I had been in the wedding business for 5 years professionally when I met Lonnie so planning a wedding was easy peasy or so I thought! Since I had already put my parents through enough Lonnie + I decided to pay for the wedding ourselves and although we were gifted help it was our goal to do things the best we could on our own! Including our honeymoon to Tahoe! Now 3 years ago we were not where we wanted to be finically to get married, as I believe most people aren’t but we did it and it was beautiful!

We invested into things that meant the most to us so we started with Photography. We hired a professional that fit our personalities and our goals for the day. I built Shayla a schedule and she handled the rest. It was captured beautifully and I cannot be more thankful for these amazing images. As you can see from our wedding photos, almond blossoms have always had a place in our heart! To view all of our pictures click HERE!

A huge deal for this curvy girl was to find a dress that made me feel beautiful. I knew without a shadow of a doubt I wanted to go to AE Bridal in Yuba City because I had YET to see a dress that I didn’t love. I spent about 2 hours there trying on $1500 dresses that were beautiful but didn’t feel right or fit. No matter where you go, one think I know is that the wedding dress industry is messed up when it comes to sizes, 90% of the dresses are not your correct sizing. I wish someone would have said oh, you are size 12 well here is our size 6 dress size that will fit you instead of the other way around. I walked towards the door a little bummed I couldn’t find anything that I felt was right, I was almost there when Happi, the woman working said..”Hey Kayla, have you ever thought about a bridesmaid dress?” The first dress she pulled out was the dress I wore on my wedding day, and for $325 I may add. I love that place.

As for my bridesmaids I asked them to find short, black dresses that had lace and wear gold shoes. I didn’t care if they borrowed it, found it on clearance or made it themselves. I just wanted them to all be comfortable and happy.

We did the same for the guys but we did buy them Vans + Music Note socks so they all matched Lonnie.

Next was food. One thing we love to do is bring people together around a good meal which is a big reason we have a HUGE dinning room table. We also wanted our guest to enjoy themselves with something other than that traditional steak or chicken. So we hired La Unicas to cater! It was perfect. I cannot say enough about how delicious it was after barely eating anything all morning.

Next on our list was to be sure and nail down a dream venue. In the past 3 years I have seen some of the most beautiful wedding venues but for us, nothing beat Paula + Scott’s house. It brought everything together for our relationship considering we got engaged in the buttes and spent so many nights out there getting to know each other, hanging out with friends and listening to worship music. The buttes set the perfect backdrop for our love story.

Everything really fell into place after my flowers came together. Not a lot of people, if anyone, has a mom like I do. I am so very thankful because she’s so talented in so many ways! She brought my flowers and built all of the arrangements herself. The boutonnieres were wrapped in music note paper, my bouquet was wrapped in a gold sparkled bow and pearls and my dad build a box that hung over our sweet heart table which my mom filled with flowers and a sign the completely represented our day.

One thing I wanted but I just was not 100% sure on was a Wedding Film and I didn’t personally know one, or so I thought. I reached out to one of my friend Scarlett who had been dabbling in the film scene and asked her if she would be interested/pricing. She offered her services for free and I am so thankful to have it!

Now, 3 years later the Wedding Film industry is BOOMING and I am proud to be a part of it. I have had countless brides say “I wish I had a wedding film.”

When I asked Lonnie who he wanted to marry us he said, “ what about Pastor John? Ambers dad.” One of the best decisions we made. We called John and went to meet with him, when he asked Lonnie what was going on Lonnie said, “Well, we wanted to ask you to marry us…” John started crying, instantly. He was blown away and couldn’t wait to tell his wife. HE IS THE CUTEST MOST GENUINE MAN! Lonnie and I are thankful to have his daughter Amber and her hubby David as some of our best friends.

As I finish up with our vendors, I have to give a shout our to our DJ, Quentin. I wrote him a script, gave him a playlist and he created magic that kept the flow at the reception perfect. Forever thankful.

We kept our guest list to close friends and family only, there is no other way I would have done it. As we head into our 4th year of marriage I cannot imagine where we would be without our friends and family, specially now having our sweet baby. We are instruments for God’s purpose and together we do believe we are unstoppable. We hope to be a light for others that God can do amazing things through your trust in him.

Thank you for coming along on this journey with us we truly love you all and look forward to all the things God has for us.