*o* Crissa & Tim *o* True Disney Style

[epfootballcutie04]

Well, a year and a half later, Im getting around to finally writing one of these things for our wedding!! Ive never really made a trip report, so we'll see how this thing ends up turning out...

I guess I should start out by saying Hi !!! My name is Crissa and I'm 26 years old originally from Minneapolis, MN. I met my Husband, Tim while we were both on the Walt Disney College Program in the Spring of 2009!!

While on the college program, he had a girlfriend back home, so we just remained best friends and spent pretty much every waking hour together! He was photo pass at Magic Kingdom and I had the absolute pleasure of working at my families DVC home resorts, Saratoga Springs and Old Key West at the Front desk!! Some of my fondest memories on the college program include Tim in them such as our College Program Formal...

and simply just playing in the parks....

After the college program, I was devastated but it only took a couple months before Tim and his girlfriend went their separate ways and I made my move... He invited me to visit him in Indianapolis for a party he was having over new years 09-10 and we officially became a couple at midnight on January 1st 2010!! We made a couple trips back and forth from Minneapolis to Indianapolis and got to know families and friends...

and then we decided that I would make the move to Indianapolis to live with him in May 2010!

By December we were engaged and couldn't have been happier!! I knew from the day I met him that we were meant to be together and I was proved to be right!! We celebrated our engagement in January 2011 while we went on a trip to Hawaii with my family and it was amazing!

My mom snapped some engagement pictures for us at a beautiful beach that we found...

We took a really awesome ATV tour through Kauai which had some absolutely breathtaking photo op stops along the way...

and at a luau, we were called up to learn how to Hula since we were newly engaged... so embarrassing but so much fun!!

After that trip, Tim and I sat down and really discussed when and where we wanted to get married.... for me it was ALWAYS a disney wedding but he wasn't so sure about it. It took a good amount of convincing on my end, but he eventually agreed that the wedding pavilion was the place to do it! After numerous phone calls between my mom, us and Disney Weddings... our date was set and our planning session would be shortly underway!

Up Next: Planning Session!

 

[epfootballcutie04]

In August 2010, my mom, Tim and I went down for a VERY QUICK two day trip to Orlando for our planning session!

We stayed at All Star Sports and after we checked in we went straight to Hollywood Studios for some play time with our College program friend, Corinne! It was a nasty rainy day and we were EXHAUSTED from early morning travels, but we still had a blast!

We also ate lunch at one of my favorite restaurants on property... 50s Prime Time Cafe!!

After that, we decided to go back to the hotel because we were too tired to do anything else and we had an early morning wake up call for our planning session the next day!

The following day brought the most INTENSE 5 hours of my life!! Meeting with our wedding planner, Lisa Smith, was fantastic! We talked about EVERYTHING... what my dress looked like, cake tasting, menu tasting, floral decorations, music selections, you name it, we discussed it! IT was so much fun though!!

Our planning session was only supposed to go for 4 hours, but it actually went for 5!! After that, we got changed and ran over to Downtown Disney and met up with our Officiant... Rev. Tony White from "A Beautiful Ceremony". He was awesome. We really liked him. Turns out that he used to live in Indy and knew the exact area that we were from. Small World! It was neat to find that out because it made us feel like we already had a connection with a complete stranger that just so happened to be the guy to marry us in a couple short months!

The planning trip was too fast, too much information and too exhausting... but I wouldn't have traded a single thing about it!

Up next... LEAVING FOR OUR WEDDING!!!

 

[MrsSpratt]

Your story is so sweet, I can't wait for more!

 

[epfootballcutie04]

Well, the day to leave for our wedding vacation had FINALLY COME!!! Tim's mom had been staying with us a few days prior to leaving so after we got ready she gave us one of our wedding gifts so we didn't have to bring it on the plane...

For the record: My black shirt says "Soon To Be Mrs. Paul" and my white one says "Bride" on the back ... The gift was a Snow Globe in the shape of a carriage that played "when you wish upon a star"! So cute!

Flying with my soon to be mother in law was an interesting experience. I always get a kick out of flying with people who rarely fly to see their reactions because I have had the opportunity to fly numerous amounts of time so it doesn't bother me at all. However, she was the type that gets very scared when flying so I felt pretty bad. Needless to say, we were ALL thrilled when we touched down in Orlando!!!

After explaining to her how Magical Express worked and that no, we really didn't need to grab our luggage from baggage claim, we made our way to where the Magical Express busses picked us up... and who did we run into??? MY FAMILY!!!! They had already touched down from their flight from Minnesota !!! They had rented a car though, so we said hello, exchanged hugs and went our own ways, them to get their truck and us to get on magical express where we met up with my BRIDESMAID, Alyssa!!!! That's when I saw it... the most beautiful thing ever...

We soon grabbed our seats and were on our way!!

I was VERY IMPRESSED with myself because I had not cried yet. Normally when going to Disney World I will be water works over everything... hearing the flight attendants welcome us to orlando, seeing little kids with their mickey stuffed animals, boarding magical express, while the video plays on magical express, driving under the disney sign, you name it, i cry happy tears about it... Disney has such a special place in my heart... it just gets to me haha But so far, so good!

