When Bryce McGovern proposed to Jennifer Roemer, he opted for the darkly dramatic. The couple was carving Halloween pumpkins in 2009 when he pulled a faux bloody finger stump sporting a diamond engagement ring out of a jack-o’-lantern. At first, all Jennifer saw was the plastic digit. “I said: ‘that is so stupid. It doesn’t look real,’” she said. “And then I saw that he was shaking and he got down on one knee.” When she took another look, she got his meaning, and didn’t think it was stupid at all.

The pair met in Florida while he was in art school. After he landed a job at DreamWorks, she would meet up with him every year at Christmas when she came to the Bay Area to visit her family. They were the best of friends—until 2008, when they became something more. “I was moving back to the Bay Area, the timing was right, and we were ready for a change,” she says.

When it came time for the wedding, the pair opted for a setting that blended their personal aesthetics. “He likes things that are simple and authentic,” Jennifer says. “I like things that are a bit more elegant and decorated.” The Tiburon venues of Old St. Hilary’s Church and the Corinthian Yacht Club provided the perfect feminine-meets-rustic backdrop for the event. “We loved the wooden interior of the church,” says Jennifer. “It reminded us a bit of the Kill Bill church—and that appealed to Bryce’s dark, edgy side.”

The July 30th ceremony took place in the little church perched on a hill over Tiburon. In the vows that they wrote, she promised to love him forever and he swore to give her all he could give from that day forward and declared to her and all gathered: “You’re the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”

After they were pronounced man and wife, everyone went down the slope to the Corinthian Yacht Club, another venue with wood paneling, but also with fantastic views of the water. But perhaps the most striking sight was the desert table, crafted by their friends Greg and Christina Mandell. The spread for the food-loving pair included artisan chocolates, cupcakes, truffles, jellies and chocolate marshmallows.

But desert had to wait until a dinner that included sea bass, chicken roulade, and peas and carrots—as in Forrest Gump’s famous quote: “We go together like peas and carrots”—was finished.

And, despite what the proposal might lead you to believe, the best part of the wedding wasn’t scary at all: “We loved seeing our friends and family from across the country all in one place,” says Jennifer.

Ceremony site: Old St. Hilary’s 
Reception site: Corinthian Yacht Club 
DJ: Quantum Music Event Planners 
Pastry Chef: Greg Mandell, with Christina Mandell: gregthebaker@gmail.com
Photography: Nightingale Photography 
Makeup: Lisa Ribar: lisaribar@gmail.com