Alright, final wedding post of the week, I promise. (You all have been champs to stick with me this far!)  It’s a final glimpse of our special day…on video!

Big thanks to our talented friend and videographer, David Matthew Fiser, for spending the entire day with us and capturing it all so beautifully. And deep thanks to Becca as well for all of the stunning photos that I’ve shared throughout the week. (Believe it or not, that was only half of them — amazing.)

Barclay and I are more convinced than ever that wedding photographers and videographers are absolute saints — working for so many hours and being so present with couples on their big day, and then putting in an even longer stretch behind the scenes afterwards to sort through and edit all of that footage, and pouring so much heart and thoughtfulness into it all. But gosh, the memories they capture on film and hand back afterwards are absolutely priceless. I have no doubt that we will be flipping through those photos and watching this video literally for the rest of our lives. Such gifts.

Thank you all again, too, for tuning in for our story this week and for all of your kind and awesome comments. I feel like you all were right there with us now, which makes my heart all warm and fuzzy and thankful. So thanks for being here, and for being the best, like you always are.

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Well after all the tears in our wedding ceremony, I’m happy to report that the reception was all smiles. (Well…almost. Our first dance song gets us every time. ?)

Since we had the ceremony and reception side by side in Union Station, we were able to kick off the party literally the minute the ceremony wrapped up. Actually, make that “fiesta“, since the reception kicked off with chips and salsa and margaritas for all, followed by a Mexican street food dinner and a surprise Mexican treat for dessert. Add to that two dozen of our friends each taking the turn in the live band playing and singing love songs, a kickin’ VW bus photo booth, yard games, and our friend DJ-ing a dance party until late in the evening — it was the fiesta of our dreams.

And you’d better believe everyone came ready to par-tay. ?? ??

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Fun fact: I’ve attended over 200 weddings in my life.

Back when I was working as a full-time musician, I used to spend my weekends working as a wedding singer. Which means that I have sat through soooo many wedding ceremonies. And ha, feel like I have seen just about everything imaginable in a wedding ceremony. And for all those years, always used to dream about someday planning a wedding ceremony of my own.

So when Barclay and I got engaged last Christmas, and spent the following Saturday afternoon all snuggled up on the couch, dreaming together about what our day might look like, one of the first things we discussed was how important it was to us both to have a meaningful ceremony. We wanted a ceremony that felt holy and deeply real, that was full of awesome music and readings, that wove in everyone gathered there, and that felt uniquely personal, like “us”. So over the coming months — in collaboration with Barclay’s dad, who did an amazing job as our minister — we nixed all of the traditional “shoulds” and started from scratch to design a liturgical service that would provide the foundation for our marriage.

And the result was a beautiful moment in time that we will remember for the rest of our lives.

Here’s a little glimpse into our ceremony…

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This day. ?

There are about a million things I could say about this day. But after all the years of waiting and hoping it might one day come, all of the busy months of planning after we got engaged, all of the rsvps rolling in from loved ones who had promised to come join, all of the advice we received about countless big and tiny things, all of the cautions we heard about how the day was sure to just “fly by”, all of the anticipation about finally being married to my best friend…I honestly was so curious by the time our wedding day arrived about how on earth it was all going to feel.

Would we be on the highest of highs all day long? Would we be nervous? Would we feel like we were able to stay present through it all? Or would it the whole day feel like a total “blur”, as people so often said? Would things go according to our plans? Or would we feel distracted throughout the day trying to fix last-minute problems?

I mean, we felt really good about the wedding we had planned. But by the time June 2 rolled around, we were both so curious how the day was actually going to go, and how we were going to feel.

Short answer?

Honestly, it all just felt so surprisingly normal and natural…in all of the best of ways. ?

I mean, yes of course, it was absolutely the biggest day of our lives when we made the biggest commitment of our lives and the most amazing people from every season of our lives were all gathered together in one room (<– that feat still strikes me as the coolest thing about weddings). But as significant as it all was, it also felt like the most natural thing in the world. Marrying Barclay felt like the most natural thing in the world, because I can’t imagine doing life without him. Spending the day with good friends felt like the most natural thing in the world, because that’s pretty much what we do all the time. Even the wedding felt like the most natural thing in the world, I think because it felt so like “us” and was filled with a room full of people we loved.

And as a result, we both felt surprisingly relaxed all day, and thankful, and excited, and present.

And it all was just perfect.

Ha, that’s not to say that things went perfectly according to plan, because there were some definite some hiccups and challenges that presented themselves throughout the day. But it was perfect because we were absolutely surrounded all day and on all sides by everything and everyone we love.

And at the end of the day…I got to come home with a smokin’ hot new husband. ?

Anyway, it was amazing. I’m happy to say that we also now have the most amazing collection of photos to look back on and remember all the details of our happy day! So rather than chatting on and on about the various details of the wedding, I thought I would just upload a zillion photos today and let them mostly just tell the story themselves. Our dear friend and talented photographer, Becca, absolutely outdid herself with her thoughtful, beautiful documentation of our day. So I hope you enjoy them as much as we do.

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Hey guys! I’m taking a break from posting new recipes this week so that I can (finally) share all of the photos and stories and details with you from my favorite day ever…

…OUR WEDDING! ?

