joy, happiness, love, companionship, peace, and friendship

Sunday brought forth the beautiful wedding of Jen and Claire, which means that I can offer pictures of the full "lego chuppah" to those of you who have been waiting patiently at home.

Before I left for the wedding, I folded and wrapped the chuppah as best one can when the chuppah may be examined by TSA officials curious about anything and everything in carry-on luggage.

All ribboned-up and double-wrapped in plastic bags, I was off for the land of sunshine (California).

A few more teaser shots:
















As you can (sort-of) see, each of the 4 curves was created with an assortment of rectangles and squares in green, blue, and purple fabrics. In binding the edges of the chuppah, I sewed strips of different fabrics together so that the final edge consists of multiple fabrics and colors (best seen in the right-hand picture above). For more pictures of the chuppah up-close and in-process, see below.

So what does the chuppah look like?

From the top (above) and from underneath (below)

Although the chuppah is predominantly white, you can still get a sense of the pattern from below: a white-on-white "snails trails" pattern spirals outward from the center in an intertwined fashion and the lego pieces curve along the borders (best seen along the top and left in the picture above). A friend took pictures of the chuppah when as several people held it up, and I'll add those images as soon as I get them.

Most importantly, here is the chuppah in use during the ceremony.

In the background, as Claire and Jen circle one another before entering the home that the chuppah represents.

Claire and Jen under the chuppah.

As part of their Brit Ahuvim v'Shutafut (Lovers' Covenant and Partnership), Jen and Claire exchanged items of value -- in their case, necklaces made from each of their great-grandmothers' engagement rings -- that symbolize the partnership they enter together, on equal ground. One of the reasons their ceremony was so lovely was because they attended to all details of the ritual; they studied and interrogated tradition in order to design and enact a ceremony that reflected their deep ties to Judaism as well as their insistence that Jewish tradition is inclusive of everyone.

[Sidenote: The tradition of Brit Ahuvim stems from the desire to move the wedding ceremony from a ritual of acquisition (the kinyan, or purchase, that occurs in a ketubah, Jewish marriage contract) to a ritual of mutual partnership. Initially created by Rachel Adler, the ceremony and language of the covenant derive from Talmudic partnership law. For more information, see Rachel Adler, Engendering Judaism: An Inclusive Theology and Ethics (1998).]

Sweet comment from a wedding guest: "Where do you sell your work?" For now, the answer is (courtesy a wise friend), I take commissions. But, like anything else, that too could change.