Kim and Casey Hogle!

I had the great pleasure of photographing Kim and Casey's wedding at the Newport Covenant Church in Bellevue.  Here is their story in Kim's words!  Photographs by Cory Parris. 

Casey and I met and became best friends in High School. We grew up in Woodinville. Oddly enough, Casey's mom was my sixth grade PE Teacher at Bear Creek Elementary. After graduating High School, Casey and I started dating, but, unfortunately, we went our separate ways in college. The day before I left for college, Casey took me in a Hot Air Balloon ride on a beautiful sunny August day over Woodinville and Snohomish.

 

I went to Washington State University and he attended University of Washington. It was difficult dating long distance, but, after four years, we made it through college. After college, I moved home to Renton with my parents and he lived with his brother in Seattle. The year after college was difficult as well, because we thought once I came home from school we would get to see each other and commuting and work schedules made it tough to spend time together.

 

March 5, 2006 was a stormy Sunday. Casey was scheduled to work and then after work his old High School Teacher had asked for his help at the High School moving some furniture. Casey asked if I would come and meet him at the school to help and then we would head to his parent's house for a warm turkey dinner.

I met Casey at Woodinville High School around 5:00pm. We walked around the school in the opposite direction of the Teacher's office, which confused me, but Casey reassured me that we were meeting him in front by the office. Woodinville High School has two parking lots. One of them is higher and the other, larger parking lot sits below about 100 stairs. He was walking me towards the stairs, explaining to me that there was a memorial service going on for one of the High School Students who had passed away. I began thinking about my best friend in High School who had passed away at 17 to Liver Cancer. Candles were at the top of the 100 stairs. Camera flashes were going off in the distance. As we approached the top of the stairs, looking down on the lower parking lot, I could see the word KIM in big letters. I thought to myself..."Oh, the girl who passed away's name is Kim" As I read on...KIM WILL YOU MARRY ME? was spelled out in over four hundred candles. Each letter was about twenty feet long. It was spectacular...but because I was still thinking there was a funeral.  I was shocked. I turned around to look at Casey and he was on his knee, a my gorgeous ring in his hand, and asking me to marry him. I just stared at him speechless.

Finally, he said, "Ah, Kim...does that mean, 'Yes'?"

"Oh yes!" I replied.

So it was there that we had met in High School that he had proposed to spend the rest of his life with me.

 
I won't go into much detail on the engagement other than, it sucked! Too many decisions, details, family matters, stress, emotion, chaos, and disappointment for not having a stress free engagement. Besides the fact that we hated our engagement of nine grueling months....We would do our wedding day over in a heart beat, everyday if we could. All of the nine dreadful months leading up to our wedding day were well worth it!

 

Our wedding day was full of excitement, emotion, tears, laughter, and joy. We were married at 6:00 on December 29, 2006. The morning sunrise was spectacular. The day was fun and relaxing and although I was so happy...tears would not stop welling in my eyes. We had the most fun entertaining our family and friends and portraying how happy, how in love we were, and will always be. Every decision we made was carefully chosen to make sure that it showed our personality as a couple. I wrote and sang a song to Casey during the Ceremony, our vows were written from our hearts, our introduction was entertaining and meaningful to show how much our wedding party meant to us. Our music was specific to what we liked, we had videos that Casey made for our family and friends, we danced and had the time of our life. We will never forget our wedding day as it was Perfect!

Casey and I were pleased with all of our wedding vendors. Of course, we were very pleased with our photographer, Cory Parris, who did an exceptional job. Grand Event Rentals in Bellevue was awesome in providing us the necessary items to use for our wedding day. Karla Laird was our florist out of Issaquah who did a phenomenal job on our flowers. They looked absolutely beautiful and her prices were very reasonable....she works with whatever budget you give her. Our caterer is a close family friend, Karen Young, who worked previously with Martha Stewart...her specialty is desserts...but the dinner was fantastic. Our DJ was from the church, Chad....he provided all the equipment, music, speakers, lighting...we was so instrumental in making sure things ran smoothly and he did a great job. Meghan Anderson, our coordinator was so valuable...I could not have done any of this without her. She was apart of the church as well. Pastor Greg Asimakoupoulos from Mercer Island Covenant is the most caring, loving, pastor who really took the time to get to know Casey and I. Jill Lewis from Bellevue is where we got our rings and we love Jill. She has the most beautiful jewelry I have ever seen. Kinkos did a great job printing our programs for us.

 

You can see more of Kim and Casey's wedding photographs and hear the song that she sang to Casey here!