Actually, make that my favorite season ever. Because thanks to our amazing family and friends, the months and weeks and days leading up to our wedding were filled with so much love and celebration that the wedding practically felt like the icing on the cake.

Truly. From the amazing wedding showers (four of them, no less, each so unique and perfect), to our unforgettable bachelor and bachelorette parties, to last-minute DIY gatherings where everyone pitched in to help fold paper airplanes and arrange flowers and fold programs, to adorable flower girl practice sessions, to shopping dates galore, to family reunions, to the countless thoughtful texts and meet-ups from everyone checking in on us during the final throes of wedding planning…man, I just can’t even come close to describing how blown away we were by our friends and family in the season leading up to the wedding. They downright overwhelmed us with the love and support and general awesomeness.

And our rehearsal dinner was no exception. ?

Seriously. In the flurry of planning for the actual wedding itself, I don’t think that either Barclay or I had really prepared ourselves for what the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner would be like. I mean, we were looking forward to seeing everyone, of course, and were especially excited to have so many of our family and friends there who had literally flown in from all over the world. And, we were definitely excited about a delicious meal at one of our all-time favorite Italian restaurants. But oh my goodness. We were completely blindsided by what an absolute blessing the night turned out to be. And I mean that in the truest sense of the word. Through laughter, through tears, through stories, through so many hugs, through songs, through haikus, through specific affirmation, and through the sheer gift of their continued presence in our lives — the night felt like one enormous BLESSING for our marriage. And it soaked deep down into our bones…and completely overwhelmed our little hearts in the best of ways.

Ha, I mean it. As we were walking out of the restaurant that night, Barclay and I both turned to one another in awe and were like, “Wait, you mean we also still get to have a wedding after all of that?!” It all seemed almost too generous, too good, too much. But in retrospect, we now see that the rehearsal and wedding were two halves of one whole. The wedding was that incredible moment of commitment and celebration that we had hoped for with all of our loved ones there with us. But the rehearsal dinner was this profound moment of centering and blessing beforehand that prepared our hearts for what was to come, and rooted our story so deeply in the community surrounding us.

There’s no way I will be able to do the experience justice in any of the descriptions below. Nor can I do so in photos — which, btw, we 100% forgot to take all evening!!! Dang! ? Thankfully, I was able to snag a few iPhone photos from friends below, including a round of 2-second videos my (other) brother-in-law snapped of each table saying hello. (Thank you, Jeff!)  But otherwise, the visuals for this one will mostly have to live on in our memories.

Still, I wanted to share a few highlights from this evening that meant so much to us. And hope you can catch a glimpse below of the amazing community of loved ones we’re privileged to call ours.

(Also, stay tuned this week for more wedding posts to come, including lots and lots of photos! ?)

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Hey hey, we’re back from our ??!

Well, actually, first of all I’d like to just celebrate the fact that we actually got to go on our honeymoon. As many of you heard, I realized about a week before our wedding that my passport was missing (whoops). But, since we still had a week before our trip to Mexico, I was able to quickly connect with an expediting agency who assured me that a new passport could be mailed to us the day before our wedding. So hakuna matata! We were good to go!

Wellllll…long story short…the expediting agency goofed.

And we found out literally 20 minutes after our wedding ceremony that my passport was in fact not going to arrive in time for our trip the next day. Which meant that all of our honeymoon plans would have to be cancelled. Which meant that we got to spend a romantic first few hours of our wedding night stuck on hold with multiple airlines and our hotel to let them know we would not be there the next day. Ha, not exactly the beginning to our marriage that we had planned. ?

But…it actually all totally worked out for the best.

Because after an incredible (and very busy) week of festivities, Barclay and I left our wedding on the biggest high, feeling so overjoyed and thrilled and thankful. But, ha, we were also so pooped. So the chance to just have that first weekend to chill and relax and staycation at home here in Kansas City ended up being exactly what we needed. Then, once we opened our laptops a few days later to look into re-booking our trip, we heard back from our original hotel that they had an opening a week and a half later, beginning on a Monday. Yay! So, since we already had that weekend before off from work, we decided we might as well make the most of those days. So we impulsively booked two extra nights in Mexico City on our way to Puerto Escondido. And oh my goodness, we were so thankful that we did.

Our “new and improved” honeymoon ended up being the perfect mix of a vacation.

We started with two full days of adventuring all around bustling Mexico City, which we absolutely loved and can’t wait to visit again soon when we have more time. (PSA – two days there are definitely not enough!)  Then afterwards, we had an entire week of total relaxation at Hotel Escondido, which is pretty much the most dreamy and beautifully-designed and delicious boutique hotel ever in Puerto Escondido (in the Oaxaca region of Mexico). So it was go-go-go…then chill-chill-chill. Two of my favorite kinds of trips, all wrapped up into one fabulous honeymoon.

And the best part? It was all with my favorite guy. ?

Anyway, I wasn’t originally planning on posting here about our honeymoon. But we came home with a few zillion photos (of course) and a long list of places we would wholeheartedly recommend visiting in Mexico. So for anyone interested, here’s an abbreviated trip post including a few of our top travel recs.

And muchísimos fotos. ?

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