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After yesterday and losing my wallet (am still trying to get all my credit cards and license restored) this was a welcome relief, had lots of happy couples here to make it all better.
All in all, a great day! |
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And this little cutie was a ring bearer in an earlier wedding (her grandparents got hitched), all in all it was a great day here at the chapel of love! |
| August 2, 2010: For those of you who have been following my blog, I have canceled my October vacation, I will not be able to do what I was planning, nothing horrible, just bad timing. So I took the dates off the top of the pages and I will be booking weddings that week. thanks. |
| July 28, 2010: I really needed this...I have been just sitting outside on my patio and reading (in between naps) I am slowly coming to the realization that I am getting older...I know now why people retire at 62. And I spent an afternoon adding the prices page...I am hoping that I have made it easier to navigate, I had so many people going straight to the "packages" page and not even looking at the chapels pages, so now they are all on one page with links to their pages. And hopefully, this will make it easier for people to find the chapel they want. Email me and let me know what you think. |
| July 20, 2010: last week before vacation...just 5 days to go. I can't wait! 8 days of doing absolutely nothing...I love all of you, but I need to not have to answer a phone for a week...see you all after my break. |
| July 16, 2010: crazy Friday...13 weddings today! Will let you know if I survive...I have an impinged nerve in my neck that is making me dizzy at the most inopportune moments...went to my chiropractor this morning and he fixed it, I am just hoping that it will stay in place long enough to get me through this day...ahhhh, the joys of getting older.. |
| June 20, 2010: I think I will refer to this as the "long hot summer" in years to come...I can't believe the heat (and without a break) this summer. Give me last summer again....it was so gorgeous. I was thinking of going to Lake Michigan for vacation, but I may postpone till the October shut-down and do something where I won't be out in this heat in July...maybe Alaska...LOL... |
| June 3, 2010: We will be featured on the 6am morning news on 10TV...set your dvrs! I can't wait to see this, it was so much fun having them here. |
| June 2, 2010: Anietra just left and the segment will air on Friday early...so set your dvr to record! I will post the actual time here as soon as they get back with me. I am really excited, they really filmed every inch of the place and I can't wait to see it...more later. |
| June 1, 2010: Anietra Hamper from channel 10 will be here tomorrow to interview me...had a great time on Friday the 28th with Carl who shot 3 of our weddings here. I will let you all know when the segment will run...and make sure that you check out the new virtual tours of all the chapels...I just had it all re-shot last week. Things are getting so big out there and I needed to update the garden, so I had them update all the chapels, even the elopement. |
click on the thumbnail for a large image of the beautiful (and tasty) rings... |
Everyone got to get married in the garden and it was just beautiful...I am just hoping that the weekends get themselves straightened out and we can have our rainy days on Monday or Tuesday where they belong. I am having the new virtual tour shot this month instead of next (like I usually do) because it has been so beautiful with the early spring that I don't have to wait and I want everyone to see how big the trees have gotten. |
| April 23, 2010: Yesterday was a total disaster! I have been using McAfee protection for 15 yrs and they got me good. Their latest upgrade trashed my entire system and the tech spent 5 hrs beating it back into submission... what a day....very stressful for me, not knowing whether or not I was going to lose everything...he pulled it out in the final minutes. Now, today is catch-up day, getting all of the work done that I couldn't do yesterday. arghhhhh |
| April 20, 2010: Can't seem to get a break here with the weather...been beautiful all week and then decides to be freezing on the weekends...still haven't had a wedding outside, maybe this weekend we will get lucky and it will be nice (and not raining). Keep your fingers crossed! And just an fyi...for 3 yrs we have planted flox at the front of the gazebo and it never takes off...and finally!! finally we have flox everywhere! don't have a clue what did it (maybe the 3 feet of snow) but I am so grateful... |
It is hard to remember what I started with and how barren it was out there for the first year, I have to go back and look at the old photos of our first weddings out there to see how far we have come. click here to see one of the first weddings performed in the garden in April 2006. There was no gazebo and very few trees, the landscapers had installed just 2 serviceberrys, 6 roses, and 4 small grasses...by May I had the 2 quaking aspens behind the columns and had added 2 magnolias (click here to see May 2006). It has been a long and arduous journey but well worth it, the garden is spectacular and just gets better every year. |
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I will have the garden open as of next Saturday, (the weather this week kept us from getting things done) and it is just gorgeous out there. |
