September 26, 2014
With the perfect blend of Norwegian & Lancaster County PA: This day was beyond fun. Beyond Beautiful. And beyond all that was hoped and dreamed for. Bryan wrote the love story for this post. It's listed later- near the end- and after you read it you, like me, may find a few tears slipping out. When love is long distance it becomes sweeter just for the fact of endurance. And how do lives come together so individually when there are millions of people in between? How beautiful the commitment that starts long before the wedding day. The blending of two hearts and many families....The mystery of when a man loves a woman.
Beautiful models bridesmaids. =) As you will read later not one of the guests at the wedding were actually from Conway, SC. This takes an incredible amount of organization and cooperation and from the looks of things this bride could have planned a wedding anywhere in the world and it would have been as perfect. Everyone chipped in and did whatever it took to make it happen. Her bridesmaids were completely selfless and supportive.
While the girls were busy getting ready at the Thompson Farm in Conway the guys were getting their duds on at Myrtle Beach. Mary did a spectacular job of catching the essence of these boys. Their friendships and they were a blast to work with.
Brothers. Cousins. Friends. Crazy fun !
To complete the vow ceremony the couple put together a cross.
See? Crazy! I could not resist.
Loved the girls choice of dresses! Perfect. Perfect. Perfect.
This wedding was an all day affair with a lunch prepared after the ceremony.
Following lunch there was skeet shooting and lawn games.
Not your typical lawn games BUT a lawn literally set up with games.
Like tether ball- a giant slide- a rubber ducky race.
I like how they blended 2 cultures. Candy. Snop. There was an American "cutting of the cake" and a Norwegian one, which, by the way, is like nothing I have ever seen. =) The bride and groom are blindfolded. Or, they hold their eyes shut tight. Then they hold a knife and together cut into the middle of the cake vertically. The top of the cake is pulled off and inside are stashed tiny little fake babies. Fake, of course. =) However many babies are attached to the string is how many babies you are going to have in real life. Neat, Right?
Lawn games for the kids. There was a lot of children at this wedding and they had so much fun!
THEIR STORY: by Bryan
Eileen and I met for the first time in 2009 where we were both serving in Panama City, Panama under Youth With A Mission (YWAM). Our encounter here was short as I (Bryan) was just on two month outreach but only met Eileen a month into it. We connected well as friends and briefly stayed in touched for the next half a year after I left. Ironically, in May 2010 we met under similar circumstances in YWAM Haiti following the earthquake. I (Bryan) went to St Marc, Haiti as YWAM staff and Eileen was the one on outreach this time with the Discipleship Training School (DTS) she was staffing. As was the case in Panama a number of months earlier, while we were able to catch up as friends briefly, we again went our separate ways. Following this, Eileen and I (Bryan) had no contact with each other for about two years. Then randomly, on June 3, 2012, Eileen wrote me (Bryan) a quick message on facebook saying how she saw pictures of me at one of my friends wedding and got her wondering how I was doing. Naturally I wrote her back and filled her in asking her the same questions. THANK GOD FOR FACEBOOK! This went on for months. Obviously during this time the conversations got longer and deeper and feelings were beginning to arise. But, we both were trying to resist as I (Bryan) was on orders to deploy to Kuwait in just a few months and Eileen was in school in Norway, her home country. However, Eileen had a trip planned to the states over Thanksgiving, which would be the last time I would be home visiting my family before I shipped out, so naturally we made plans to see each other. We both flew in to VA on the same day, me from Camp Shelby, Mississippi where I was training and Eileen came in from Oslo, Norway. My mom picked us up from the airport and we were able to spend the next three days together and Eileen was also able to meet my family. It was during this time we decided to try and take this friendship to another level in spite of the circumstances and what would become long distance. And that is what we did, over the next 10 months when I was deployed and Eileen was back home all we had was cyber communication. But we made the best of it with date nights over skype and even netflix movie nights. As the tenth month was approaching Eileen and I both decided that the following fall we would both transfer to colleges in South Carolina so we could be closer together and not have another year of long distance in our relationship. During Christmas vacation that year I traveled to Norway with Eileen to meet her family. While I knew before, it was during this time I felt God confirm that she would be the one I would marry, so I asked her dad for his blessing during this time as well. On March 15, 2014 I proposed to Eileen in Mount Jackson, VA on a mountain lookout near my parents home. Thankfully she said yes and the wedding planning began! After months of looking through pinterest, watching "say yes to the dress", thrift store shopping, and of course our own creative imaginations, we were able to create our dream wedding! My mom and Eileen used their crafting skills to make things like the invitations, programs, and a quilt that our guests could sign. Most of the other details came from thrift store shopping with intent to make our own style that combined Norwegian and American culture. The wedding took place on the Thompson Farm in Conway, SC on September 26, 2014! The day was perfect, and was everything we imagined it to be. We had family and friends from Norway and the United States making it a true international wedding, which was perfect for the theme of our wedding. None of this could have been done without the help of our parents during the planning months all the way up until the big day. On the wedding day too, we also received a lot of help from extended family and friends. Having all the help we did, and the great amount of support, we can say with confidence, that this day will surely go down as the best day of our life!
And then it was reception time.... more good food, games, and dancing.
It was more fun than it looks and more beautiful than it appears in the photos.
Bryan and Eileen- You did it! And it was very good. You both have beautiful families and i can see your future in their eyes.
The hope and the love they all have for the two of you.
We were honored to be a part and wish you the best of both worlds. Literally =)
You make a beautiful beautiful couple.
A HUGE thank you and much love to my dear friend, Mary. She has been my traveling companion on all of my out of state weddings so far and i hope we can keep up that little tradition. We have so much to talk about at all times and her life inspires me to no end. ALSO she is an excellent traveler. I need her support just to arrive at destination =) ALSO she is a dear friend to my husband and i.
My husband was brave enough to take this trip with us and did an excellent job with the camera! In case you were not aware, shooting a wedding takes an incredible amount of patience and he had every drop of it (especially when it involves traveling). Steve, I'm having so much fun living this life with you... thank you for entering into my crazy dreams and aspirations.
PLUS they matched perfectly =) How do i get so lucky to know so many beautiful people?
People like you- Diane
