regrets here!”
“Our wedding was planned for June 2010. In January 2010, my fiance was laid off from his job and lost his health insurance benefits. We made a decision to elope in January so that he would be covered by my health insurance. Yes, we are THAT practical. We like to think of it as signing our marriage license early. So with absolutely no fanfare or announcement, we were legally married in January. In June we were married in front of our family and friends (by the Officiant at Teacup Wedding) and celebrated our wedding! And – bonus – we will celebrate both anniversary dates.”
There are as many reasons to elope, as there are couples who elope.
While a suit case is optional, hopefully you won’t need a ladder or sheet to escape!
Illustration source unknown.
