statements

name

After much deliberation on a variety of possibilties, including combinations of our last names, anagrams of our last names, and random last names, we have chosen the last name Merand. Merand is, of course, a combination of our two last names: Fulmer-Anderson.

Hyphenation gets complicated quickly for our children. We want to have the same last name as our children. Also, a merged name symbolizes our merged families while at the same time asserting the uniqueness of the family that we are creating.

industry

You may have noticed from our registry page that we are going about planning this wedding in a non-traditional way. You likely will notice this during the ceremony as well. After highly extensive research into the logistics of planning weddings, we've found that anything with the word "wedding" attached to it tends to be expensive, generic, possibly exploitative, and not at all representative of our individual views on planning events or buying things, not to mention our commitment or our marriage.

cemetery

Why are we having a wedding in a cemetery? The Forest Hills Cemetery has been a continually meaningful location to us throughout our relationship thus far. It's beautiful as a park, it's peaceful, and it's interesting (e.e. cummings is buried there, for example). Having our wedding there gives us the chance to give back in a small way to a place that's meant a lot to us, and also to allow our loved ones to experience it in the way that we have.

joint bachelor(ette) party

If you're so excited about having a night away from your partner where you can do "whatever you want", then why are you getting married?

bikes

We like the quaint and touching symbolism of the tandem bicycle. Bicycles figure prominently into our daily lives, both as recreational and utilitarian vehicles. Also, even on special occasions, we feel that it's important to live by example in following our strong belief that alternative forms of transportation should be prioritized whenever possible.

rings

Why does the bride get an engagement ring but not the groom? We don't understand, so we both got one. Then we thought, why does the bride need two rings? The way we figure it, she doesn't. We've chosen to wear our titanium bands, chosen for ecological reasons, as engagement rings. For the ceremony, we've created a design to engrave on the rings, which will be re-placed on our fingers during the ceremony.