Weddingbee bios

I was born & raised in the small town of Robert, Louisiana.  He grew up in the big city - New Orleans.  Our unlikely meeting led to an even more unlikely courtship & an unexpected proposal.  We love to travel, and have a special place in our hearts for National Parks.  We've been to Grand Canyon National Park, Smoky Mountain National Park, and of course Rocky Mountain National Park, where we are members.  We look forward to our next trip to a new National Park, but our next trip will be out of country to Cancun for our honeymoon.  It will be my first "passport trip" - getting my passport was a highlight of the planning process.  He's been to Cancun several times as a child, so it'll be like having a free tour guide - score!

I love to cook, and especially bake.  He works for a major airline, and I am a Sales Lead for a prominent personal care product company.  We moved to Denver, Colorado about a year ago and couldn't be happier with our decision.  Of course, we both miss our families but since we fly free (gotta love those flight benefits), we go home as much as our work schedules will allow.  

Here we are on the Grand Canyon Railway on our way from Williams, AZ (very cool little town, by the way) to Grand Canyon National Park.  

This was about a year before our engagement.  

Now, we live in Denver with our pets. . . to be fair, I'll list them in order of age.  The patriarch of our animal kingdom is old man Max.  We have no idea what kind of dog he is - mainly because I never did send off that DNA test to find out.  And yes, they really do sell DNA tests to find out what breed your dog is, and we did indeed purchase one. Max is the most docile dog I've ever met.  When Jakob's nephew was 18 months or so, he would climb all over Max, pulling his hair, yanking on his ears - and Max never so much as growled.  He's been with Jakob since he was a pup.  He and his sister, Diogi (pronounced Dee-Oh-Gee) were abandoned in a friend's front yard.  Here he is, in all his lazy glory...

He's a 100 lb baby who is convinced he's a lap dog.  

Next is Montana.  She's a tortoise-shell tabby cat that Jakob found as a little bitty kitten in the parking garage of New Orleans International Airport, where he worked before we moved to Colorado.  She now is pushing 15 pounds.  She was named after the state of Montana, which I love to visit.  

And then, there's the baby of the family, Simba.  He's about 16 months old, by our best guess.  Like all of our pets, he was a rescue, but technically we paid for him.  He was found in a ditch with his mother & siblings.  He's a Catahoula Leopard Dog, the state dog of Louisiana.  Because the dogs are bred for function, not form, it is not a AKC recognized breed.  He's the only one of his litter that looks like he does.  He likes to help me when I'm editing my blog or posting on Weddingbee.  And by "help," I actually mean he uses me as a pillow and whines when I move.  

His brother Brooks lives in the same condo complex as we do.  It was Brooks' "mom" who found the puppies on a trip to Louisiana.  Her friend has been a long-time foster mom for dogs with CAAWS (Capital Area Animal Welfare Society).  CAAWS took in the mom & all of the pups, finding homes for them.  Kim adopted Brooks, and told Jakob the story.  Since he knew I'd wanted a Catahoula puppy since I was little, he got the info & passed it along to me.  I was able to complete the lengthy interview process and adopt Simba before the big move. 

We moved to Colorado with one other pet - BooBoo, a gorgeous seal-point Siamese cat.  He died of leukemia last December.  His story was pretty interesting.  When we lived in New Orleans, he was kind of the "neighborhood cat" - he'd been fixed & declawed, so at one point, he belonged to someone but we had no idea who his owner was.  As we were preparing to evacuate before hurricane Katrina, we realized he was still there, and we were the last ones in the neighborhood.  Everyone else had already left.  There was no way we could leave him behind - we were sure the area would suffer a direct hit and thought he'd be a casualty in the aftermath.  But taking him with us wouldn't be easy.  We had made progress with BooBoo - he'd come close to us, but wouldn't allow us to pick him up - sometimes, we could pet him a bit.  Jakob lured him with some kitty food & managed to grab him.  We put him in the car with Max (we didn't have Montana or Simba at that point) and the two of them got a crash course on dog-cat relations on the long drive out of the city.  BooBoo was with Jakob & me during a difficult time in our lives, and we'll always miss him.  

While on vacation in Estes Park, Colorado, Jakob took me to dinner at Cascades Restaurant at the historic Stanley Hotel, made famous by the mini-series “The Shining,” based on a Stephen King novel. We were seated in an alcove with a wine rack/chiller. We joked about why we ended up in the "kiddie room". Come to find out, he had contacted the people at Cascades and requested romantic, somewhat private table. I remember wishing we were seated nearer the fireplace - I love fireplaces. . . maybe because I was born & raised in south Louisiana and therefore have never had reason to have a fireplace.
The hostess was overly smiley when she seated us. I didn’t find out why until later that night. We were talking about my upcoming visit to my mother. He reminded me to pick up the kennel for the puppy I was getting when I got back home to Metairie.“And you’re going to tell her you’re moving to Denver, right?” Distracted by my glass of Riesling, I responded that I was.“And you’re going to tell her about this?” Confused, I looked at him, then down at the box he held in his hand, then back at him as he uttered four words I honestly didn’t expect to hear at any time in the near future, if ever. . . “Will you marry me?”Of course I said yes. Then it all made sense - the kiddie room, the overly happy hostess, the waitress who alternately hovered and disappeared for obscene amounts of time, even his comment about how I had “no idea” how much this vacation cost. I should have realized something was going on - Jakob is a very practical person, not one to spend money on frivolous things like a cabin on the river with a hot tub and elk in the yard.After the reality of it sank in, my first thought was, “I can’t wait to tell Athena.” Athena is my niece, eight years my junior. She’s one of my best friends, the mother of my gorgeous goddaughter, and now my maid of honor.

"The Ladies" include my Matron of Honor, two bridesmaids, and flower-less flower girl.  

Matron of Honor Athena is my niece and seven years my junior.  Obviously, I've known her since she was born.  I vividly remember when she was about six years old and I decided I'd rather style HER hair than my lifesize Barbie head.  Of course, I ended up burning her with the curling iron, and that was the end of her letting me do her hair.  She wasn't without fault in the hair care department early on either. . . one time she really wanted to brush my very long hair, but was still too young to really grasp the concept of brushing vs. teasing.  She "brushed" my hair into the biggest knotty mess you've ever seen.  It took my mom two days to get all the knots out of my hair - and then I got in trouble because I shouldn't have let her do it!  Now that we're both adults, our hair faux pas are few & far between.  

Bridesmaid Claire & I worked together at BBW in New Orleans.  We kept each other sane (somewhat) during Christmas 2007 while doing night shipment for the company.  We both still work for the company - just in different states.  It's always good to have someone who understands where you're coming from when you're having a stressful day at work, and Claire definitely understands!

Bridesmaid Laura is Jakob's younger sister & only sibling.  When I lived in New Orleans, we spent a lot of time together - that's the great thing about living two blocks away.  Her son was our ring bearer.  I definitely miss seeing them now that I'm in Colorado.  

Flower girl Dakota is my goddaughter & Athena's daughter.  Since she was just a couple of weeks over a year old at the time of the wedding, we opted to not have her carry a flower basket.  I was happy with her just getting down the aisle.  I can't wait to post photos of her - I swear, I've never seen a more photogenic kid!  She can't take a bad picture.