Sanibel Wedding | Jill + Andy | Florida Wedding Photography

Bacon brought them together….

Their paths never would have crossed had it not been for Match.com and Bacon! Jill’s tag line on Match was “I love Bacon”. Andy was drawn to the fact that Jill was into CrossFit, a sport (Volleyball) and seemed to have a strong personality. His first Match message was “Did you know that if you go to Whole Foods and buy 12 packages of bacon they will give you a case discount?” to which Jill’s response was “Shut Up!” Jill found Andy’s profile intriguing. Even though she didn’t have kids Andy had two boys (Alex and Brendan) that he was obviously very devoted to, which was sweet. He was interested in travel (pictures of Mexico & Colorado), he was active (CrossFit, skiing, throwing the boys in the pool), and his Match username was XfitGeek (Jill has a secret crush on Patrick Stewart, that’s pretty geeky). Their first date was June 6, 2013.

Resistance was Futile…

Jill and Andy’s parents all grew up within 1.5 hours of each other in Western NY so it was incredible that they ended up meeting in Austin!
They both LOVE 80s music. They have seen Motley Crue live in 2014 and Andy got to fist bump Tommy Lee! They have also seen Journey, Warrant, Ratt, Great White, Steelheart, Firehouse and have tickets to Guns N Roses this year!
They both love to travel – both Jill and Andy travel frequently for work and have incorporated vacations into work travel as much as possible. For a while there was a competition on whose company put them up in a nicer hotel!
They are each self-proclaimed Sci Fi geeks – Star Trek (any series), Stargate, Eureka, Warehouse 13, etc. The first movie they saw together was Star Trek: Into Darkness. A typical lazy week night involves watching a few episodes of Sc iFi before bed!
Bacon is a staple for them. It gets incorporated into pretty much any meal!
They worked together to make their backyard THE place to hang out. The boys have many impromptu pool parties and Jill is always prepared to entertain by handing out popsicles, juice boxes and snacks.
Happy hour in the pool with adult drinks for Jill and Andy and teenage beverages for Alex and Brendan has become a “family” tradition ever since the first time Jill came over and hung out with them in the pool.
Their favorite low key evenings early on in dating involved cuddling on the poolside lounger looking at the night sky, naming the constellations, and looking for shooting stars.
Jill LOVES high heels and Andy is happy to indulge her.
They discovered early on they made a great team. Everything from making dinner, planning parties, making the house their home and even tackling doing surprise renovations of the boys’ bedrooms!

A little while later in a city far, far away… He asked the question. She said YES!

December 5, 2014 Andy planned to propose. The week prior they had driven from Texas to New York and back during the boys Thanksgiving break to spend time with family. It was exhausting! Andy had this surprise trip planned the weekend after returning from NY for a while. Jill was not interested. She just wanted to be at home in their bed, not on the road again. She was kind of a whiny traveler (by her own accord)! It was so bad that Andy was to the point that he was ready to ask “Do you want to get engaged or not?” Either way they made it to a breathtaking view of the Golden Gate bridge at 11 pm on December 5th and Andy pulled out a plastic gumball machine ring (Side note: Jill had told him before that she didn’t care if it was a gumball machine ring or a real one, she just wanted to be with him) and asked Jill to marry him. She laughed and said “Are you serious?” Andy responded with “Maybe this ring will do better…”

So they decided to take the plunge!

They chose Captiva Island because in the search for a wedding location Andy wanted somewhere tropical with “palm trees on the beach” and Jill didn’t want to leave the country. However, her family had vacations on Captiva and Sanibel Islands multiple times while growing up and she had fond memories. They checked it out while on vacation with Jill’s family in March of 2015. He was sold! As they began discussing the overall plan they decided to make this a two-week family vacation with a wedding in the middle. They began searching for a home to rent for their vacation/wedding and the minute they stepped onto Otter Banks’ property they knew this was it! It didn’t’ take much convincing to get Jill’s parents to rent the house across the street and beachside allowing for the event to be fairy tale worthy (thanks to all of their amazing vendors!)

While their path hasn’t always been smooth Jill and Andy have made some amazing memories in the three years they have been together. It was really important to them that they incorporated as much of that into their wedding as possible while also making sure that their wedding was a fun event not only for their guests but for themselves too…. You tell us if you think they were successful!