Saturday, August 28, 2010

Milner Chapel

Today I had the chance to marry off Dan and Danielle at lovely Milner
Chapel! Milner Chapel is such a great year round venue- cozy and
charming, classic and great in photos! It has a great story (which I
will save for another post).

Patricia and Wayne

I'm about to marry off Patricia and Wayne in their lovely backyard in Coquitlam...

It's the neighbourhood I lived in until age 12. It's fun to come back to my old stomping grounds.

Wednesday, August 25, 2010

What A Great Crowd Adds To A Wedding

I've done a lot of great weddings over the past five years, but I don't know if I've ever had a better crowd than Joe and Cherie's, Sunday afternoon, at the Langley Golf Centre.

Those people were so excited for their couple that they actually applauded the groom when he walked his parents in. Then they applauded the bride as she was walked in by her mom and dad. It wasn't rowdy or crazy, but it was a genuine outpouring of their affection for Joe and Cherie. I loved that.

A great crowd is an underestimated part of the wedding experience.

Happy wedding watchers tell me, as a chaplain, several things: that they feel invested in the couple's life, that they love them, and that they genuinely want them to be happy together. They want to have fun on the wedding day, because they are so full of joy for their couple.

Joe and Cherie's friends and family were excited for them. They spontaneously showed that excitement with their applause, grins, cheers, and, yes, even tears.

I remember when Jenny and I came back down the aisle, lo those many years ago, and our friends and family high-fived us the whole way out. It was awesome, and fun, and we felt very loved. Our photos show people with big, silly smiles on their face: they were genuinely happy for us.

So some free advice to couples: if the people you're inviting aren't going to be that way, why put them on the guest list? Invite the people who will be thrilled to celebrate with you--it will add more to your day than you expect.

Monday, August 23, 2010

Still in Love with Love


Welcome to our blog! Jordan and I started this blog as an addition to our website so we could have a chance to talk a little bit more about what we do, share some of what we love and pass on a few of the great ideas that we get to see.

First, a bit about us-
We got married on June 3rd, 2000 and have an amazing family. We were married young, and our marriage has been amazing! We're passionate about what we do because we love being married ourselves and believe in the idea of two best friends who are deeply in love sharing their lives and having a blast doing it!

We have a great life, our three kids, Indiana 7, Danica 3.5 and Jackson 5 mos keep us busy, crazy and so happy! We both have 'regular' jobs but do weddings as a side business because we really love it.

Jordan and I are both experienced and licensed wedding officiates who have been in the wedding business since 2005. We do weddings in our extra time and we really love it. We believe we have a young, fresh and easygoing approach to weddings and really enjoy meeting and getting to know the couples that we work with. In fact, the novelty of standing up at the front with a bride and groom in front of their family and friends is not lost on us. We still love marriage, we love love and we love sharing in the wedding day. There are still times when we will get a little misty as the groom sees the bride start down the aisle or when the couple gets choked up during their vows. We really consider it an honour to be invited to share in that moment.

In our 5 years we have been a part of some fantastic weddings. We have great stories from our experiences and look forward to sharing some of them here.

Looking forward to having the blog to share a bit more. Feel free to share your ideas or questions and maybe I can include them in a future post! If either Jordan or I have been the officiate for your wedding, would love for you to send me a pic so I can start including those too!

We are booking 2011 now, so if you want some info or to check our availability send me an email weddings@jordanbateman.com and I will get back to you. THANKS!