| April 8, 2010: crazy day...the doorbell (which just happens to chime like Big Ben) which I have set to it's loudest so that I can hear it from anywhere in the house, decided to have a meltdown today and ring constantly...had a couple come over to book their wedding and they rang the bell, only it would not stop...I checked to see if it was stuck on the button...finally had to take it off the wall and cut the wires...it was 5 minutes of total chaos, the bell ringing, the dog barking (because the bell was ringing) the phone ringing and I was scrambling to find something to stand on that was tall enough for me to reach the %%^$#% thing! arghhhhhh.... Tomorrow, Phil is going to finish the garden pavilion and we will be ready to open this weekend...3 weeks early! yay... |
| April Fools Day!: What a great day to get wedded...no way to tell if I am really pronouncing you or if I had my fingers crossed and your marriage is null and void...hhehehehe... and you get this wonderful April Fools Marriage Certificate that I designed last year stating that I was only kidding when I told you that you are legally married! Let the fun and games begin! |
| March 31, 2010: got to love this weather...going to be in the high 70's and we are power-washing the parking lot, the gazebo and the arch...I am more than ready to get the garden open and see some plants in bloom! It was a really long winter and hopefully we will be able to open the garden early this year...if the weather holds I think we could open as early as next week or so...just need some of the buds to "pop" and give us some green... |
| March 22, 2010: Had a new section of concrete put in so that the bridal party has an easier time walking to the garden. We are calling it the "Bride-walk" instead of sidewalk...we used to have to give up a parking space so that we could line up the wedding party to walk to the garden, but now, they have a new 3.5 foot wide space to walk through to the garden. The grass is so green this morning, I can hardly wait for things to jump into full bloom! |
And we just did our first wedding with a cat! I mean the couple brought their cat with them...we have had lots of dogs, but this was our first cat... |
| March 16, 2010: Day started off with a bang...was running late, doorbell ringing, wrapped in towel grabbed box from mailperson...had 2 cars waiting already at 9:40. Ran back upstairs, got dressed and the doorbell was ringing again before I could get down the stairs...did a wedding, booked a wedding, bought the new advertising with yellowbook, sold rings, got a twitter account for the business...whew! and all before 11am...we are weddingsrusohio on twitter. |
| March 15, 2010: I am looking for someone mature to help on weekends only, must be able to multi-task, speak in public, be good with people; I need a very well-dressed woman/man who is already ordained or wants to be ordained to perform weddings here. They need to be available EVERY Saturday (and some part-time Friday). If you know someone or want to apply for the position, send me a resume and cover letter. |
| March
14, 2010: Woke
up this morning at 7:30...didn't remember that it was spring ahead time...got
downstairs and And yes, I will perform a wedding on a Sunday, I just charge an extra $200.00 to open the chapel on my day off. And I now have a partner in crime here at the chapel, for those of you who haven't met him yet, the adorable toy poodle is Babar and he is here helping me during the week...he goes to daycare on Saturdays when I am super busy. He just loves everyone and especially children. |
| March 13, 2010: Been getting requests to get this back up, so here it is. Seems people missed being able to see the transition (especially the garden). As you all have seen by now, I have closed on Sunday and Monday recently, I needed to close for the cleaning/maintainence crew to come in and get things done. They have always been here on Mondays, but they had to work around the weddings and it was time to give them and me a day to get things done. You can
still walk in if you absolutely need to, I am here most of the time
catching up on the bookwork, so just give me a call and let me know
you need me...I will be in my jeans and t's, but as long as you don't
care and don't mind people working around you, I am fine with doing
a quick wedding. It was a long winter and I decided that with the weather and the economy both lousy, it would be a good time to have the two big maples in the front removed. (basically, I was tired of the mess they made and wanted to finish my landscaping) Now, I have space to put in some smaller flowering trees that will give you more photo opportunities out front by our little bench. We are working on the garden pavilion now that the weather has gotten nice again, already have a bride who wants to get married out there next Saturday! And I love the wonderful things my brides come up with, this is Ashley (who is being married today) during her rehearsal last night in her Minnie Mouse veil (she got it at Disney World) and I just loved it! (click on the thumb for a larger view) |
turned
on the computer and was getting caught up with the bookkeeping when
I looked at the clock on the screen and it said that it was 9:52...I
totally freaked out! The atomic clocks all said 8:52 and I thought they
were confused...turns out that my computer was wrong..(after I reset
all the clocks and ran around like a mad woman) I have an 11:00 wedding
today and thought that I was going to have to skip breakfast so that
I could get everything ready....I
finally checked the dvr in the kitchen and it had the same time as the
atomic clocks (had originally) so I had to reset everything...