It’s always nerve-racking for me to meet new people. Hands get clammy. Anxiously checking to make sure I am at the right spot that we planned to meet at and at the right time.

“Did I go to the right place?”
“Why did I wear this?”
“What if they changed their mind and didn’t come?”

All those thoughts are of course going through my head before meeting Elaine and Gerard. Although, to be honest, I figured that they were guaranteed to be awesome because they suggested we meet at Pyramid Alehouse. An Alehouse for a first meeting? Sounds like people with awesome taste to me!

When I finally found them they greeted me with smiles and offered me a beer – A beer that unfortunately I couldn’t have as I was on one of my many diets that I like to rotate through. So while I enjoyed my delicious salad (that unfortunately tasted nothing like beer or French fries), I added more awesome points to them for the fact that they wanted to enjoy a beer with me.

Aside from my abstaining from beer, it was one of the best first meetings I had ever been to. But how often do you meet a couple that the groom wants Shaquille O’neal photoshopped into at least one of their wedding photos?

Elaine and Gerard met when Gerard accidentally dialed the wrong number. Fast-forward from that phone call to their wedding day at the Wildwood Acres Resort in Lafayette, which made me laugh so hard at times that my side hurt.

I watched two best friends promise to stand beside each other forever. It was awesome and I took some photos of it happen. Here are a few of them.

Thank you so much to Shelby for coming out to document this with me.