Our wedding!!

A couple days ago was Valentine's Day.
The day before that was our 7 months anniversary.
So I figured it's a good week to write about our wedding. :)

I'm a stereotypical girl to where I've been planning my wedding since I was little. A lot of things were different but I was still very pleased with how everything turned out.

Let's start with the date. July 13, 2012.... FRIDAY, July 13th.
Choosing this date goes back quite a few years. My aunt and uncle were married on a Friday the 13th only it was in August. Then my dad and mom were married on a Friday the 13th, in August. With that lead, my other aunt and uncle wanted to get married on the same date. Theirs didn't hit on a Friday though. It was a Monday. lol.
Then we jump quite a few years. My older sister was married on Saturday, May 16th. (pretty close to 13). My oldest sister was married Saturday, June 13th. And my younger sister got married on Saturday, April 26th. (13 plus 13)
The number 13 may seem unlucky to some but it works for us! This year those anniversaries will be 47 years, 42 years, 40 years, 15 years, 15 years and 10 years. We're in good company.
I chose July for a reason too. If you look back at those months we have April, May, June and August. July needed to be in the running too. I would have gotten married even if it didn't land on a Friday but I feel it's pretty neat that it did. :)

There were a few other things that I wanted that were unique. One thing that was very important to me was our programs. I wanted to be like a little book. It told the order of ceremony and who was a part of the wedding party, of course. But it also told our story of how we met and our engagement story. We had the words of the songs in there as well.
Here's Our Story and Our Engagement as it was in the program:

Nate and Amanda first met in High School freshman year when Bridgewater/Fontanelle and Greenfield joined schools.  They never dated but were friends.  Nate played football, and Amanda was a cheerleader.  Ironically, Amanda wore Nate’s football jersey for her Powder Puff game their Senior Year.

         After High School, life led them down different paths.  However, they seemed to run into each other at several community events.  At one point, Nate had heard Amanda was back for Christmas and called to see if she wanted to hang out.  Having been in a car accident and not feeling well, Amanda declined the offer.

         Nate and Amanda ran into each other again at a friend’s funeral.  Amanda had moved back to Greenfield so Nate got her involved with planning their ten year class reunion.  During that time Nate and Amanda started becoming friends again. February 24, 2009, Nate gave his life to Christ by accepting Him as his personal Savior.  That change in Nate made his and Amanda’s friendship open up even more to the point of becoming best friends.  They were together often over the next year.

         February 5, 2010, Nate and Amanda went on their first date as more than friends.  They had a wonderful time eating at Amanda’s favorite restaurant, Olive Garden.  Then they went miniature golfing and showed their competitive spirits.  They ended the evening by just talking together at Starbucks.

         That was the beginning of their relationship. They’ve spent a lot of time together doing things they both love… watching football, being outdoors, leading youth group, and so much more. They were even able to take a trip to Boston with Amanda’s parents and aunts and uncles.

         They’ve always strived to do things as a family with Brady and Noah. They love going to the pool together, riding bikes together and having a family outing to the zoo with their friends. April 20, 2011, Nate took Amanda to Meadow Lake and tried to teach her to skip rocks as they had done on many occasions.  When Amanda turned toward Nate expecting him to give her another rock, he was down on one knee.

         Amanda said, “Are you serious?  You’d better not be joking!  Are you being serious?”  Since she wouldn’t let Nate get a word in, he just held up the ring.  She then covered her mouth with her hands and whispered, “Sorry!” feeling like she had ruined Nate’s moment.

         Nate was finally able to ask Amanda to marry him.  Of course, she said, “Yes!”

         They will forever remember that moment.

        Now today, July 13, 2012, Nate and Amanda will become husband and wife –

                                    Mr. & Mrs. Hilpipre.

Now that you have the background of the date and how we met... let's get to the best day of my life. :)

We were having an evening wedding so I didn't have to get up too early. I had my hair done and then headed to get ready at the church in the early afternoon. 

My mom and my friend were very big in my getting ready process.

                         

My other friend was a big part of my day as well!!

