Leah & Chris

Elegant Wedding at the Historic Landmark Theater

05/21/2022

Theme: Elegance, classic and timeless

We are so excited to share with you a true example of true love prevails. A huge thank you to Leah for sharing her wedding with us! We truly wish you the absolute best as you start this next chapter of your lives together. Read on to learn all about this elegant wedding fit for the cinema!

The Veil

If you’re wondering about her custom made veil, Leah chose a custom 2 tier veil 30 x 36” in length with a circular cut style. This beautiful veil is trimmed with lace # 30, a very soft leaf pattern. This small pattern is perfect to add just a touch of detail to your veil. We think it was the perfect choice for Leah’s bridal look!

Love Story

From the bride: Chris and I met when he was my attorney, not criminal lol. He was my real estate attorney. I am an attorney as well, but I don’t practice. When I met him I thought he was so handsome and so smart. We were both however in other relationships so we maintained a friendship. After I bought that land I built a house, sold my old house and then bought more land. This was about a year and a half in the making.

By that point we were both single and he asked me out finally. Although I did slightly nudge him lol. When he stopped by my office to have me sign some documents I said to him well I hope this isn’t the last time I’m going to see you. He lost his words, it was adorable. He later texted me that one of his friends had 2 extra VIP tickets to the Zac Brown Band and he asked me to go with him. It was an epic date and probably one of the most expensive dates I have ever been taken on.

Fast forward a year and a half and he asked my parents for permission for my hand in marriage. My father‘s health at the time was not well; he suffered from Parkinson’s disease for 28 years. I was so grateful that Chris got to know him and meet him and further ask him for my hand in marriage. Chris was whisking me away to the Adirondacks to propose when my father passed away. We did not get engaged that day, but instead returned home to be with my family. Chris had planned an amazing engagement with a tram ride to the top of a mountain. He now had to come up with a completely different plan because the cat was out of the bag lol. A few months later he took me to Saratoga where we went on a carriage ride to a covered Bridge and got engaged for real this time. There was champagne, chocolate and roses, it was a true fairytale. I grew up riding horses so that is how he came up with the idea of incorporating them.

Ceremony & Reception Theme

We were engaged for about a year and set our original wedding date for our anniversary on June 20th 2020 at the historic landmark Theatre. My senior ball in high school was there and I fell in love with it and ever since then wanted one day to get married there. Everything was all planned, literally everything. But once again life had other plans for us. Two days after we sent out our invitations on March 14th, 2020, Chris’s eight-year-old daughter, Zoey unexpectedly passed away in her sleep from sudden unexplained death in early childhood. This was absolutely devastating and to top it all off, it was also the beginning of Covid when everything started to shut down. We decided to postpone the celebration.

On Wednesday May 13th, 2020 I contacted the landmark Theatre to see what dates they had available the following year. They told me that they had Saturday, May 15th 2021 available. I called Chris at work and said baby do you wanna get married on Friday, May 15th 2020? This way I had hoped to keep our wedding dates the same. In less than two days I was able to get a dress, pick our rings up, flowers, my uncle as the photographer, my parents best friend the judge to marry us, and marriage certificates! It turns out the town clerks mom had adopted a dog from me. I run a nonprofit dog rescue. So she pulled string and got us our marriage certificate in time! As for the second dress, my friend owns Rebecca‘s bridal boutique where I bought my original dress. She opened up her shop specially for me and I found another dress. I felt like a princess! We then got married Covid style in the rain in a judge’s driveway.

The following year we had to postpone our wedding yet again it was still in the mists of Covid. We had to get yet again a new wedding date. (On a sidenote, I was surprising Chris with a cake topper which now I have three different versions of lol) This time it was going to be May 21st 2022. And nothing was going to stop us now! Or so I thought, life tried to stop us again.

