For the girls at Lesner Inn, one of the hardest parts of our jobs is seeing our couples leave on their wedding night. We have been through so much with them and after the main event, we are so sad that we won’t be working with them anymore. Thankfully, we get to see photos and videos from the big day and we love following along through custom hashtags and photographer blogs.  But there is something special about hearing a bride talk about her wedding day so we reached out to Sarah, one of our March 2017 brides, to hear more about the big day from her point of view!

Starting with the age old intro…how did you two meet?

Mike and I actually met at the OneLife gym on VB Boulevard when it opened up, the minute I saw him I swear I knew he would be my husband (and I proceeded to tell all my girlfriends that the cute guy in the black nikes would be mine!) Once he finally got up the courage to ask me out, I found out that he had been calling me his gym wife to his guy friends (before meeting me).. so it was definitely love at first sight!! I love our story and even now at 7 months pregnant with our little guy, we still work out together all the time!

This is the most fun part to hear, how did he propose?

We love to ride bikes together at the oceanfront so one (hot) night in July he took me for a bike ride to the north end… and I could see the ring box in his pocket the whole time!  I was silently freaking out and then he finally said we should pull over for a minute and I knew it was coming! Then he got down on one knee and I pretended of course to be so surprised, it was very sweet!

Did you always have a clear picture of what you wanted your wedding to look like or did you find your vision along the way?

I went back and forth a lot on what my wedding would look like, I always thought I would do something small and intimate and we still had the intimate piece at the Lesner Inn but ended up with about 120 people and it was perfect. Color and theme-wise, I have always wanted a blush, champagne and whimsical wedding.

How long after you got engaged did you start looking for a venue and what made you pick Lesner Inn?

We started looking right away, I wanted our engagement to be a year or less so we moved quickly!  I lived on Shore Drive for a few years and love the area, we plan on moving back there eventually and it just seemed like the perfect fit!  Lesner Inn is the perfect mix of the beach and class, which was perfect for us.

What other vendors helped with your big day and let us know why you loved them : )

Hannah Hildebrandt was my wedding planner and she is AMAZING, hands down the best decision I made with our wedding was choosing her as my planner!  She helped me pick out our vendors, including Kirstyn Marie Jordan (our photographer), Incredible Edibles (bakery), Kelly Gish (our florist), and PaperDolls Design (for all of our invites and paper goods). All of our vendors were so easy to deal with and our vision came together perfectly with the help of Brittany at the Lesner Inn, she is a godsend!  Our engagement and wedding pictures are honestly perfection and we are using Kirstyn again in a few weeks for my maternity pictures! 

What was the hardest part of the wedding planning process?

Honestly, Hannah and Brittany made it so easy, I am also pretty laid-back when it comes to decision making so I wasn’t super OCD about the wedding but we didn’t have much stress over anything.  Towards the end, making sure all the tiny details come together was probably the hardest part.

What was your favorite part of the wedding and why?

The ceremony, hands-down.  We used Ken Lane (Reverend) to do our ceremony and he was just incredible, the whole thing was beautiful and personal and heart-felt.  My Husband’s vows were also so loving truly the sweetest words I’ve ever heard, everyone was in tears, so that was probably my absolute favorite part.

Were there any special little touches that you included to make the day more personal to you?

I loved having our signature drink named after our dog, Winston. We made sure to get some great pictures of him with Kirstyn and put those up at the bar with the drink menu!  Mike and I also opted out of the first look and waited to see each other until I came down the aisle, and this made all the difference in the world to me.  I know there are perks to a first look, but nothing could change the way we felt when we saw each other, his face was priceless and it made me feel like the most special girl in the world! So, if you are debating a first look, I say don’t because the real first look is so special! 

If you had to go back and do it all over again, is there anything that you would change?

I have thought about this a few times and talked with family and friends…and honestly we wouldn’t change a thing. Our wedding was absolutely perfect.

What advice or recommendations would you give to future couples planning their big day?

Use a planner!! Enjoy the process and don’t get hung up on the little things because when you’re walking down the aisle, the little things that didn’t turn out perfectly won’t matter at all! 

Truer words have never been spoken. We find that a lot of our brides comment that having a planner or even a day-of-coordinator helps to make the whole process much smoother. Don’t forget that Lesner Inn offers day of coordination but we also have some great full and partial planning friend-ors that we would love to recommend to you!

Congratulations again to Sarah & Mike and we cannot wait until Baby Sawyer’s debut!

Photos by Kirstyn Marie Photography!