Some weddings are mother and daughter affairs. And the 1999 wedding of Susan Elrod Creagh’s second daughter—and namesake—was one of those celebrations planned in loving partnership together. “It was a unique little fairy land wedding when Susie and Bill married,” Susan told me recently. “And I have lots of scrapbooks and articles to share!”

Creagh sisters Catherine, Ceci, Susie and Mary. Ceci (age 13 at the time) is wearing Susie’s graduation dress from years before. The cotton batiste and lace dress was made by designer Jeanne Dudley Smith—the family friend who made Susie’s wedding gown.

Family heritage is important to both Susan and Susie, so the choice to use the historic Monteagle Sunday School Assembly as part of their wedding day festivities was perfect. Founded in 1882 and nestled in the Cumberland Mountains north of Nashville, Tennessee, the Creagh and Elder families had vacationed there for generations, Susie and Bill met and developed their friendship there, and the Monteagle community held deep and rich relationships for all involved in the wedding.

“It was so special for us both, not only to be planning her wedding together, but to be able to plan it at this place that is so mutually loved by both families and dear to our hearts.”

Grandmother & Mother of the Bride.

What They Wore
The Elrod women know fashion. Susan’s family had clothing stores in Tennessee for many years, so of course I wanted to know what she and her mother—the grandmother of the bride, the late Betty Garmany Elrod—wore for Susie’s 1999 wedding. “Oooh, my dress was so beautiful,” Susan said of her mother-of-the-bride confection! “All alençon lace—pale pale pink tea length and I wore an orchid in my hair. My mother, who loved elegant clothes, was perhaps disappointed that she couldn’t wear her fancy beaded gowns to the afternoon wedding!”

Although Susie wanted to wear her mother’s wedding dress from 1968, they decided not to cut and redesign it since Susie had two younger sisters who might want to wear it. So Jeanne Dudley Smith of Nashville, well-known designer and family friend, suggested that Susie wear the train from “mom’s gown” on a new dress. Jeanne, using the train of Susan’s vintage gown to guide her in fabric and detail choices, made a scoop neck, bare arms design that suited the bride’s more casual and lighthearted nature. “Susie loves the outdoors and still has long curls like she had as a little girl,” Susan explained, “so Jeanne’s simpler design was perfect for her. Susie wore my train on her new gown, fresh flowers in her hair, and a dear friend’s family heirloom veil.”

Susie wears the heirloom veil of a family friend.

Susan could not find her own family’s vintage veil in time for Susie’s wedding, so her dear friend, Rita Johnston Rose of Nashville, came to the rescue and loaned them her grandmother’s two-tiered silk illusion veil trimmed with antique lace. (The family veil did turn up in time for third daughter Mary Creagh’s wedding in 2003!)

The Heritage of Family
Combining old and new is what weddings are all about, whether expressed in heirloom gowns, family heritage, or community rituals. Weddings are about dreams fulfilled: the dreams of little girls about their future, the dreams of mothers about their daughter’s happiness, the dreams of a family’s desire to share a rich and love-filled legacy. Susie’s wedding not only had her mother’s loving and wise fingerprints on it, but the imprint of generations of families that have shared their lives intimately with each other.

Susie, who is the director of education at the Frist Center for the Visual Arts in Nashville, is now the mother of two little girls of her own, Georgia and Zoë, ages five and two, so the mother-daughter partnerships continue!

Mothers & Daughters Debora & Alice Layne & kimberly