A Wedding Story

Our second winner of the "Crazy Wedding Story" contest is Sarah. This is one of the most memorable wedding stories we've ever heard! (Send us your address and book choice, Sarah!)

My Husband, Matt, and I planned on getting married in our Church in Lodi, Ca on May 11th of 2007. In Northern California, May is a beautiful time to get married, and boy were we excited! We had a guest list of about 250 people. We absolutely could not wait!

After a 10 month engagement (10 months is too long!!), the day was fast approaching. I scrambled to finish all of the last-minute details. I had spent hours, and hours on a slide-show that went through our childhood years, and through our engagement. I had procrastinated a bit, and the night before was trying desperately to burn it to DVD.... When suddenly my computer crashed. I freaked out, and started call every friend I had that knew anything about computers. Sadly, my slide-show was lost forever, and my hard drive fried.

That night I couldn't sleep, and was feeling sick. Friends told me that I had "Wedding Jitters". I figured they were right. I got up the morning of our wedding, and crawled to the bathroom. I was running a 103 degree temperature, and was throwing up. This was not the wedding morning I had had pictured. My bridesmaids and I planned on getting our hair done in Sacramento (a 45 minute drive from our town) and having dinner at The Cheesecake Factory before our 7:30pm wedding. So I stayed in bed as long as I could, drinking tea, and praying.

I was finally feeling better, and met my Bridesmaids at the church. We drove to Sacramento. I still felt sick, but thought I would be ok. So we got to the hair salon in Downtown Sacramento, and everything is going well, and my bridesmaids were looking beautiful, minus one that was running late. That's when I noticed a large group of people around the building next door, followed by about 20 police cars. One of the women from the salon went over to ask what was going on. We just happened to be next to a federal building that had received a suspicious package. The entire block was shut down, and they weren't allowing people to leave--or to come in, as my late bridesmaid found out the hard way.

I panic, and start to feel sick again. I remember thinking "This can not be happening!". I called my Fiance, and told him what was happening. He turned on the news, and the story was on every local channel. I knew then that this was a big deal. After spending hours trapped in the salon, panicking, and getting sick, I went outside to talk to a police officer. we had about 2 1/2 hours until our wedding, and were 45 minutes away from the church, and my bridesmaids were starving. So as I started to talk, my voice started cracking, and before I knew it I was bawling to this police officer that I was going to miss my wedding. He ever-so-graciously made a few calls, and had my bridal party and I escorted out. Praise God! Though I did feel like quite a "Bridezilla" after my little melt-down!

We stop and my bridesmaids grab a quick bite to eat, and head back to the church to get ready. As we're driving back, I get a call from my Fiance. "Um, I'm at the barber, and my car won't start". Thank goodness one of his Groomsmen just happened to be a few blocks away, and jump started his car... whew!

The wedding was beautiful. Everything I dreamed of, and our Pastor joked about "the wedding that almost never came to be" (referring to the bomb scare), and everyone had a nice laugh. We stayed at the church to finish our pictures, and were the last ones to leave. We were driving to the reception in my Father-in-law's 1977 Corvette. We got in and it wouldn't start. Matt and I couldn't help but laugh! It had been a crazy day... We tried calling everyone, but they had turned their cell phones off for the wedding. Finally, one of our attendants called us, and asked where we were. They came and picked us up... we were an hour late to our own reception!

The reception was lovely. A dessert bar, with chocolate fountain. I was still feeling sick, and so I didn't get to eat anything, but I was ok with that! We left the reception, and got to the nicest hotel in Lodi, which was a gift from my in-laws. There had been a mix-up, and they didn't have a room for us. The hotel worked it out, and after two hours of waiting(!), we were in our room, and we were both starving to death. We drove to Jack In The Box, got food, and headed back to the hotel. We ate, and fell asleep... ha ha. Definitely not what we had imagined! I made a visit to the ER before we left for our Honeymoon, and it turned out I had a double ear infection...

It's been two years, and we laugh about the day all the time! I must say, it took me a while to be able to laugh... We're just glad to be married, and couldn't be happier! Although one day I would like to renew my vows, on a beach, and far away from any government buildings.