It was a beautiful day for Carmen and William to get married at The Oaks Wedding Venue!
Their Story:
2020 started off great ringing in the new decade at the Passion conference in Atlanta, but then it quickly went down hill from there. My tight-knit school community experienced two tragedies; I went through a break up, and I totaled my brand new car. Yes, this was all before January 31st hit. I jokingly told everyone in my life that my 2020 started in February. Little did I know how prophetic that would be. On February 2nd, I matched with Will on Tinder. Yes, of all places. What can I say? God works in unconventional ways. He was at his brother’s house, and I was at my parents’ trying to sort out everything after my car wreck. After many messages back and forth, we came to find out that we both actually lived in Columbia. I’ll be honest, most of my responses were one word. I honestly don’t know why he continued to give me the time of the day; I know it is hard to believe, but I might have been a tad bit mean. Will likes to say that I was guarded. After texting back and forth most of the day, I finally decided I needed to go to bed. I had to leave in the morning by 5:45 to get to work on time. Despite what it looked like with the one word responses, I was intrigued by him. So, I sent THE text that I honestly feel like starts it all: “The ball is in your court; I’ll be on the road from 5:45 – 7:15ish” He sent back: “I don’t miss.” Fast forward to the next day, and I was leaving my parents for CMS. I was getting my GPS set up when I saw I had a missed call. I thought to myself that there was NO way that missed call was from Will. Yet, it was. I called him back immediately apologizing for my phone going straight to voicemail as my phone was on Do Not Disturb. He said he was thinking I had played him like a fiddle. I felt SO bad. Now, I know that he had planned on calling, but his alarm wasn’t set for 5:45. God had woken him up. Safe to say, He has been writing our love story ever since.
The Proposal:
I knew the proposal had to be coming because I had told Will I wanted a 10 month engagement, and we may or may not have already had a date picked out before we were engaged. I had told him I wanted it to be a surprise, alone, not near any birthdays/holidays, and photographed. Simple. Right? We were going up to my parents Labor Day weekend, and I was pretty sure that’s where he was going to ask me. The dock at my parents’ had meant a lot in our relationship. (It was our railroad trestle, iykyk). It was the perfect place. Earlier in the week, Bess texted in our group chat with the four of us inviting us over for dinner. I loved them, so I asked Will if he was also free for dinner Friday. He was. I was so excited. I remember telling Will: “They are just the sweetest people”. Will mentioned a little later in the week that when he had talked to Michael, they mentioned taking the boat out to see the sunset. Um… yes! Fast forward to Friday, I work all day and decide to stay after school and work up until I had to leave for the Jones’ house. Dinner was at 7:30, so I had plenty of time to get ahead with work stuff. I had thought about getting my nails done, but decided not to. Around 7, Will texted me that he had just gotten to the Jones’ house, and what I was wearing. I sent him a selfie of me in my “One Happy School” t-shirt, and he told me Bess wasn’t wearing a t-shirt. He didn’t want me to feel underdressed. I decided just to roll with it. I got to the house, and Will met me outside. We walked in together, and Michael and Bess were their normal sweet selves– asking how my day was etc for about 10 minutes. Then, they asked if we still wanted to go out on the boat, I was like yes! They sent us down to the dock on our own, and I thought for a second… “Is this about to happen?” but didn’t see the box in any of his pockets. When we got down to the dock, I saw the rose petals and knew. He said some stuff. Addelyn came with the ring. He got on a knee. I said yes.
Vendor Details:
Venue: The Oaks Wedding Venue
Wedding Planner: Timeless Events
Caterer: Boulevard Catering
Wedding Cake: Holly’s Cakes
Florist: AGS Floral
Event Rentals: Tri-County Rentals
Wedding Dress: Dimitra Designs
DJ: Premiere Party Entertainment
