California or Bust…
Days 21 – 11/11/11 Wedding Day!!!
Friday, November 11, 2011
SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT!!!
We interrupt this BLOG for a special announcement…
We interrupt this BLOG for a special announcement…
Really... after 10 years together, we have made it official and tied the knot!
We got married at Eberle Winery in Paso Robles with Brigit and Riley in attendance. Jeff Cotter was our Officiant, Paul Rigby played his acoustic guitar and sang some of our favorite songs, Anna Denham was our Photographer and the beautiful flowers were by “Flowers By Kim”.
We are so happy to share this news with you... it is a very special day for the two of us! More pictures and info to come...
UPDATE:
Now that the blog has caught up to this day, we can add some more details about our wedding. Many of you have asked if we had this planned… yes we did. About a year ago, we decided that we wanted to get married on 11/11/11 and then it wasn’t until about ten months ago that we thought about taking an RV trip to California and getting married at a winery. We know that the Florida Keys are a wedding destination in itself but we really wanted to do something different and away from home… just for us. We didn’t tell anyone because we didn’t want anyone to make a fuss over us… LOL. It was difficult at times to be excited about getting married but not being able to tell anyone… none of our friends or family knew!
It was interesting planning a destination wedding 3,000 miles from home. Once we had decided to have our wedding at Eberle, everything else fell into place. The event staff at Eberle, Jan Erkenbrak and Oralia Guzman, gave us a couple of names of local florists and our musician Paul who knew and suggested our photographer Anna. They also suggested a wedding planner who we really did not need for our small intimate event, but the planner gave us Jeff Cotter’s name as an officiate. All amazing wonderful people that helped coordinate our wedding and make it super special to us and just how we wanted it to be.
Kim who owns Flowers By Kim emailed a few pictures of arrangements and a questionnaire to determine what style and color of flowers I wanted. We decided on two large arrangements that were amazing and too large to keep in the motorhome after the wedding. So we left one at Eberle and one at the Wine Country RV Resort. Both Drew and Riley had boutonnieres, Brigit had a neck ring of flowers, and I my bouquet wrapped in deep purple ribbon was exactly what I had imagined. I had to give up some control and just enjoy however things turned out. That included the rain… our hopes were to be married on the deck overlooking the vineyards but that changed with the weather. It didn’t matter… Drew was surprised at how easy going I was about everything.
We arrived at Eberle Winery about 3:45, both Jan and Oralia made sure that the wine cave was set up as we discussed… complete with indirect lighting, candelabras and wine barrels. We began the ceremony at 4:34 (numbers add to 11) as per Jan’s suggestion to stick to 11’s which represent the doors to opportunity and success.
For the actual ceremony, Paul sang and played his guitar for us, Drew and I exchanged our vows to each other. And our Officiate, Jeff performed the wedding ceremony with perfect words and emotion. We enjoyed some Eberle Cabernet before our vows and then toasted our marriage with some “J” champagne and enjoyed an assortment of cheese and crackers. Our party of seven… plus two dogs! When the rain stopped for just a moment, Jan rallied us to the outside vineyard through the large timber cave doors for a photo op. We slid around in the mud in our new wedding shoes… Riley and Brigit ran around like lunatics… we were laughing and having FUN!
For the actual ceremony, Paul sang and played his guitar for us, Drew and I exchanged our vows to each other. And our Officiate, Jeff performed the wedding ceremony with perfect words and emotion. We enjoyed some Eberle Cabernet before our vows and then toasted our marriage with some “J” champagne and enjoyed an assortment of cheese and crackers. Our party of seven… plus two dogs! When the rain stopped for just a moment, Jan rallied us to the outside vineyard through the large timber cave doors for a photo op. We slid around in the mud in our new wedding shoes… Riley and Brigit ran around like lunatics… we were laughing and having FUN!
Our photographer Anna took some amazing photos… and made it very easy for us to still enjoy each other and the moment. After the ceremony we wandered through the wine barrel lined tunnels of the cave. And to top it off, Paul, our strolling minstrel was serenading close behind with guitar. We made arrangements with Anna that she would edit our photos and provide us with a CD of the good ones before we departed Paso Robles on Sunday.
Please enjoy some of the beautiful photos that Anna posted on her blog from our wedding… she is very sweet and talented. http://www.simplemamasshutter.com/2011/11/wedding.html
We had made after wedding dinner reservations back in August for a very nice restaurant in Paso Robles… The Artisan Restaurant. Their menu is California inspired and features local and organic produce and proteins that are wild caught or sustainably farmed with no hormones or antibiotics. We were spoiled by the wait staff and enjoyed a romantic dinner.
I love this picture.It is perfect! I'm so happy for you and I still cant believe you managed to keep it a secret!!! Congrats again to the new couple ;)
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