Fun and Casual

About five seconds after we woke up Mary Ellen and I started singing/screaming to Sarah, "You're getting married today! You're getting married today!" The whole day was going to just be so fun. We quickly headed upstairs to her mom's suite. Sar's friend Katherine came to do everyone's hair. After meeting her so many times on visits she's become one of my friends too and it was so good to see her. Kat, Ben's sister, did a fabulous job with everyone's make-up.

 

The photographer and videographer arrived to start filming and things never slowed down. We were all there to watch Sar put on her beautiful dress. We had to play secret agent in the hotel (checking around corners and hiding Sar behind walls) when we were in the hallway to make sure we wouldn't run into Ben early. Good thing we were so stealthy about it because when the elevator doors opened the groomsmen were inside with Ben. Mary Ellen dove at the elevator, we yelled at Sar to get back, Chris punched Ben back and shielded the door. It was awesome. They whisked Ben away and we were in the clear.

Ben and Sarah had their "first look" outside of the hotel, rather than having her walk down the aisle as the first time they would see each other. Then the whole wedding party boarded the bus to go take pictures. Sarah and Ben were adamant that all of us should take pictures before the ceremony like this when we get married. It really was so much better that we could just all be together, Sar and Ben were so much less nervous together and we could take pictures without worrying about everyone else waiting on us at the reception.

This wedding party is SO fun. After hanging out at our wedding party weekend in Wisconsin and being together the day before we really were all friends.

 

Once we got on the bus Kat couldn't stop smiling. She said, "I really didn't expect to feel this way at all but I'm just so excited." This kind of excitement and enthusiasm is incredibly rare for Kat but Mary Ellen pointed out that she actually could choose to feel like this all the time if she wanted too.

 

We loved the flowers. Loved listening to the wedding mix in the bus and waving our hands in the air to "You and I" like Sarah's dream. Loved seeing Sar and Ben so happy to be together. Loved the guys crazy socks peaking out of their suits. Loved their polka dot ties.

 

We took photos at a log cabin, on the beach and in front of the church. We've been so worried that it would rain but the day turned out to be beautiful and so much warmer than it has been. It was perfect.

I'm so thankful that Sar asked me to be in her wedding and that I got to share this experience with her. She is one of my very best friends and I love that we've stayed so close even though we live in different places now. Sar has taught me so much about myself, how to have hard conversations, what it means to love people well, how to be confident and totally yourself, what I deserve and how to live a life following Christ. She's the best.

We were sequestered at 4:00 as the guests started filling the sanctuary. Katherine helped Sar with her veil and wedding planner Megan ran around making sure everything was going smoothly. Sar's mom Barbara (in the blue suit) is the best. Seriously. She was the power behind this whole operation, making sure it was exactly what Sar and Ben wanted, being supportive and positive, taking care of little details and making sure everyone was having fun. It's obvious how much she loves Sar and just watching her watch her daughter made me tear up several times.

Hannah and Riley, two old Carmel YL kids that are now in college, drove up for the wedding and I gave them my camera for the ceremony. A few selfies for good measure and lots of great pictures of wedding.

From where we were standing on stage we had the perfect view of Sar and Ben. It went so fast but I'll remember Jack's message about how the wedding as well as Sarah and Ben are fun and casual, singing Be Thou My Vision together, the look on Ben's face, how Brian and Jack were the perfect officiants, Barbara tearing up when Sarah said her vows, the cheering after their first kiss.

Mr. and Mrs. Ben and Sarah Battaglia!

We're all about fun so everyone threw rainbow sprinkles when Ben and Sarah ran out of the church. We learned after the fact that it's painful to get hit again and again with sprinkles but it made for really fun pictures.

 

Ben has been using #benandsarahgetmarried on Instagram for weeks now. His dream was to get up to 100 pictures with that tag. It was so fun to be able to see all the great pictures at once that people tagged #benandsarahgetmarried. (Don't worry, we surpassed 100 pics.)

 

 

After visiting Sar up here the last two years I know several of her friends and was excited to see them. Laura is on YL staff in LaGrange and a YL leader for several awesome Camp Tecumseh girls.

 

The reception was SO much fun. They'd thought of everything through the lens of "How do we make this more fun?" and all their work paid off. To find out where you were sitting you found your envelope on this wall. Inside was your table number. Then you wrote a note to the bride and groom on a paper heart and put it back in your envelope. Coolest guest book ever.

 

I loved getting to spend a lot of time with Hannah and Riley. I spent all of last year in Campaigners with Hannah and then led a Wyld Life cabin with her at Timber Wolf Lake. She was thrilled to be at the wedding and I'm pretty sure she cried most of the ceremony she was so happy.

 

The tables were beautiful. Love the chevron table runners and the bright flowers in the middle.

We ate more at this wedding then I thought was humanly possible. Appetizers when we started. Fiesta Station and Spud Station after the first dance. An hour later they opened the Polynesian Station and Sandwich Station. They served wedding cake and had a Cold Stone set up. Then to top it all off they had individual deep dish pizzas late at night.

Don't you love the S B monogram on the floor too? They had towels in the bathroom with it printed on it too. Gosh, aren't they just so cute and in love?

Kylie represented the Houghton children and I was excited to dance with her and take pictures in the photo booth.

 

We had a live band, Pleasure Towne, which makes everything even more fun. They were the same band that played at Jenna and Kyle's wedding so we knew they'd be great. They played for three hours and we only left the dance floor once for ice-cream. We know how to go hard dancing.

 

Many of my camp friends were at Jordan and Stacey's wedding in Lafayette at the same time so I was sending these pictures to Kata while she sent me pictures from their dance party. I loved getting to dance with Sar and Ben, all the Indy people, Chicago YL people I knew and other friends.

 

This wedding weekend was so much fun from start to finish. I loved getting to be part of it all and being reunited with all of these people. But now I'm most excited to see Sar and Ben living their life together. I'm confident that they will be one of those couples that others aspire to be like as they model what unconditional, selfless and intentional love looks like.