*Wedding photos credit to Meg O’Neill Photography*

Our wedding day began with a 3am alarm. Kaila spent the early morning getting ready while Kirk made coffee and breakfast. The rest of the families didn’t have to meet us at the trailhead until 6:30am but the top for Kaila’s dress required another person so Kaila’s mother was kind enough to get up with us. Besides helping with the dress she was also planning on trying a hairstyle out on Kaila. Unfortunately that didn’t go as planned but it was for the best since the wind was out of control.

When we were ready to head out, we excitedly hopped in the car only to sit and wait for the heater to defrost the windows. Our wedding took place at St. Mary’s Glacier; a 30 minute drive up the road from our cabin and a half mile hike from the trailhead. We met our photographers (officiant included) and hiked up to the lake as dawn was breaking. We changed into our wedding attire in the trees surrounding the lake and did our first look at the lakeshore. After that we were able to transition into photos. Our photographers had scoped out locations to shoot while we were changing so things flowed well and we were able to get a variety of shots in a shorter amount of time than we had planned for. That was perfect since it was about 17 degrees with the crazy wind.

We were all glad to head back down to the parking lot to warm up in our cars for a bit while we waited for the families to arrive. After pee breaks, hair upkeep, and blasting the heat we were ready to head back out when they got there. Everyone was surprised by just how cold it was while we were happy to have the sun this time. The hike up was quicker for us the second time around since we were already warmed up from the first trek (we were also very excited!). Howling wind was still present so everyone was wrapped up in blankets. Our photographer had already determined where we were going to do the ceremony so after a bit of taking in the views we jumped right to it.

The ceremony was short and besides a minor snafu with getting Kirk’s ring on (we blame the cold) it went great. We did some family photos at the lake and decided to wait on champagne. Our photographers sent the families down first and we did a few more photos near the ceremony site before making our way back to the vehicles. Once down, we signed the license, thanked our photographers, and headed to breakfast.

The rest of the afternoon was pretty lazy for us; we opened champagne, took pictures and did a toast, took a steam shower, took a nap, went for a walk and played Cornhole, relaxed in the tub with a bottle of wine, and took another nap. As we were waking up from the second nap we heard a group of people and then Kirk saw his brother and parents walking to their car. When we went into the kitchen/living space we noticed there appeared to be no one in the cabin. Surely they wouldn’t leave without telling us? After verifying our car was the only one left (and no notes were in the kitchen) Kaila started calling her parents. Turned out everyone had gone down to Idaho Springs for Beau Jo’s (the best pizza place outside of Chicago)…without us. On our wedding day.

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After the yummy dinner we played Dixit (a lovely card game like Apples to Apples but with gorgeous pictures instead) and generally relaxed since everyone was leaving relatively early Monday. Except us and Kaila’s sister; our flight was at 5:30pm. We managed to say goodbye to almost everyone the next morning and ate leftovers for breakfast. There were some checkout chores that needed to be done and we needed to go back to Georgetown to file our license. Since we had plenty of time before our flight we headed down to Golden and hiked Dinosaur Ridge for a bit before finding food. Our flight was in a few hours so we headed to the airport, got through security, and headed back home. We got back before 10pm which was definitely better than past midnight like the previous flight, but we still had work in the morning.