In case you’re just popping in for the first time: Stu, Rocky and I are currently on the road for one year in our 36-foot fifth wheel, which is pretty cool in itself, but our wedding story is where it’s at! I could write a million stories about our travels so far this year, but a blog post for our wedding story was definitely a must!
First of all: How we got here
We had always talked about doing the full-time RV thing, or taking a “gap year”, but it was always something that was “one day”. Stu had some changes at work in June of 2023. He was coming home grumpy, his days were beginning to drag. He felt he needed change. One Sunday night he received an email from his union about a fly-in job in northern British Columbia, doing one of the world’s largest construction jobs at the time… It must have excited him, because he applied that night, accepted the next day, and was quitting his current job by Tuesday. The plan quickly evolved into us moving out of the house, and into the RV, and all of a sudden that “one day” was here!
So things happened pretty quickly after all this: we put our house up for lease, we found renters for the year, we packed up all of our personal belongings and put them into storage and our RV. By August 20th, 2023, we were on the road! The plan was for Stu to do these fly-in shifts for the remainder of the summer and part of the fall, while we lived in the RV on Vancouver Island, and then once it got cold, head south!
Our Wedding Story
A few weeks before we took off, we made one more crazy decision: we decided to elope! Which would turn our epic adventure into a super epic honeymoon. We had been engaged for years, with no wedding plans in sight (COVID and other things got in the way). When we saw advertising that the beautiful venue, South Cross House, up the road from us was doing micro-weddings, in collaboration with my favourite local photographer, Mary Zita Payne, we just knew it was time.
Our Big Day
We were married a few days before we left, all by ourselves, not even our kids there. We figured it would be the last time we’d be alone, just the two of us, for a very long time… It was all planned by the venue themselves in just three weeks. All we had to do was show up, a relief we very much needed at the time.
The Venue
South Cross House is a stunning, and serene, family homestead in our little hometown of Ennismore, Ontario. We had the whole farmhouse, grounds, pool & pool house, all to ourselves. All we had to do was arrive with our clothes. After the whirlwind of Stu flying in from BC, us packing up the house and tying up all loose ends, it was a luxury to show up to our magical little wedding day with everything taken care of… the food and beverages, the cake, the music, the makeup and hair, everything.
The Vibe
The day itself, was calm, fun, and romantic all at the same time. I got pampered by the ladies upstairs in one of the beautiful and bright bedrooms of the farmhouse. I walked the long, green lawn of the backyard to an arch gorgeously decorated with flowers from down the road, where my soon-to-be-husband waited. We had a short, sweet and informal ceremony, signed our papers under an ancient willow tree, and had our first dance being serenaded by some of my most adored local talent.
We had the most romantic home-cooked meal outside on the porch, surrounded by greenery and peace. There was a delicious, locally-made wedding cake for us to cut and feed to each other (of course – have to keep some tradition), and before the evening came to and end, we snuck in a ride on Stu’s beloved Harley. We cruised down the road to dance in some flower fields, and of course, snap some gorgeous pics!
The big reveal!
On our wedding night, we spent our last quiet night in our home, alone…
The next day, we were right back to business! We still hadn’t told anybody our big secret (other than a FaceTime to Stu’s parents who live on the east coast, and my big kid, who had just moved to Alberta). That night, what we did was, we invited immediate family and a few friends for a “going away dinner” at a local restaurant, and showed up in our wedding attire and surprised the heck out of them with our news. The look on everyone’s faces is something we will never forget.
Watch the video of our big reveal on our Instagram here.
The following weekend, our family threw us a lovely sending-off party at our family cottage the night before we got on the road. There were some teary goodbyes the following morning, but we were off on the biggest adventure of our lives, and as husband and wife!
Follow along to see what we got up to on the road!
