My best week ever {Happy Anniversary Ryan}

{Photo courtesy of Jenn Van Wyk Photography}

To date, it is still, my best day/week ever.  Since then, so much has happened, including the birth of my daughter.  And while she is the best thing that has happened to me, the events surrounding her birth in no way make that experience any better than my wedding week.  I simply loved everything about it–and I think it is because we stayed true to ourselves.  We had no outside influences, nothing we didn’t like or agree with, and we put a lot of thought and heart into planning a real celebration.

Today is our anniversary.  We’ve been married for three years, but together just about ten.  I love looking back at how much has changed, how much we’ve grown, and how easy it’s been.  And more then I’d ever would have thought, I think back to our wedding week and remember something new each time.  I laugh at something someone said or did, or just smile remembering how truly happy I was.

Of course having (literally) thousands of pictures to look back on helps. The more weddings I attend, and moments I capture for people, the more I realize just how important having someone capture photos of your day is.  I hired a professional photographer, had disposable cameras at every table, had a photo booth, and had family give me all of their pictures; while I realize this is quite overboard (borderline obsessive) I am SO happy I did it.  And now, as the years pass and we grow further and further away from our wedding week I treasure my trove of pictures more and more.  Which I now understand is a HUGE reason I put so much effort into photos for others.  I know just how much I treasure my pictures–the great professional ones AND the crappy quality ones.  Those moments captured and the feelings of the day emulate through them all.  I’m blown away that I get to do this for others–that I am trusted to save your moments from your day.

In so many ways I owe many thanks to the my hubby, for helping me, encouraging me, and supporting me in this crazy dream I had when I met him ten years ago.  At the very beginning of our relationship, one of the very first gifts he ever gave me was a ‘really nice’ Kodak point and shoot digital camera after I once told him my dream would be to take pictures for a living.  An upgrade a thousand times better than my first generation digital from Y2k.  It was the seed planted.  The faith he had in me, an outsider, someone with a fresh outlook on life.  Everyone says ‘follow your dreams’, ‘do what makes you happy’, but for some reason when he said it, I believed it.

Happy Anniversary Ryan.  I love you and our lives together and I would marry you over again and again and again if it would mean we’d get to live another day like today and yesterday and the past hundreds again and again.  I never knew then how much I know now just how much you are the ying to my yang and just how right our opposite personalities are for each other.

I’d marry you over again and again and again if it meant I’d get to watch you become the most amazing daddy to our babies and master this fathering thing like I’d never imagined.  I’ve never been more in love with you than I am in the moments of normalcy when you walk through the door after work and greet our little girl, or tuck her in at night with a kiss and a hug.

I would do it all over again even if we’d had none of this dream we live in, even if it was just me and you and our love.  Again and again and into the dark.

{photos courtesy of family and friends}

That truck right there? My pride and joy.  That’s right ya’ll..I had to rent a U-Haul to transport all of my wedding stuff to the venue.  I was a TOTAL DIY bride 😉

{Photos courtesy of family and friends}

A little family reunion party at the hotel, involving luggage carts and dancing on tables…doesn’t get much better than that!

}The rest of the photos are a combination of Jenn Van Wyk Photography and family and friends}

Who goes go-carting just right before they get married?!?  ^^this guy….

Thank you Jenn Van Wyk Photography for the awesome pictures!!  By the end of their time with us, Jenn came up to me and said “I ran out of storage space on my cards!!” That is how many pictures she took!! THANK YOU GIRL!Love these shots from the disposable cameras on our tables!!

The photo booth was the best investment we made (aside from the photographer) for our wedding!!  People LOVED it, and it rendered some of the best pictures of the day!

We got married at The Wilderness Resort in Wisconsin Dells, because we had people traveling from all over the country to make it to our wedding.  So the day after, we spent the day at the water park with our friends and family relaxing in the lazy river and having a great time!

So. Much. Fun.