17 years ago today, I married the man of my dreams. After a very brief courtship, (which I told you about in "My Real Life Love Story"), Luis came to New York on a fiance visa. This type of visa stipulated that we get married within 90 days of Luis' arrival in the U.S. or he would have to relinquish the visa and return to Mexico. Even though we hadn't known each other long, Luis and I knew that we were going to be married before he ever even arrived in the states. We discussed what type of wedding to have, as none of his family would be able to attend (since they didn't have visas), 90 days wasn't enough time to plan a wedding in New York, and we didn't want to get married at city hall because we only wanted to get married once, and in a way that would be as special as our relationship. While looking through a bridal magazine, I saw an ad for Disney Fairytale weddings and I told Luis about it. We thought that having a Disney wedding would be perfect for us because it would allow us to have everything that WE wanted in a wedding. AND I was able to plan everything over the phone and fax.
As there were going to be less than ten people at our wedding (including us), we were able to arrange our wedding in an a la carte manner. We chose to have our ceremony in a gazebo, in the rose garden at the Disney Yacht and Beach Club. We wanted to be able to have a first dance (to "I Swear" by All 4 One), have a champagne toast (with Pink Fairytale wedding champagne) and have a wedding cake (German Chocolate.) And with the help of our Disney wedding planner ALL of this was possible. We wanted to take our guests (bridesmaids) Stacy F and Michele Q, (Best man) Russell, his wife Randee and Michele's (now husband) Tony, out to dinner and the photographer recommended that we go to the character buffet at The Grand Floridian, because it was an ideal place for photographs and he reasoned that if you were going to get married at Disney World, you might as well have Mickey and Minnie in your wedding pictures. He was right, our pictures were spectacular and the food was excellent.
One of the benefits of getting married at Disney was how natural it was to walk around in a wedding gown and tux. We were treated like royalty, and at one point a mom came up to us with her son (who couldn't have been more than 7) and she said "He likes you both very much." I think that he thought that we were a prince and princess; and for that night, we sure were.
After dinner we all went to Pleasure Island (Disney's nighttime entertainment complex) and again we were treated like celebrities. Our wedding party never had to wait in line, and we were congratulated and wished well by more people than we ever could have imagined. It was the most magical night of our lives; and everything that we could have hoped for.
The day after our wedding, Michele, Tony and Stacy, joined us at The magic Kingdom. It was the first time that Luis had been to Disney World and the experience was priceless. Luis had told me that he'd seen commercials for Disney World when he was a kid and he'd asked his dad if they could go, and his dad said "probably not." So to have actually been married there, was VERY special for him too. We said goodbye to our friends at the end of the evening and spent the rest of our honeymoon alone. Two weeks after we returned to New York, we hosted a brunch at a Mexican restaurant so that the rest of our friends could celebrate our marriage with us. We played our video, shared our pictures, I threw the bouquet and we had cannoli cake. It was a wonderful way of incorporating our other friends into our jubilation.
17 years ago and it seems like just yesterday to me. I guess it really is true that time flies when you're having fun!
Till next time...
Queen of EVERYTHING
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