A Relaxed, Rustic Wedding at Armstrong Farms in Saxonburg, Pennsylvania

Frances Lamb (29 and a nurse and a US Army Reserves captain) and Joe Urmann (29 and a teacher and a high school basketball coach) planned their wedding while living on separate continents for nearly a year. While Frances was deployed in Afghanistan throughout their engagement as the S1 personnel officer and adjutant general for a battalion of more than 1,700 soldiers, she somehow found time to plan her wedding. “Planning a wedding overseas, although difficult, gave me something to look forward to once I returned home, and it was a constant reminder of how lucky we are to have found each other,” Frances says. “Although it was hard being apart, that experience truly made us stronger and closer.” Given Frances’s involvement in the military and Joe’s love for the Navy, various patriotic touches were incorporated into their farm wedding, including an Army-Navy cornhole setup and a donation to the Wounded Warrior Project in lieu of favors. The rolling landscape of Armstrong Farms in Saxonburg, Pennsylvania, let Frances and Joe focus on their nuptials and family instead of decorations. For that reason, they chose a more natural palette with accents of green and maroon. —Allie Volpe