In October 2021 Chris was diagnosed with stage four metastatic colon cancer that was in his liver. He had a section of his colon removed, went through chemo and had liver surgery. Hopefully he has his final liver surgery scheduled for October of this year. He is responding wonderfully to all of the treatment. We were able to time the wedding between treatments and surgery. Ironically our first dance song which we picked out the first time around was nothings going to stop us now. It is very fitting for us.

Bridal Look

The theme of the wedding, my dress and hair were simple elegance. The landmark Theatre is so ornate and beautiful in itself, I wanted to be tastefully simple. My wedding dress which I bought 2 years prior was inspired by being classically beautiful. When I went to have my hair done it was not what I envisioned but I absolutely loved it! I let the stylist do what she thought would look best with my dress and it was amazing.

I could not find a simple yet elegantly beautiful veil to go with my dress. I scoured the Internet and bridal stores. I had envisioned a very specific look in my mind which you were able to create for me! I was so thrilled and happy with the quality and the look of my veil. I wanted something not to distract from me but to complement me. I chose the pattern of leaves along the edges because it matched the leaves on my cake!

Gifts & Favors

After the ceremony at the Landmark Theatre, everybody met us outside and we released butterflies, it was so lovely. We then went inside for a cocktail hour which also included my friend who is a magician! We danced and partied the night away.

Instead of favors, we decided to do a donation to the wolf sanctuary in honor of Chris’s daughter. She absolutely loves wolves. And to the Parkinson’s foundation in memory of my father.

Wedding Playlist

Music while people are being seated:

Vitamin String Quartet

Walk down the aisle, Wedding party

True by Spandau Ballet Vitamin String Quartet version

Walk down the aisle to:

Canon in D (Pachelbel’s Canon) – Cello & Piano

Introduction as married couple:

When I get my hands on you by Bob Dylan, Marcus Mumford

MUST HAVE:

First Dance

Starship – Nothing’s Gonna Stop Us Now

Dedicated to my dad:

James Brown – I Feel Good (One of his favorite songs)

Chubby Checker-The Twist (He and I always used to dance to this at bar and bat mitzvahs, we were the Twist champions)

Earth, Wind & Fire – September (Mom’s request)

Chicago – You’re The Inspiration (Mom’s request)

Bill Haley & His Comets – Rock Around The Clock (Father in law’s request)

Wedding Planning Tips & Tricks

I am definitely not crafty so I did not do any DIY.

We wanted to do a Playbill to go outside the landmark Theatre, but we realized we didn’t have any pictures for it so my friend who volunteers to take all of the photos of our rescue dogs said she would take photos of us! She had never photographed humans before and jokingly said I’ll just have you run around in the field and jump over stuff lol. She did an amazing job and the Playbill’s came out awesome.

My only thing I would’ve changed was that I would not have spent so much money on flowers. They are beautiful but they don’t last and I probably could’ve gotten away with half the amount in each table setting lol. And a great tip is only the top tier of our cake was real! We served delicious sheet cake to our guests and saved a ton of money.

Update

On Monday October 24th Chris had hopefully his final liver surgery. The doctor said that everything she hoped to accomplish during the surgery she was able to and his liver is she believes disease free! Now this doesn’t mean that there still isn’t cancer anywhere else in his body so he will most likely have to do systemic chemo as a precautionary. But the wonderful news is that it is gone from his liver!

They removed about 80% of his liver but the liver grows back! The surgery was very tricky and there are three main arteries that go to the liver. Two of them were impacted by the cancer. This leaves Chris with one remaining artery which is why his surgery took six hours and was so delicate. His recovery to be honest has been quite difficult. He had to have an NG tube and two blood transfusions. He spent a week in the hospital and is recovering now and already back at work! His pain level is pretty good, he is just extremely tired all the time because he is anemic. The blood transfusion Will take about two months for him to build back up his hemoglobin levels. This means that he will be short of breath and get tired easily until then. It is basically like having a constant asthma attack. But his spirits are high and hopefully this is the end of this chapter. I hope our story can inspire and help others.