Jennifer Cooley and James Antoszewski grew up around the corner from each other in New Canaan and had mutual friends around town but it took a date at age 31, fifteen years since they’d last seen one another, to reconnect them. After a year together, James knew he didn’t want to let Jennifer get away. Brandishing hundreds of tulips, the flower he’d brought to their first date, James asked a pajama-clad Jennifer to marry him while she was defrosting chicken in the kitchen.
“Needless to say, it came as a complete surprise,” says the bride. “We made some excited calls to our parents. Then I got changed and we went to our favorite local restaurant and had a great dinner to celebrate.”
The ceremony took place in a field at the New Canaan home of the groom’s parents, among a rustic barn, pond and stonewalls. With “La Vie en Rose” as her processional, the bride, accompanied by her brother Peter Cooley, walked down the aisle. Jennifer’s stepfather, James Ughetta, performed the ceremony and the couple recited vows they had written.
There were many nontraditional touches and activities at the wedding, including glow-in-the-dark lawn games and toasts from the couples’ mothers and fathers at the reception, which took place under a tent in the yard. Rowayton’s Dough Girl created both the small cake that the couple used for the cake-cutting and sixty-five cupcakes, one for each of the guests.
“We didn’t plan for organized dancing and didn’t even have a dance floor,” says the bride. “However, right after the cake we broke out in spontaneous dancing and many of our guests joined in.”
The bride is the daughter of Gina Ughetta of New Canaan and the late John Robert Cooley. A graduate of the University of Arizona, she holds a bachelor’s degree in creative writing. She recently earned her real estate license in Connecticut.
The groom is the son of Jurek and Stephanie Antoszewski of New Canaan. James graduated from the University of Chicago with a bachelor’s degree in history, and from Brooklyn Law School. He is a vice president at S.A.C. Capital Advisors in Stamford.
The couple, who live in Darien, spent their honeymoon in the Caribbean on the island of Antigua.