One Single Thread Of Gold Tied Me To You
Wedding celebration : June 4th 2022
I always had a gut feeling that my 30th year would be pretty special.
When you start dating your significant other in high school, you aren’t waiting for the appropriate amount time to pass in order to get engaged. The timeline starts so early, everything gets a little bit out of order. When we finally got engaged in February 2021, I had zero interest in having a long engagement.. I thought “It’s been 13 years let’s make this thing official already!”
I didn’t have a fantasied version of what our wedding would look in my head prior to our engagement. I just wanted to be married to the person I knew I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. Everything else would happen exactly the way it was meant to.
I began chatting all things wedding from the second that ring slid onto my finger. We got engaged in Charleston, SC on my 30th birthday trip and on our travel day home I remember saying to Brandon “let’s elope!”. He turned down this idea pretty quickly and wanted to plan some sort of wedding with a ceremony and reception in a traditional sort but I didn’t want to wait long. We were 30 years old, together for 13 years, owned a home and I just wanted to be married already! We sat and brainstormed (our travel day consisted of 11 hours of travel from SC to PA because the plane ticket was only $29) and talked about timing. It was February of 2021. I wanted it to be warm when we got married but spring was just a few months away… not enough time. We decided September would be enough time to be able to plan (7 months total) and the last possible month with predictable warm weather. Unfortunately planning a wedding of any sorts in 2021 was a mess from covid. Places were booked years out from all the weddings that got canceled and pushed back. We wanted something small, outside and not cost an outrageous amount. We also wanted a taco truck. Which meant that we needed to find a location that allowed outside food. Planning a wedding is no joke and if you currently are, I feel for you!
Then we found a local arboretum that had a beautiful outdoor area, the cost was a choice of donation - I emailed back of forth to set up a time to visit and when we did.. they said no alcohol. Back to square one. We considered having it in my parents back yard, but nothing felt right, nothing was working out. There were so many odds against us. Push back from so many areas, we got to a point where it wasn’t fun to plan anymore. Words I normally tell myself, I wasn’t listening to. “The right things will fall into place. The timing of the universe, and the divine plan with unveil itself if we listen.” We hit a wall and decided in one day’s time that we should plan an elopement to get married just the two of us and then plan a wedding celebration later on. “Where would we want to go? Where would be the most beautiful place we could travel to, in the US (since Covid) that would have warm weather and give us the most incredible memories of us doing things we love?”
I am a firm believer that the universe is always showing us signs and messages if we listen.
In 2018, I was in the wedding of a childhood friend. We were very close at the time and talked so much about the details of her wedding. We discussed her first choice for a honeymoon. The location was Hawaii. We chatted about her travel plans in length, what they would do there and why she thought she would love it so much. I listened but had no urge to jump on a plane to visit. It just wasn’t the right timing for me to go but I was happy she was going to have such a great trip. That same year, her sister in law had a destination wedding in Hawaii. Again, it was not a big deal at the time to me but looking back I can reflect on the significance of the universe putting Hawaii in my path.
In 2019, I began building my Young Living business. They had a contest called Dream 100 over the summer and the grand prize was a trip to Hawaii. I worked so hard. I did really well but I didn’t win a trip to Hawaii. It was really the first time I considered it as a travel destination, I imagined what it would be like to win, to visit. I researched a bit more about what it looked like and loved everything I saw.
When it came to choosing a location to elope to.. there was only one place that came to mind. I knew we were supposed to be in Hawaii. There were so many other little things that pointed to that location, I knew it was the right place. I had pinned images of destination weddings on my Pinterest board that brought me to Hawaii photographers and saw blog posts of Hawaii must do’s on instagram. The weekend before we left for Hawaii, Brandon and I were driving and the car in front of us had a Hawaii license plate. A HAWAII license plate. A car that would need to be ferried into the rest of the US to come off the island was planted right in front of us. September also happened to be the best weather month in Hawaii. It was meant to be.
I worked through every detail of a 6 night stay in Maui, Hawaii in a matter hours. Planned every bit of our travel plans, car rental, hotel stay, wedding details and excursions in ONE DAY. I found a package through AAA for flight, car rental and hotel stay the Hyatt Regency Maui Resort & Spa that made everything seem so easy. Choose excursions for each day from the AAA website. After searching Hawaii elopement photographers on Pinterest and falling in love with her photography, I found an all inclusive elopement package with Mersadi Olsen that included all the details for our wedding day with photography, videography, hair, makeup, florals, and a celebratory picnic. We basically just had to pack our bags, bring a wedding dress and show up to get married! I proudly walked Brandon through all my planning and on one Sunday evening we just “booked it”. All of it. “Welp that was easy! Really easy.” We were so excited. We just had to share the news with our closest friends and family.. some were upset but most were so supportive.
I didn’t want to have to sacrifice some of the really special parts of the wedding process just because we were doing things untraditionally. I invited all of my closet girlfriends to a dinner at True Foods, brought bridesmaids jean jackets I originally painted for them to wear at our wedding and shared the news with them! One of my closest friends also shared that she had plans to do the EXACT same thing a few months before us and I was so happy to be able to share in the excitement together.
A few weeks later I made appointments at two different consignment wedding dress shops to try on dresses. The first shop we went into was Something Borrowed Bridal Boutique in Perkasie, PA. I wanted to find a dress that needed a second love story so that’s why I choose to shop consignment. I tried on 15 or so dresses rather quickly and nothing stood out until… the one. I had the “this is my dress feeling”. I tried to talk myself out of the purchase because it was a bit more than I had originally been hoping to spend but I knew deep down that it was my dress. I canceled my other appointment for the day and went home with my dream dress.