I show you this picture so you can kind of see the back of my hair. I had been growing it out but it wasn't as long as I had hoped. I couldn't do an updo or a veil because of my headache so I chopped my hair a week before the wedding. I have naturally curly hair so we kept that going in the back. 

I LOVED IT!!!

Those three ladies were the ones who kept me calm and relaxed before the pictures and ceremony began.

OH WAIT!! lol

I had always thought that I'd do the pictures after the ceremony because I wanted the first time my husband saw me was when I walked down the aisle. As I got older and experienced more weddings, I decided to change that and go ahead and do the pictures beforehand. But we still had a moment to ourselves of the first time he saw me.

I loved his reaction although a picture could never capture it fully. :)

Thus began a couple of hours of picture taking.

This is our bridesmaids, groom's attendants and ring bearer.

We also had a Miniature Bridal of our 14 nieces and nephews!!

This was something else unique that was important to me. I love kids. I love my nieces and nephews. I knew that they wanted to be a part of this day as much as I did. I loved the way they looked and it all turned out!

Our first family picture.

My Family

Nate's dad's side Family

Nate's mom's side Family

My sisters and I are very close. I loved having them share in this special day with me. I will always treasure this picture.

I now have another sister. Nate's only full sibling. :)

I wanted to incorporate so many areas of my life. These are our youth group boys. They were our ushers and sound guy. I'm not sure they were thrilled to have to dress up and be a part of our wedding but we enjoyed having them there. They're a good group and this picture describes us pretty well.

The ceremony was in our chapel. My dad and brother-in-law (the electrician) figured out a why to make my vision a reality. The lights were strung up over wire and plugged directly into the lights. The light bulbs were loosened so that when the switch was turned on only the Christmas lights turned on. This was so that our only lighting was the fancy lights AND so we didn't have a bunch of extension cords hanging around the walls.

It was great!

All the prelude music was instrumental Disney songs. The processional music was also all Disney. The grandparents and parents walked in to So Close from Enchanted. The nieces and nephews danced in with That's How You Know from Enchanted. The bridesmaids and ring bearer walked in to Can You Feel the Love Tonight? from Lion King. And my dad walked me down the aisle to I See the Light from Tangled.

During the ceremony we had two songs. Bless the Broken Road by Selah and When I Say I Do by Matthew West. Those are the songs we had the words to in the program.

The recessional was more upbeat music. After we were introduced to the audience, we walked out to I'm a Believer by the Monkees. Then the next song connected us back to the Disney theme. It was Ever Ever After from Enchanted sung by Carrie Underwood.

My two favorite men! My dad and husband!

We had the honor of having my dad officiate our wedding.

Our reception was in the newly refurbished Opera House. We were the first wedding event there. My dad has been highly involved with this project for years and so it was great that it was finished in time for us to do this!

There were several things about our reception that was unique and again, important to me.

I LOVE chocolate so we had a dessert reception. 

Cupcakes for everybody's choice of flavors...

with little signs that connected the Disney theme.

There was a Candy Bar.

And notice that it's not all chocolate for those crazy people that don't like chocolate. ;)

And a chocolate fountain!

I actually had a three of these.

One with milk chocolate, one with dark chocolate and one with white chocolate. 

What are we waiting for here?

Our chocolate ice cream and Pepsi float!

We also had a more traditional fruit punch/sprite mixture for those people who aren't very daring and are no fun! lol. JUST KIDDING!

Our float actually was a hit! :)

M&Ms are my favorite candy so our wedding favors were in our colors.

Our cake covered with perfectly symmetrical M&Ms.

Again, since I love kids, knew there was going to be a lot of kids attending AND that they'd be on a sugar high, I had paper covering the tables and crayons in little jars to keep them entertained. :)

One other table had a picture of each of our grandparents' and parents' weddings. 

Our family and where we come from is very important to us.

We were whisked away to a honeymoon in the Dominican Republic!

That's it! That's our wedding! People seemed to have a good time and we got a lot of compliments on a lot of our unique touches. It was a wonderful day and a beautiful beginning to our life together.