We're gettin' married!! We'd love nothing more than to have our closest friends and family join us for a day of celebrations on George Street (where Jill spent most of her university years), in St. John's, Newfoundland. Feel free to arrive early and be a tourist in Newfoundland. We chose our date for a reason - tons of fun stuff on the go in St. John's this week. Take a look at the Things to Do page for more information.
We met in Redlands through mutual friends/coworkers. It didn't take long before we discovered our mutual interest in having a fun time while tying a few on. A few 'margy parties' later, and we made it official. We became a fun duo who love to travel, throw a good theme party, and critique each other's Python scripts (for the non-geeky folks, these are computer programming scripts). Five years later, we decided we'd like to continue this fun life together and throw the ultimate theme party - a wedding.
Normally, we'd see this type of story as being a little too corny to add... but, Jon deserves some credit here. Short version: Jon proposed in Vittoria, Sicily on November 23, 2016. Long Version: We decided to take a 3 week vacation in Italy for Jill's 30th birthday celebration. Italy is amazing in so many aspects, we absolutely recommend going. One cool thing about going to Italy for us was that Jon has family there. His mother's parents are both from a town named Vittoria which is on the east side of Sicily. We decided to check it out since his mother & aunt still kept in touch with his relatives there. Jon's extended family were incredibly welcoming and we felt so loved even though this was our first time meeting (I should mention that there was a huge language barrier - we knew little Italian, and they knew no English, Google translate got us through). Over the next two days, we ate more food than we ever imagined, brought to see the lovely sights of Vittoria, and met a ton of family members, all of which immediately felt like family. On the last day in Vittoria, we are being driven around by Jon's cousin and his family and we stop to have a quick breakfast before getting on the road. Jill is near dying from eating so much food, so while she is in the bathroom, Jon whips out the ring to show his cousin and explain his plan. They are more than happy to help him out. Next stop on the tour is the San Giovanni church where Jon's grandparents were married. We get out of the car and wait for Gaetano, who is frantically trying to find a parking spot. Jon asks his cousin to take a photo of us in front of the church (seems normal), but then his face is all flushed (Jill's thinkin', what the heck?) and this is where it went down (Jon literally, on one knee). He doesn't get many words out, but Jill gets the gist and manages to even remember the correct hand to put the ring on. Bonus points for Jon: he did it 2 days before she turned 30 and got it on video.