So we eventually get to our destination... SARATOGA SPRINGS. My true home away from home... my home resort with DVC and the place that I had spent countless hours working on the Disney College Program! The cast members here and at old key west are the most AMAZING people you will ever meet in your life and I consider them ALL to be family!! My parents had already arrived and were waiting for us by where DME drops off so we all went in to check in together. What do I hear? "WELCOME HOME!!!" *happy tears*

So we get all checked in and head right over to our TREE HOUSE VILLA!! I actually had the extreme honor to be on the opening team of the grand re opening of the tree houses when I was on the college program ANNNNND they just so happened to re open on my BIRTHDAY and so as a birthday present, my parents bought me a night in them for their grand opening so my friends and I could stay there I call the tree houses "my babies" so to have them be a part of my wedding vacation was SUPER SPECIAL to me

Before I knew it, Tim and I had to get ready because that night Tim, my parents and I ate Dinner at the Turf Club. My parents presented us with our wedding gift and my dad gave me a special gift from him... a ring that has his birthstone, my birthstone, my moms birthstone, and the diamond in it was from my grandma's wedding ring, who passed away the morning I graduated high school, and I was really close with. There is also one more spot in it that I can put Tim's birthstone in.

By the time that dinner was over, we were already exhausted but... still had plans with our best man and my maid of honor to go to LA NOUBA!!!!! So we raced back to our rooms, got ready and off we went.... Look how tired we looked before the show started!!...

We had seen the show before and it gets better every time we see it, but my maid of honor and tim's best man had never seen it before and they LOVED it!! I was thrilled that we could treat them to something so awesome!

Up Next: REHEARSAL DAY!

 

[epfootballcutie04]

I had to wake up, once again, very early because I had booked my maid of honor (my sister) and I an appointment for manis and pedis. It had been a couple years since I had been on the college program so I had a good idea how to get around down on Disney Property but I couldn't remember one hundred percent so on our way to the appointment we ended up .... AT EPCOT !!!

We explained to the cast member where we were trying to get to and she directed us how to get out of Epcot and to where we were going! haha... my bad!

The appointment was nice but it wasn't really what I was expecting. I had the original appointment booked at the Spa at Saratoga but then I was informed that they didn't do acrylics there so I was stuck going to another hotel to get my acrylics done and it just wasn't the same atmosphere... but it was still nice.

It was funny because after our appointment was over, we actually saw a Disney Bride getting her portraits taken

While my sister and I were getting our nails done, Tim went with his mom (who LOVES harry potter) and he took her to Universal!! They said they had an AMAZING time!!

We didn't have too much time to get back to the tree houses though because I had to hurry up and get ready for our rehearsal!!

Everyone met up at the Grand Floridian Convention Center and I don't know why, but once I got to the Grand Floridian I had the hardest time finding out where to park. I actually had driven through the security entrance THREE TIMES and Im sure the guard thought i was crazy.

Once we figured out where to go though, we found some people that were already there and waiting for us was my friend from home and her daughter who was our flower girl!! I hadn't seen them since they came to visit me on the college program and the flower girl was only 3 years old when I was on the CP so I didn't know if she would remember me, but she RAN over to me and I just love that little girl so much

The rehearsal was over in a blink of an eye though and when it came time to practice the kiss, our Rev. told us we had to kiss for at least 5 seconds to allow for the photographers to get their pictures. It was awkward with everyone hootin' and hollerin' lol

We kept it very simple for our Rehearsal Dinner and just had a potluck back at our Tree House. Tim's dad cooked and we just hung out. I had to get to bed by at least 9pm because I had a 3pm wake up call on the wedding day so it was nice that we were already in the tree house!

I said my "I love you and you better be at the altar in the morning" speech to Tim and tried my best to fall asleep... yeah that didn't happen. I had been awake since 7am and the clock was quickly approaching 3am and I had gotten NO sleep and here it was time to "wake up" for my Wedding day!!

Up Next: Getting Ready and Pre Ceremony Portraits!

 

[epfootballcutie04]

The big day was here and I was already SO EXCITED to see Tim!! It was the longest that we had been apart while sleeping since the day I moved to Indy like two years before!! I woke up at 3am to get ready for hair and make up to arrive to the tree house at 3:45... yes.... 3:45 IN THE MORNING!!! It was crazy early...

Hair and make up was done by Janet Mednick with Onsite Beauty. Remember how our officiant was from Indy... well, SO WAS SHE!!! Such a small world... *cue annoying song!* She was awesome!

Our Photographers and videographer arrived around 6am. For photography we had Danny Gorman Photography, who was a pro photographer friend of ours from the college program. I DO NOT RECOMMEND HIM WHAT SO EVER... just FYI for future Brides. His photos aren't bad, but his professionalism and attitude and business ethics were AWFUL. It wasn't until after the wedding that we discovered how lucky we were that he even showed up and how lucky we were that we even got any images at all. Anyway, our assistant photographer was also a friend: Katie Ackerman Photography and she is a total sweetheart!

Videography was done by: Orlando Wedding Films. He's AWFUL. Don't book him either. We should have just done everything through Disney. Our wedding video was FINALLY given to us months after it was promised per contract and it was ALWAYS an excuse with him. Once again, not until after the wedding did I realize this was his 2nd business... his first one was shut down due to complaints and legal problems with clients. yikes.

Anyway, our bridal party went to each others tree houses to give us each others wedding gifts...

Tim made me a canvas with our favorite bible verse which was read at the wedding with all of his favorite pictures of us on it...

Tim is a professional photographer so I had ordered him a personalized really nice camera strap that has "i love you 11-5-2011" on one end and his business name on the other...

Our flowers were delivered around 7:45am and they were so pretty!!

and before we knew it it was already time to go wait for the limo to arrive... it was FREEZING outside and the limo was half an hour late coming to get me after doing all of it's runs for the guys and that side of the family...

While I was freezing, Tim was getting his portraits taken at the grand floridian with his groomsmen and family...

and when I arrived, we had to RUSH through my pictures because we only had 20 minutes to get them ALL done!

After pictures, we were rushed to the Wedding Pavilion because I was GETTING MARRIED TO THE LOVE OF MY LIFE <3 ...

Up next... the CEREMONY

 

[CinderALLIE]

Glad you decided to post about your wedding. Can't wait to read more.

That sucks about photographer and videographer.