❤

5 years of marriage

+

10 years together

=

An incredible ride

 

The saying time flies when you’re having fun couldn’t ring more true.   As you are reading this, we are currently in Illinois for the weekend, staying in a cabin and exploring life along the Mississippi river from the seat of our two wheels.  In honor of year 5, I felt like taking us on a little journey back to 09.10.11 when we both said I DO to this crazy, fun adventure we’ve gotten ourselves into.

Our Wedding Day

The morning of September 10th, 2011 started off as most typical weddings do…

√ with the girls all shoved into a hotel room

√ clouds of hairspray in the air

√ and slight buzzes all around from mimosas

Or if you are the Bride, you are buzzed from drinking champagne straight outta the bottle.

Don’t you dare deny it.  You know you did.

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These girls provided much laughter and entertainment as we each got ready for what was bound to be a fun filled day.

Once the makeup, hair and jewelry were all set in place and the dress on; my sparkly orange shoes and I made our way downstairs to see Clint for the first time.

I believe the look on his face says it all.

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With a little dress help from the soon to be husband…

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…we set out on the Pre-Wedding Party Bus for an afternoon of photos, boozing and laughter.   The thought of doing photos with zero beer sounded insanely boring and not our style.  Plus, who wants a party bus after the wedding when you only get to use it for 5 seconds?

Psssh…. Let’s do this RIGHT.

Load ’em up!

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We chose the old train station in the Old Market as the location for all our photos.  Off the beaten path, a little edgy and zero stuffiness of a traditional setting.

Just the ticket.

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I crack up every time I look at these photos of the boys.  They took the potential awkwardness of photos together and threw it out the window with their ridiculousness.   Priceless.

I love those boys.

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To be serious is really hard.  I believe there are more laughing photos than smiling or serious.  Which is cool for me!  After all, this is a true reflection of our marriage, but most importantly, friendship.

I dig the shiz outta this dude.

❤

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After we wrapped up the photos, we trekked on over to Joe Banana’s Bar for a few shots and relaxation before making our way out to Westfair for the Ceremony.

Wait, wait.  We hadn’t gotten hitched yet and we were still out having a good time?

BINGO!

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Party Bus loaded, we made our way back to Westfair to actually DO this thing!

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For the walk down the aisle, Clint and I chose to walk together.  We’d already established ourselves as a team and a united front.  Why not go into it as such?  Plus, it took the pressure off my non-spotlight kinda dad and soft-spoken step-dad.

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While my brother played the guitar for our entrance, the wedding party made it down the aisle (and up the stairs in a straight line, might I add) before we made our own way down with a pit-stop at both sets of parents for hugs and love before taking our own spots on stage.

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With the girls to our left and the boys to our right, we said our own vows, prayed for the Lord’s Blessing on our marriage and said our I Do’s, surrounded by the folks that mean the absolute most to us.

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And just like that we became Husband and Wife

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Post-ceremony we made sure to grab our families for some photos before we lost them all in the sea of friends and beer.

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Then came the eating, drinking, laughing and reminiscing with friends past and present.  A SPECIAL shout-out to Claire’s mama, Kendra, for the insanely delicious frosted sugar cookies that proved to be painstakingly tedious to make.  I fell in love with Kendra’s sugar cookies in High School.

COULD NOT. CANNOT. GET ENOUGH.

So, when I asked her to make enough cookies to feed a few hundred, she didn’t hesitate once.   Unfortunately, I nearly ruined her of making these for eternity after this stint.   But, I am happy to report, I have had a few of her creations since then.  Whew… crisis diverted.   Thank You, Kendra!  ❤

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And then the rest of the night?

DANCING

Oh, the DANCING!  With Lemon Fresh Day taking over the Westfair Stage, you KNOW we danced and partied hard.

What an incredible night.

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Cheers to year 5 and to many, many more.

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Venue: Westfair

Catering: HyVee

Photography: Gulizia Design

(please note photos are slightly distorted due to program I used for cropping and combining, NOT from actual photos)

Ties: RokGear